Of the 10 largest projects launched during the initial coin offering (ICO) era, three are now inactive or suspended, while most of the rest are struggling to find relevance.
A study of companies that achieved great success during the ICO craze found that raising millions of dollars doesn’t solve all problems and can sometimes make things worse.
EOS
At the height of the ICO era in 2017, Brendan Blumer and Dan Larimer proposed EOS, a new, ultra-fast blockchain that would provide both vertical and horizontal scaling for decentralized applications.
Block.one, the company that manages EOS, completed a year-long ICO in 2018, raising a whopping $4.2 billion. It remains the largest token sale of all time.
Block.one and EOS didn’t take the crypto world by storm as expected. Instead, the company sidetracked into projects that had nothing to do with its core mission. A centralized exchange called Bullish was launched, and a social media platform called Voice raised $180 million in capital.
Perhaps Block.one’s multi-billion dollar extravagance took their focus away. In 2021, the EOS community created the EOS Network Foundation to support the project’s growth independently of Block.one.
In May 2024, the EOS Network Foundation announced a new token model, eliminating inflationary token economics and introducing a fixed supply model with a maximum supply of 2.1 billion tokens.
EOS (EOS) has a market cap of $770 million and is trading at $0.52 as of this writing on August 23, down 97.7% from its all-time high of $22.71 in April 2018.
Status: Activated.
Telegram Open Network
Russian brothers Pavel and Nikolai Durov had big plans for the Telegram Open Network (TON). If they had come to fruition, the network and its native Toncoin (TON) would have supported messaging, file sharing, and anonymization layers on the network.
While the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has allowed other blockchain projects to continue after paying fines, it has been less lenient with TON.
After raising $1.7 billion, the SEC banned TON from issuing tokens and ordered Telegram to return the money to investors. It also imposed an $18.5 million fine.
The Durov brothers were not so easily discouraged. They created “The Open Network” and launched it with many of the same features and functionality that were initially proposed for the Telegram Open Network.
Later, developers independently of Telegram launched the TONCOIN currency without any instructions from Telegram.
Status: Reborn and active.
thesis
At first, it seemed like Tezos was destined for something big. Led by American husband-and-wife team Arthur and Kathleen Breitman, Tezos offered a fresh and compelling story that captured the imagination of cryptocurrency investors.
The idea? To create a “self-amending” cryptocurrency that allows stakeholders to influence the future direction of the Tezos blockchain. In theory, this would allow Tezos to do whatever users want it to do. It would also eliminate the specter of hard forks, since whenever disagreements arise, issues can be resolved through democratic voting.
In July 2017, Tezos broke the crowdfunding record by raising $232 million in Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) in a token sale. Expectations were high on all fronts, but the trouble was only just beginning.
Shortly after the funding was raised, a feud arose between the Brightmans and Tezos Foundation Chairman Johann Gevers.
Progress on the “democratic” blockchain stalled as C-level executives became divided. Gevers was persuaded to step down from the Tezos Foundation in February 2018, but by then the significant momentum and goodwill of the community had disappeared.
Adding to Tezos’ misery, the SEC soon called in the unregistered securities offering, which was followed by a class action lawsuit.
Tezos has faded from the public consciousness due to legal battles, drama, internal conflicts, and frustrating delays. But the project lives on.
Today, Tezos (XTZ) has a market cap of $698 million. The token price is $0.70, down 92% from its all-time high of $9.12 in October 2021.
Tezos price chart all time. Source: CoinMarketCap
In June 2024, the company released an updated roadmap, “Tezos X,” promising faster blocks and scaling through “smart rollups.”
Status: Activated.
Filecoin
Filecoin is a decentralized storage project that raised $233 million in 2017. The hype has long since died down, but the project continues to operate as advertised, providing file hosting services.
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Decentralized physical infrastructure networks (DePINs) like Filecoin have been one of the popular narrative trends for 2024. In March, the price of Filecoin (FIL) rose to $11.46 but failed to maintain this high.
