I mean like 98% of the zoosadists listed here are from the US and other first-world nations (especially on the west coast, what the fuck is happening to California) but I get the sentiment.
There have actually been a huge upswing of groups dedicated to animal welfare from China, the middle east, Russia, and other countries who are characterized as less sympathetic towards animals. A lot of these groups have taken to posting their rescue and recuperation videos on Youtube for ad revenue as an alternative to donation money or government funding (since a lot of these countries might not have any sort of political or social incentive to provide financial support for such groups). My guess is that this guy has seen those videos (along with videos from other independent animal rescuers, for example Robin Sepult from Russia) and wants a slice of ad revenue, so found a stray kitten and is now using it in a similar fashion in order to gain views (and the subsequent financial boon from that).
We saw something similar with the Elsagate thing; people were creating toy videos but someone figured out that anything with Elsa and Spiderman in it would get the attention of children, and a lot of the creepy escalation regarding the content was largely just a way for the individuals making these videos to 'stand out' compared to the thousands of other videos of the same type.
Animal videos have the same effect, but it's audience is much broader. Kids watch animal videos, but so do adults and probably your nana. This means that they can be incredibly lucrative for someone who wants to exploit them for financial gain. This guy might've just started with a plan to pretend to find a neglected kitten to 'rescue' him, but realized that the more mistreated the kitten was the more invested his audience became in it's recovery (and more views from people just finding his channel), and that people were only really interested in the initial discovery video rather than the recovery or care involved.
It's still an abominable practice, but I've been kind of been expecting it over the years. Despite the fact that people on the internet get vitriolic and back-bitey about how people care for their animals (vegan pet owners screaming at people for giving their dogs meat, dog owners screaming at other dog owners for feeding their dogs chicken instead of veal, etc.) that could actually just generate more views. For someone who doesn't give a shit, it's a very easy system to exploit by simply jumping accounts once outed as an animal abuser, especially if you aren't showing your face (which most of these people don't).