The Hottest, Largest-Ever Cryptocurrency ICO Mindblower

But regulators are waking up.

Block.one, a software startup registered in the Cayman Islands and lacking a central office, has accomplished an astounding feat: So far, it has extracted $700 million in real money from the global public by selling tokens, called EOS, in an initial coin offering. It is by far the largest ICO ever.

An ICO is similar to an IPO, but here buyers got nothing other than the digital tokens – no ownership in the company (unlike what an IPO offers), no promises of any kind, no participation in anything, not even any fake promises of free future products. No matter how awesome and world-changing the blockchain platform or whatever the company might be developing might turn out to be, it won’t be connected to the tokens.

The purchase agreement that buyers in the ICO must sign states this very clearly and explicitly:

The EOS Tokens do not have any rights, uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities and features, express or implied, including, without limitation, any uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities and features on the EOS Platform.

By comparison, with an IPO, investors actually end up with shares in the company. They become part-owners of the company.

The only thing buyers in this ICO got was the hope that the price of the token, given the current cryptocurrency mania, would surge by thousands of percent in the shortest time span – on the principle that the less people get, the more they’re willing to pay for it, and if they got nothing at all, they’d be willing to pay the most. Those hopes have been realized.

The price of the token has skyrocketed, though prices vary around the globe, depending on the exchange where EOS is traded. At the moment I’m writing this, on the top 10 exchanges by EOS volume, prices range from $9.67 at Bithumb to $8.54 at Binance.

In mid-October, the price was still in the 50-cent range. So to people who bought at the time, it doesn’t matter that they own not even one iota of the company or its world-changing technology platform or whatever because since mid-October the price has multiplied by 19. That’s all that matters (via Coinmarketcap.com):

To pull off the mega-ICO, block.one “made a public relations splash, hosting numerous informational sessions, sponsoring post-conference receptions, giving out free t-shirts and even advertising on a Times Square jumbotron,” Coindesk observed. Its executives “have spoken at myriad conferences and met colleagues and potential clients at “meetups” in cities like London, Amsterdam, Singapore and New York,” the Wall Street Journal observed.

The sale of EOS has started in late June. And it’s not finished yet. Every day, block.com sells two million tokens via an auction process. According to Brock Pierce, a co-founder of block.com cited by the Wall Street Journal, the company plans to keep the ICO going until next June to raise “well north of” $1 billion.

But even at $700 million raised so far, this ICO is leagues ahead of the prior records:

  • The second largest ICO, Filecoin, raised $262 million from August 10 to September 7, which broke the all-time record for ICO funding at the time.
  • The third largest ICO, Tezos, raised $232. It is now embroiled in lawsuits, controversy, and allegations of US securities laws violations and investor fraud.

The most recent class-action lawsuit, filed in the Tezos case a few days ago, stated:

In sum, Defendants capitalized on the recent enthusiasm for blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies to raise funds through the ICO, illegally sold unqualified and unregistered securities, used a Swiss-based entity in an unsuccessful attempt to evade U.S. securities laws, and are now admittedly engaged in the conversion, selling, and possible dissipation of the proceeds that they collected from the Class through their unregistered offering.

Practically anyone can sell tokens in an ICO. So far in 2017, 165 companies have raised more than $4 billion via ICOs, up from $226 million in 2016. Often, companies promise investors something of perceived value for their money, such as something for free down the road, other than ownership. It’s really more like a donation. The main thing is the digital token that can be traded for instant riches if enough buyers can be dragged out of the woods.

Regulators are just now beginning to wake up. A week ago, the SEC ruled Munchee’s $15-million token sale illegal and halted it. SEC Chairman Jay Clayton, still rubbing his eyes from having slept through much of the mania so far, warned “main street investors”:

The world’s social media platforms and financial markets are abuzz about cryptocurrencies and “initial coin offerings” (ICOs). There are tales of fortunes made and dreamed to be made. We are hearing the familiar refrain, “this time is different.”

