ICOs

ICOs ARE HOT. How about that for a revolutionary statement? We all know that. BUT, they are not quite as hot as several months ago. Why you ask? Well, since the ICO market caught the eye of those pesky regulators, there has been a little bit of apprehension (like, I don't think I'd like jail) that the unregulated market could see some regulation......and a crackdown. Also, China banned them in September and with hedge funds only in "for the flip" things needed to tighten up. Good news though. The ICOs are getting better quality and are, in fact, becoming more regulator-compliant (or, anticipating being compliant). We at FintekNews see tons of new ICOs coming to us and even we (oh yes, we turn down dollars) only pick the best ones to present our readers. What does all this mean? It means the ICO format is maturing and becoming an accepted form of capital raising. YES! We are strong proponents.

(Bill Taylor/CEO)


"ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings) are one of the hottest topics of the year because it’s an easy way to raise cash and it’s largely unregulated. Even last night at Red Bar + Restaurant, a rooftop bar at the International Finance Center in Hong Kong, I heard chatter of different upcoming ICOs to invest in. Then there’s Twitter where the conversation literally never stops amidst the latest rumors, panics, cryptocurrency news, and blockchain projects...

...Over $3.5 billion dollars have been raised to date via ICOs. In 2017 alone, $3.2 billion was crowdsourced. Top projects like Filecoin ($262M), Tezos ($232M), EOS ($180M), and Bancor ($154M) are taking the lion’s share of the funding. Raising $1-10M as a small startup just getting off the ground becomes very achievable.

It was a red hot summer with $462M raised in June, $575M in July, and the peak was reached in September with a whopping $663M of ICO funding.

Coin offerings only started to cool after September 4th, the day the People’s Bank of China placed a ban on ICOs. In fear of upcoming regulations, only $516M was raised in October and so far $486M in November. ICOs are still operating in a legal gray area. However, the industry is moving fast to develop standards for a compliant framework for token sales. Projects like the SAFT (Simple Agreement for Future Tokens) help navigate U.S. laws..."

Full Story published November 27, By Sherman Lee at Forbes.com

“Three Reasons Why The ICO Market Is Cooling Down, But Crypto And Blockchain Are Here To Stay”