FIL currently has a market cap of $2.2 billion and a token price of $3.90, down 98.4% from its all-time high of $236.84 in April 2021.
Status: Activated.
Dragon Coin
In 2018, Dragon Inc. launched an ICO for Dragon Coin (DRG), a gambling token and payment system for the Asian online casino market. Oddly enough, there were also plans to build a “Chinese Cultural City” in Cambodia.
The ICO was a huge success, raising $320 million. A month later, it was revealed that the project was linked to Wan Kuok-koi, the head of Macau’s 14K Triad. Wan was previously sentenced to 13 years in prison for illegal gambling, usury, and criminal association.
Wan Quoc Koi (center) and his colleague Chen Huy Min (left) with the Cambodian Prime Minister’s Security Commander (right). Source: China-Cambodia Monitor
Dragon Coin’s connection to the Thai film industry was revealed when actor Jiratpisit Jaravijit (often referred to as “Boom”) was arrested after ICO funds were found in his bank account.
Jiratpisit may have believed he was on a fast track to making easy money, but this particular ICO project has left everyone with a huge slap in the face.
Status: Deceased.
HDAC
In December 2017, Hyundai Digital Asset, a subsidiary of the South Korean automaker, announced its entry into the blockchain space through a $258 million ICO.
HDAC had great plans for enterprise blockchain, IoT, and automotive production lines. They would also connect blockchains and support esports games.
The project appears to still be active in 2020, but at some point it stopped updating and has not been seen since. While other ICO projects have crashed and burned, HDAC has simply disappeared.
Status: Missing, presumed dead.
Sirin Labs
December 2017 was a busy month for ICOs, with Swiss-Israeli Sirin Labs also completing a $157.9 million fundraising round that month.
Sirin Labs set out to create an affordable blockchain phone, and less than a year later, they released their latest model, the Finney.
Named after blockchain pioneer and Satoshi candidate Hal Finney, Finney launched in November 2018 at $1,000.
The Finney wasn’t cheap, but it was still a better value than Sirin Labs’ previous pre-ICO phone, the Solarin, which cost a whopping $16,000.
Sirin Labs had an interesting concept and a product that actually worked, but Finney ultimately failed to gain traction in the competitive mobile phone sector.
Status: Deceased.
banking
In June 2017, Bancor raised $153 million, making it one of the largest and most successful ICOs of all time.
The company is still active today, with its flagship project being Carbon, a decentralized exchange for on-chain trading.
On July 8, 2019, Bancor restricted US customers from its platform, citing a lack of regulatory clarity. In February 2021, this decision appeared to be prudent after a US judge dismissed a lawsuit against Bancor for lack of personal jurisdiction.
Bancor (BNT) has a market cap of $63 million and is trading at $0.50 at the time of writing, down 95% from its all-time high of $10.72 in January 2018.
Status: Activated.
banker
Bankera, an alternative to traditional bank accounts, completed its ICO funding round in February 2018. The payment service provider raised a significant sum of $153 million.
Bankera (BNK) was originally launched on the ERC-223 token standard, but this decision did not work out as expected. In February 2022, the company announced that it would be launching a new Bankera token on the more widely accepted ERC-20 standard.
Sometimes being a pioneer doesn’t pay off. Etherscan reveals that BNK’s current market cap is just $700,000. BNK tokens are trading at $0.07.
Status: Almost active.
Polka Dot
Rounding out the list is Polkadot, a project founded by Gavin Wood, one of the founders of Ethereum.
In October 2017, Polkadot’s ICO raised $145 million and promised to bring horizontal scaling to the industry through parachain technology. Polkadot acts as a base layer on which other blockchains, known as parachains, are built.
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In May 2024, Polkadot reached an all-time high of 514,000 daily active addresses, according to a Messari report, up 48% quarter-on-quarter and 192% over the past six months.
Bottom line: Polkadot continues to grow, unlike many of its ICO competitors.
Polkadot (DOT) is an inflationary token that is currently trading at $4.65, down 91.5% from its all-time high of $54.98 in November 2021. It has a market cap of $6.5 billion.
Status: Activated.