Since the SEC started issuing warnings about ICOs in June, block.one has closed its ICO to residents in the US. China too cracked down recently on ICOs, and block.one also closed its ICO to residents of China. But cryptocurrencies are transnational, exchanges are everywhere, and people in China and the US who want to buy into the ICO can probably figure out how to do it.

Oh, and over the time that it took me to write this, EOS spiked another 23.8% on Bithumb, to $11.97. So it really doesn’t matter that it doesn’t convey any kind of ownership of the company or anything else, as long as it continues to surge exponentially forever.

Bitcoin takes over the media, in ten practically funny screenshots. Read… Peak Bitcoin Media-Mania Yet?

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  86 comments for “The Hottest, Largest-Ever Cryptocurrency ICO Mindblower

  1. Alister says:

    I am keeping my powder dry and waiting for Tulipcoin…..then I will jump in and become amazingly rich in crap-o-coin….

    • cdr says:

      Gold nuts must be fuming. Gold’s price is stuck in the mud, yet they say it’s the only true money. Bitcoin and other cryptos are pricing into the stratosphere and beyond. And you can actually spend it. Kind of like supercharged fiat. Can’t stop laughing.

      Since gold is holding its value against fiat quite well, I guess that implies fiat is the other true money. Or maybe cryptos are really true money and gold is fiat. Can’t stop laughing.

      Also, as wondered previously, why do sellers of gold want fiat in exchange for gold? Why will crypto millionaires accept fiat for bitcoin? Hint — fiat is the only true money.

      • cdr says:

        Pin … meet Bubble. You two talk for a while, then let nature take over. Take your time. Bubble is still eating.

      • RD Blakeslee says:

        “true” = contemporaneously accepted. That has always changed in the past, except for “precious” metals, which only fluctuate in fashionability.

      • Nick Kelly says:

        We’ve heard this song. There is another verse: Why do buyers of gold want gold in exchange for fiat?

        The ‘fiat’ (literal meaning ‘command’) is only as good as the authority commanding it. There are thousands of extinct fiat ‘used to be currencies’ and a whole bunch of dubious ones right now.

        Some years back before German reunification some poor forex clerk found this out the hard way. Someone came in to exchange a lot of West German marks. Clerk looks up the exchange and pays the guy in $US.

        They were German marks alright, but they were Reichmarks, Germany’s currency before 1945. They were worthless because the issuer of the fiat no longer existed.

        The RM had become worthless outside Germany and her conquests long before this. Germany could not buy oil with RM but of course could buy it with gold. There is a roomful of good reading about the efforts of the conquered to keep their gold away from the Germans, especially those of the Norwegians.

        An amusing fiat among the numerous scrips that Japan issued at the time were notes for the soon to be Occupied West Coast of North America.
        Knowledgeable Japanese thought these ‘useful as spills for lighting dream pipes’.

        When defeated Japan was faced with reintroducing the yen, a helping hand was lent by Emperor Hirohito who made available
        as backing tons of gold that had been hidden in Tokyo Bay.

        I am not a ‘gold bug’; Japan TODAY might need no gold,such is the strength of her fiat.

        Canada is a real odd ball re: gold reserves. It has almost none. China is always accumulating gold. Trying to dethrone the US$?
        Whether to move in or out of gold or a fiat is dependent on the situation, including, obviously, WHICH fiat.

        There is no hard and fast mantra covering all bases.

      • Not sure about that, I do know that I want to be accepting gold in payment for goods and services and not the other way around. If you have to trade gold for bread, you are the loser.

        • cdr says:

          What good is gold if you never use it? An end table has more practical value. Hoarding gold in exchange for fiat or anything else is still hoarding. You take a metal with investment value and turn it into a doorstop or less. Images of Duck McScrooge appear to me from this.

          What do you tell your friends … I could live an interesting life, eat better, and live better but that would mean I would have to stop hoarding gold.

          At least you can shop on Overstock with bitcoin, I think.

          I would rather have fiat so I can pi** some away when the mood strikes. Since gold has parity with cash, cash is as good as gold. Actually better since it’s accepted in more places.

          Cryptos are computer tulips.

