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Part 3: Ossi Ketola on Launching Counter-Strike Skin Gambling Site at 18 After Getting Scammed
Part 1: Billionaire Ossi Ketola: I Made $10K a Month in Runescape at 13 Years Old
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Ossi Ketola sits down with Vlad to explain how Valve’s crackdown on Counter-Strike skin gambling reshaped the entire marketplace—and nearly wiped him out. Ketola breaks down how U.S. legal pressure pushed Valve to ban trading bots used by gambling sites, forcing competitors to shut down or pivot into crypto gambling. He details how Empire survived by building a difficult peer-to-peer trading system that connected users directly, creating what he describes as a near-monopoly in the space.
Ketola also opens up about the financial pressure behind the scenes: a crypto-heavy portfolio that fell from nearly $20 million to about $2 million during the Bitcoin crash, while his businesses were burning roughly $600,000 a month. From “suicide bots” to liquidity problems and the risks of holding wealth in crypto, this conversation offers a rare look inside Counter-Strike skins, online gambling, and high-stakes entrepreneurship.
