ICOs Topped $4 Billion In 2017: WIll 2018 Be Even Better?

The past year has been a record-breaking one for cryptocurrencies and ICOs (initial coin offerings), where more than $4 billion have been raised and a number of successful token placements have increased to a sum of couple of hundreds globally.

According to the E&Y IPO Global Trends report, the traditional IPOs are estimated to have raised $188.8 billion in total of 1,624 deals. So, ICOs are sitting at less than 2$ of the global IPO proceeds. However, ICOs have surged more than 40-fold in 2017, from only $96.3 million in 2016 to the $4 billion mark hit in 2017.

This practically means that the growth of ICOs was massive compared to the previous years and that these offerings are becoming more and more present in today’s world. Now, there are three main reasons why ICOs have been so successful this year.

First and foremost, ICOs and cryptocurrencies are there to exploit fundamental flaws of the traditional funding methods. They bring justice, equality and decentralization as their core – which are all things designed to lower the risks of the intermediaries.

The second (and a bad reason) is that ICOs are more complicated when it comes to due diligence, legal and compliance procedures. This is another reason behind the ICO triumph and one that doesn’t actually work in line with the major exchanges and financial markets.

Last but not the least, ICOs are part of the crypto-anarchic world which is self-governing and one that praises human progress and ingenuity. As a life-changing invention, they are used to cheat, defraud and steal – which is why many people see them as ‘ugly’.

In the end, ICOs are expected to offer more jobs, projects and opportunities for the broader community. What’s certain is that they won’t limit themselves anymore to the blockchain infrastructure, payments and speculative trading – but purely focus on the financial technology and its potential use.