        • Robert says:

          TO CDR ( No reply button available )

          Quotes from your post :
          “What good is gold if you never use it?”

          “Hoarding gold in exchange for fiat or anything else is still hoarding.”

          “. . . and live better but that would mean I would have to stop hoarding gold.”

          First of all, what good is Fire Insurance on your house if you never use it ? Really ? Gold is, for me, portfolio insurance. Ask any Venezuelan what they think of that.

          Secondly, “hoarding” is a value judgement and not a proper description. What is “hoarding” to one might very well be a proper level of prudent “saving” to another.

          In today’s spendthrift economy, where half of all people cannot lay their hands on $400.00 for an emergency car repair, prudent savers like myself are those whom FDR would have called “hoarders” . “Saving” is prudent, not “hoarding” .

        • Kraig says:

          I’d be fine with this as long as I got more gold coming in than gold going out and I could pay all my expenses in gold. Same with bitcoin. If I can pay rent,utilities and food and taxes in Bitcoin then income in bitxoin is fine.

      • Otto Maddox says:

        “Paper money will always return to its intrinsic value. Nothing.” – Voltaire

        • cdr says:

          I agree. Send me yours. I will give you a $50 WalMart gift card for your trouble. No need to say ‘thanks’. Just being helpful.

      • Petunia says:

        Countries like Russia and China are hoarding gold to enhance their credibility. But you have to have credibility in the first place to enhance it. They may be able to use gold in some emergency trade sometime in the future but that’s about all it’s good for in their hands. I wouldn’t hold rubles or yuan based on their gold holdings because that guarantees me exactly nothing. They have no history of keeping promises of any kind. I would only hold these currencies as a protest against digital money.

      • Gershon says:

        Gold “nuts” fuming? Hardly. Let the reckless and stupid pile into the Bitcoin bubble, while “gold nuts” keep stacking physical precious metals on the cheap. And when the cryptocurrencies revert back to their intrinsic value – zero – the shrieks and wails of the Bubbleonians will reverberate off the ionosphere.

        And won’t you love the sound, of the last laugh going down….

        • cdr says:

          No, I’ll be long gone off to my eternal reward before gold purchased in the last couple of years makes out like it did for rj below. So will you unless you’re younger than 40 and hold it that long, plus get real lucky.

      • rj says:

        Well, it’s for savings, not spending. Yeah, saving money is an archaic concept, but I’m old enough to remember World Savings Bank paying me 10% on a passbook account. Gold has given me around 20% per year since y2k which ain’t too bad.

      • Matthew says:

        Perhaps a partial answer to why “crypto millionaires” are exchanging some of their bitcoin holdings for fiat is that, very simply put, it is smart portfolio diversification. A field of tulips is not only more at risk of being destroyed by an insect infestation for example, but is decidedly less attractive than a diversified farm full of different and distinct flora. It is wise to build up a diversified seed bank, is it not?

        • cdr says:

          Others might call it speculating, then selling at a gain, and possibly at the top.

  2. Suzie Alcatrez says:

    When is the WolfCoin going to be available for purchase?

    • Steve C. says:

      You fail to mention that EOS is being developed by the top blockchain/dapp programmer out there, Dan Larimer. He has two successful projects already already out, one called Bitshares, and another called Steemit. Together these two projects have more transactions on the blockchain than all other crypto currencies combined. EOS is a good bet, especially if you got in at 50 cents (the price about a month ago).

      • MCH says:

        OMG, OMG, is it too late, can I still get in. How do I do that, where is the website. *sqeuals like a little school girl*

      • Hiho says:

        But it is just that: a bet, a gamble.

        And when people buy the lottery some of them win, lots of them lose.

      • Wolf Richter says:

        All of this is completely irrelevant. Owners of EOS will not participate in any way in anything the company does or develops. They own no part in the company and have no right to anything. All EOS owners will ever have are tokens that continue to grow in number.

        • Thunderstruck says:

          “All EOS owners will ever have are tokens that continue to grow in number.”

