The 10 Largest ICO Fund Raises: Eye-Opening Successes, Controversies and Lessons to Be Learnt
Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) are a great time to invest in new projects, as they are set at reasonable low prices prior to reaching the markets. This being said, let’s take a look at some of the successes, controversies and lessons traders can learn from the top 10 ICOs. This is will one to identify the strong from the poor projects and what to watch out for prior to making large investments.
Petro (PTR) – 5 billion
Petro has raised the most money in its ICO stages compared to the others that will appear on this list. In addition, it has been the most controversial to date. Petro was created by the Venezuelan government in early February 2018.
The controversies tied to this ICO is not necessarily on the project, but the country and the political stance itself, as Venezuela has been in the worst economic crisis for some time now. This raises the question of who actually invested in the project. It has been reported that Russian officials are the ones who helped Petro lift off. Furthermore, the US government has banned its citizens from trading it, while Venezuela’s lawmaking bodies have declared Petro as illegal as well.
EOS – 2.5 billion
EOS was created in the hopes of improving a better blockchain platform for decentralized applications. The project combines both the security feature attached to BTC and the computing power of ETH. Many people have invested in its ICO due its scalability and ease of use, which are two features many have failed to incorporate.
Unfortunately, with any success comes controversies and EOS was troubled because of its ICO structure. The ICO structure is said to have used a continuous distribution model over a one-year period. This had many assume that the approach was mainly done to drive speculation and get investors budding heads against each other.
Telegram (GRAM) – 1.7 billion
Telegram is a social networking app that has grown exponentially and has reached over 100 nations. The approach taken by Telegram in raising funds for GRAM coin is commendable, as it is one of the only projects known to have accredited and sound investors in the US. So, how much can one expect to invest in a GRAM coin? Outsiders can expect it to cost them $20 million, whereas friends can get hold of one for $500,000 each. This rises a great concern, as the distribution appears to be centralized. This not only limits equal access for everyone, but it seems to promote the notion that the wealthy only can get a coin.
Dragon (DRG) – 320 million
Dragon is unique because it is backed up by real-life, physical asset, a floating casino. This means that those who are holding DRG coins will be able to make real-life use when the new casino is built.
The casino is said to be built in Macau, allowing the country to experience a whole new perspective for its gambling economy, which is said to be 20 times that of Las Vegas’ gambling sector. When considering its ICO, the project stated that 20% of the funds raised would go towards getting the construction of the casino started. The remaining 80% is said to be paid by the Norwegian government. Of all the controversies Dragon faced, its recent connection to the scandal surrounding Cambridge Analytica had many questioning the project.
Huobi (HT) – 300 million
Huobi is one of the top five exchanges known today. Due to other exchanges who had gained popularity through their own native tokens, Huobi also launched its own called the HT. Instead of introducing the ICO to the public, Huobi only gave purchasing access to the user active base. What got many attracted to this respective coin is the users’ ability to use it as a utility token on the Huobi trading platform, which results in much lower transaction fees.
Hdac (DAC) – 258 million
Hdac is notably the first every IoT contract and payment platform that makes its services possible through the use of blockchain technology. Hyundai, South Korean car manufacturer has been supporting this project from its start, which shows the reason why it was the only region to have given large support compared to others.
Many were disappointed with the fact that Hdac failed to show how it is different, especially from IOTA, its main competitor within the industry. Another fact that surprised many is that Hdac only sold 7% of its total supply during ICO. This might be problematic in the long run due to the rampant inflation upon its release.
Filecoin (FIL) – 257 million
Filecoin was created with the intentions of providing users with a decentralized file storage solution that will allow users purchase extra storage using the FIL token. Its ICO was launched September 2017 and was known the most successful in that time. Unfortunately, like Telegram, Filecoin focused more on accredited investors, as opposed to making it available to everyone of all asset holdings. More as to whether FIL will continue to gain value is too soon to tell, and it will be an interesting journey.
Tezos (XTZ) – 238 million
Tezos was favored by many because of its promise of creating a new built-in consensus algorithm. Most importantly, it was strongly backed by capitalist, Tim Drape from Silicon Valley. The ambitious project goal behind Tezos was what drove its funds outrageously. Unfortunately, its co-founders, Kathleen and Arthur Breitman discovered that the Tezos fund manager, Gevers, gave himself a $1.5 million bonus without consulting with other members. This not only led to a lawsuit, but the anticipation since the ICO is said to have reduced drastically.
The DAO (DAO) – 168 million
DAO, Decentralized Autonomous Organization, launches its ICO in May 2016. A lot of traders were anticipating its launch as it was a project that solely focused on creating a decentralized venture capital fund at the time. Ultimately, the goal was to create a voting system that would allow the community to make crucial decisions regarding to how crypto project fund managers should distribute raised funds.
The entirety of this project, according to the members of DAO seemed to be the most decentralized possible, but unfortunately, a major hack after the IC) resulted in a loss of 3.6 million ETH, which is equivalent to 33% of the entire funds raised. Because the team was unable to recover the loss, a fork had to be in place to reverse it. Therefore, the network became two, Ethereum and Ethereum Classic.
Another controversy that was faced by the DAO tokens is the continuous legal battle against US Security and Exchanges Commission. The ruling deemed DAO tokens as possible violations of national securities laws.
Sirin Labs (SRN) – 158 million
Sirin Labs and Foxconn has been working together to create a blockchain mobile phone called Finney, which might be hitting retail stores for $1000. The project was created to ensure that users can pre-order Finney using SRN tokens. Instead of using centralized apps like Google Play or the Apple App Store, this project will allow users to download and use dapps directly from their mobile phones. In addition to the blockchain mobile phone, Sirin Labs has also put in efforts to create a software that would allow users to convert ERC20 tokens via Finney. Clearly, user adoption is a major concern that Sirin Labs has placed importance on and the steps taken on the team’s part is very apparent.
All of these ICOs have raised largest funds to date. While some grew into popularity due to controversy, many have achieved success through the strong projects that had many waiting for its arrival. This should give traders an idea as to what to look into prior to investing in ICOs
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Topic: Top 10 ICOs by fund raising (Read 3364 times)