          So, what you’re saying is that the new EOS issues are dilutive, kinda’ like a company issuing *more* new shares right after an IPO? Well, of course those shares would be non-voting shares.

        • Wolf Richter says:

          But shares represent ownership of the company. These tokens represent no ownership of the company. They represent nothing related to the company.

        • van_down_by_river says:

          When I purchase Federal Reserve tokens with a portion of my wealth I don’t receive shares in the Federal Reserve Bank. I don’t think the corporate ownership argument is valid – people buy currencies to use as money not to invest.

          I would agree that it’s a highly speculative bet (a billion to one shot) that any of these crypto currencies could ever be widely accepted as a liquid medium of exchange but none of us knows the future.

          For the moment they are a mania and the value is based on the greater fool theory – but that does not mean it will always be the case.

          Who would have dreamed houses would go from $200,000 to $600,000 in a short decade yet you can still buy a dozen eggs for $1.59. The old system is starting to crack and we are witnessing some crazy events. No one can predict how this will end, but seems to me we may be in for some tough times if the established currencies continue to lose their trust.

    • Wolf Richter says:

      Working on it :-]

      • Steve C. says:

        “But shares represent ownership of the company. These tokens represent no ownership of the company. They represent nothing related to the company.”

        Do you hold the stock certificates of the shares you “own”

        • Wolf Richter says:

          I as stockholder am a registered owner of the company (one of many). I get voting stuff (mailed to me or electronically). My ownership gets reported to the IRS. When there is a buyout or a class action lawsuit, they contact me. Dividend payments are deposited into my account. Etc. etc. Corporate ownership — shareholders own a piece of the corporation — is very well established, regulated, and documented in this country. There is no longer any need for a piece of paper.

          If you bought an EOS tokens at the ICO, you just made a donation to the company. That’s it. You own no part of the company. You own nothing but the token itself. And the purchase agreement spells out what this token is — here is the language again:

          “The EOS Tokens do not have any rights, uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities and features, express or implied, including, without limitation, any uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities and features on the EOS Platform.”

  3. Maximus Minimus says:

    Doesn’t matter, what matters is that inflation is still below 2%. I am planning to start infla-coin to help the FED achieve it’s inflation target.

    • Thunderstruck says:

      “I am planning to start infla-coin to help the FED achieve it’s inflation target.”

      Remember TIPS*? That just goes to show that they (the Fed) are ready to embrace any new ideas!

      * Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities

  4. alex in san jose AKA digital Detroit says:

    I’ll stick to the original peer-to-peer butt, thanks.

    https://www.reddit.com/r/Buttcoin/

  5. mean chicken says:

    Where is this going, in the longer time horizon?

  6. Tang says:

    Hey. Into crypto as well. Is call bithair. Each bithair associated with a hair on my body. Genetically unique like bitcoin. Each hair when purchased is imaged and the pixels on the hair image are counted and pass through an algorithm to generate a unique value. This value and the hair image form a “Key Value Pair” to be used for authenticity purposes and buy sell transactions.
    Also my body hairs limited. Just under 1 million.
    So supply very very limited.
    But new hairs will grow. Investors can try a hand at mining my new hairs. There will be futures to be traded in the CME in anticipation of demand, new hairs, hair losses, hair washed away.

    • alex in san jose AKA digital Detroit says:

      That’s disgusting! Comedy gold.

    • HowNow says:

      So, Tang, keep a safe distance from flames. They’re quite deflationary.

    • MC01 says:

      Always remember to get the unique genetic fingerprint we need the bulb and papilla as well, so when people start clamoring for them you’ll need a tweezer, not just a razor.
      maybe it’s time for an ICO to get a supply of tweezers…

      • Boatwright says:

        Bulb & papilla futures coming soon…..

        Shoe-shine guy in Grand Central Station told me about the CrapCoin futures he’s in – expects to retire to the Caymans after Christmas.

        (Legend has it that Joe Kennedy made millions in’29 shorting radio stocks after he heard a stock tip from a shoe-shine guy.)

    • walter map says:

      “There will be futures to be traded in the CME in anticipation of demand, new hairs, hair losses, hair washed away.”

      Rumplestiltskin will be counterfeiting it by spinning gold into hair.

      Tree leaves have served as currency with limited success. Of course, you’d have to exterminate the forests to deal with inflationary pressures, but that’s the policy of most countries anyway.

    • Maximus Minimus says:

      Ouch. It could be painful when cryptocrazies discover that your body hair is so valuable.

    • robt says:

      The problem with your token is that it actually represents something tangible. To be eligible as a token/coin it must represent nothing.
      Also, scarcity is not an important determinant in valuation – Ripple has 100 billion authorized issue, of which almost 39 billion are circulating.

      Here’s the site to assess your competition: https://coinmarketcap.com

      • IdahoPotato says:

        What do you mean by “nothing”? There’s a new “Bitcoin ATM” half mile from my home in Podunkville, Idaho.

        You mean it only gaseous matter?

        • robt says:

          Bitcoin and many of its derivatives is about payment systems, and some do or purport to be developing ATMs with instant conversion to local currency. Bitcoin is a derivative of money.
          Read up about tokens. If you check them out at the link I provided, it’s as Wolf said: you have no equity, no cash value except for whatever the person after you will pay for it, no yield except speculative, not even any promises of future benefit.
          The new issue of Overstock tokens is in this vein.

      • Robert says:

        You sparked a memory. Somewhere in an important box ( that I cannot locate easily ) we keep mementos, foolish memory triggers such as a “Disney Dollar” which I have no memory of acquiring; and a similar “Jordan Marsh Dollar” certificate; and, finally a Harrahs poker chip, or maybe it was a slot machine token, that is 90% silver like the old Peace Dollars.

        Well, Jordan Marsh is gone and I don’t know about Harrahs. But these were all trade-able tokens at the Company Store I suppose !

    • Carlos says:

      i’m waiting for bithair to ‘fork’ into bitpubichair, then i’m in !! Limited supply will mean greater profits …… and I have a fun way to transact !!

  7. Gershon says:

    Our captured, complicit regulators and enforcers only stir themselves when the banksters’ unfettered larceny against the 99% faces some upstart competitor to the Wall Street-Federal Reserve Looting Syndicate.

  8. Mike Earussi says:

    Ha, Ha, Ha,Ha…Wolf, we’re obviously all in the wrong business. Whom said a fool and his (are any women really stupid enough to buy in to this?) are soon parted?

    All right, lets put our collective heads together and come up with our own scam. We’ve got to get in on this stupid money rush.

    Looks like selling hot air is the latest craze. At least if you bought tulips you got something pretty you could look at instead of just vapor coins.

  9. interesting says:

    “The EOS Tokens do not have any rights, uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities and features, express or implied, including, without limitation, any uses, purpose, attributes, functionalities and features on the EOS Platform”

    I read a prospectus that sounds just about like that in 1999….but it was about the company having never made a dime and didn’t plan on ever making any money…..I wish I had the stones to pull something this crooked. I don’t because i’m 100% sure if I did this I would end up in prison.

    • van_down_by_river says:

      Sounds like a description of a Federal Reserve token to me.

    • Kraig says:

      This is just such a brilliant scheme. I basically want to work with these people I would have no problem getting projects funded.

  10. JB says:

    Well the fin tech gurus have come up with a way to promulgate cyptocurrency without the mining expense, but every company needs to make money.
    How does these companies make a profit. DO they take a cut of the new issues ? are the new issues valued at market? On a conventional IPO a big block of stock is floated . These guys are creating “shares” every day > just ask’n

  11. Lars says:

    Great article Mr. Richter !!!

    Here’s another side to the current cryptocurrency mania sweeping the world, and like how “As Nature abhors a vacuum, it likewise abhors a Black Hole”, econometrics will manifest a countermeasure to an exponential growth paradigm.

    http://www.digitaljournal.com/tech-and-science/technology/bitcoin-s-dirty-little-secret-has-real-world-consequences/article/510229

    The ‘Global Get Rich Quick’ scheme that cryptocurrencies are engendering seems to have a parallel and limiting real-world consequence, that of the electric power usage required to ‘mine’ them ! (see above article)

    As well as the currently difficult and inefficient way to ‘actually spend’ a Bitcoin, in that; ” . . . a Wall Street Journal reporter who tried to actually use Bitcoin to buy his dinner—but whose $10 pizza ended up costing him $76.16, with the fee to use Bitcoin being another $9.47.”

    Cheers ! 2017 and 2018 may go down in human history as one of the greatest manias ever !!!

    • Petunia says:

      Cryptos have evolved from being just a scam to being a joke. The real story now is how they are hyping the block chain as the answer to all our financial and technical prayers. They want to create the illusion that block chains are democratic inviolable systems which can be used to verify identities, count votes, predict events, and handle all our money too. Sure.

      So where are all those stolen bitcoins?

      • RD Blakeslee says:

        Same place as the fed’s unwound dollars?

      • Maximus Minimus says:

        You’ve got to invent something positive about this offshoot of the dysfunctional, unrepentant, unreformable financial casino.

  12. Michael Fiorillo says:

    Thanks, Wolf, for including some of the language from the Purchase Agreement; it’s for the ages, and future historians, if there’s a future from which to look back on this degenerate era, will go to town on it.

    “What fools these mortals be.”

  13. Zarathustra says:

    This is partying like it’s 1999. Literally. For those who still remember the dot com mania and the hangover the following year.

    This flood of imaginary currencies and idiotic start-ups hopefully will soon be over. It is downright harmful to economy, because real work and honest wages and saving gets degraded.

    But until then it is really a golden age of bullshit.

    • Matthew says:

      I absolutely agree, the similarities the current crypto frenzy bears with the dot com boom are not a coincidence and I expect a great deal of nakamoto schemes to tank in the not so distant future.

      Whilst I expect a large correction, if you extend that dot com comparison further and think about the companies that emerged out of the dot com ashes you have to wonder which of the current projects will be able to weather the impending crash and emerge as the next Amazon or Paypal or Ebay.

      • HudsonJr says:

        Dotcom is about right.

        I’ve read posts where someone invested 6 figures seemingly without understanding what a market order was and ended up paying 2x what they intended.

        Others are complaining that they can’t liquidate as they would like, expecting the 2-bit exchanges to work like mature online braokerages.

  14. Tom T says:

    Mommy, Mommy, the Emperor has no clothes….

  15. yoopar says:

    Spent many years wondering what the fed qe would produce. I guess now we know. This could be extremely larger than 2007 bubble. This, I would surmise, has to be making it into the seams of the entire worlds economies. Not an economist, just retired electrician, and I see just too many amps that are going to cause an overload.

  16. Paulo says:

    The tea is made and soon to go in the thermos. In ten minutes I will have walked over to the ‘property’ and started to drill studs to run the plumbing supplies. Everything will be insulated by Monday, and ready for drywall. This is my crypto investment, a nice little rental. Forty thousand dollars later and a pile of spare materials, know-how, and free sweat equity has earned our family an additional income stream plus increased the value of our vacant land.

    When the crypto craze ends with absolute wonder and hilarity, my good friend will be renting our cottage for a fair and reasonable price already agreed upon.

    What is a sound investment and holder of wealth? In my opinion it can only be hard assets that are paid for. It sure isn’t ones and zeros that can evaporate in an instant. Farm land, heat/energy supplies, good community and sound relationships. Some say guns, tools, and cash are sound. Health. A sense of humour helps. Bitcoin? Well, I guess that might fit under humour. It’s a joke for sure, but watch out, a nasty bite is coming….big time.

    You want to have a chair when the music stops, preferably one with 4 good legs.

    I kind of like this definition: Crypto

    adjective
    2.
    secret or hidden; not publicly admitted:

    • OutLookingIn says:

      A basic irrefutable truth:

      Bitcoin is nothing more nor less, than a de facto digital currency and thus yet another fictitious form of wealth, with a computer system as its counter party.

  17. mgkluft says:

    All is well, until someone falls out of a helicopter ;-)

    I remember very well, when all the little mining shells on the VSE added a dotcom angle to their press releases and then took flight. The Howe Street boys would be loving this. But I’m sure they are all old and grey, and wouldn’t understand this, because it is different this time.

  18. ROSS says:

    The best comment on cryptos I have read on this site was that they have to be connected to a power source to exist, (and of course connected to a reliable, safe, and stable internet to use).

    Even unbacked fiat can be seen, held, shown, and maybe recognized by somebody, who you want something from, who will trade you for it.

    But gold can be used anywhere in the world, without lies of any kind.

  19. van_down_by_river says:

    “So far, it has extracted $700 million in real money from the global public by selling tokens, called EOS, in an initial coin offering. It is by far the largest ICO ever”

    Real money? That’s funny. They are all “real money” but some money proves to be longer lived than other money. We don’t yet know what money will dominate this century, Who knows, the dollar could even have a resurgence (but seems unlikely).

    $700M? Not exactly earth shattering when compared to the number of Federal Reserve tokens sold every year by the banking system. Bankers probably lose more than $700M in their couch cushions every year.

    Crypto currencies have no intrinsic value and will probably be looked back on as a 2017 mania but the mania will not end until participants in the game lose confidence – the same can be said for all currencies. Central bankers are proving to be poor custodians of their currency and participants in their game are losing confidence. As currency owners panic and rush for the exits the dollar will continue to crash in value compared to almost anything that can be exchanged for dollars.

    Currencies are a hot potato, if you hold on to any of them you will get burned (this includes crypto currencies), it’s just a matter of time.

  20. Ed says:

    I just started my own coin, called TulipCoin. With this trust worthy name it will be a success. Official launch date 2018-05-01. Can be found at coinstarter.

  21. Gershon says:

    Oh, the humanity! (Bitcoin crashing)

  22. Steve C. says:

    It’s curious EOS was chosen as a topic here.

    • Wolf Richter says:

      Steve, you’re starting to sound like a crypto-troll.

      I deleted part of your comment because it was a promo. Quit promoting these online gambling technologies on my site. Advertising and promos of this type are not free. You can buy a banner on my site if you want to promote this stuff.

  23. Silly Me says:

    Computers break down.

    A single EMP event can wipe out a lot of crypto all at once. Or maybe that’s what has been the objective all along?

    • MR K C HIGGS says:

      Actually since the blockchain is distributed it should be more resilient to an EMP. That eas a major driver behind the MOD developing the internet in the frist place. In the event of a soviet first nuclear strike the net would still function and well MAD. You would only have to wait until you can connect to a full node outside the affected area. Even a rouge gamma star taking out every computer in the northern hemisphere could just connect to nodes in aussie afterwards.

  24. HudsonJr says:

    Coinbase just halted Bitcoin Cash transactions because of insider trading allegations

  25. Robby says:

    Thanks for the interesting and informative discussion.
    Everything you say about the mania is true. In my case I stumbled upon bitcoin 5 years ago and put a hundred in every few weeks, just spare cash I didn’t need from my self employed earnings as a contractor. I was buying Gold Sovereigns at the same time, for a far longer time. I now have far more fiat than I can ever forseeabley need for the rest of my life. I’ve invested profits from trading cryptos into ICOs, some of which actually confer equity, believe it or not, some others give dividends every few months, profit share, some simply double or treble in value. The key is diversify. For instance Bitcoin Cash may flip with Bitcoin, so I hold equal amounts of each, along with Bitcoin Gold. I only rarely sell nowadays. The strange thing is that I don’t need much, I never have – just my telescopes, cameras, guitar and gum shield and gloves. Go figure.

  26. Kraig says:

    I’m rather annoyed that this has got wrapped up with a filecoin. An actual utility token for a system with actual value and a tangible item. It is basically a hard drive backed currency. Of course that filespace can be delivered electronically via ftp or physically via post. The backing asset should double every 18 months so it should become cheaper in fiat but still retain its value. 1gb is still 1gb. Closest crypto to gold which also increases in supply.

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