Bitcoin Forum

Several times I have seen ICO coins been sold at really high prices on exchanges, however I see this happening before they coins are even possible to deposit to an exchange. How is this possible? For example right now Zrcoin is being traded on HITBTC, but I can't deposit my coins that I got in the ICO because on the deposit page there is a message: "Please note that ZRC is an IOU for future issued token. Until the blockchain is released withdrawals and deposits are unavailable. Please accept our apologies for the inconvenience."
How can it be traded when it is not possible to deposit the coin?

They trade IOUs.
After the end of the ICO, tokens will be transferred to their account.

What are IOUS?

its iou, also there are some exchanges which support push in their own site, like btc9.com,  ico365.com and there is also altcoin which has no wallet can trade like qtum

IOU market is about trading coins purchased by traders in the ICO.
https://liqui.io/IOU

Any insight of how this technically works? So i participate in an ICO, i receive a transaction ID. So i trade this ID in the exchange and then what? The buyer takes my id but i still have the id dont i? How does the transfer of ID take place in the exchange?

Just like it said, IOU.

No, the exchange is investing in the ICO so they know how many tokens they will receive, and they can put them to the market without possibility of withdraw or deposit, logically.
Or you can participate on ICO through this exchange, so you will get same IOU tokens (pre-tokens) under your account and trade them too.
If the official tokens are distributed and unlocked, than these IOU tokens are switched to the real one and deposit/withdraw is unlocked.
If the official tokens will never be distributed or the ICO was SCAM, the price of IOU tokens goes to 0 and you loose.

correct me if im wrong but only liqui.io provides IOUs right?

What does IOU mean?Abbreviation and in general?

hitbtc has plenty of IOU tokens

I owe you http://www.investopedia.com/terms/i/iou.asp

There might be a moment where the wallet goes online for a little bit and it allows people to send coins into that exchange then when after a few minutes or hours the wallet goes offline so the people that try to send coins into that exchange won’t be able to do so. This also happens when there is a huge dump or if there is a huge pump.
It all depends on what Bitcoin exchange it is.

You can do so by trading OTC (over the counter) in slacks or on the forums here. For that though, there generally needs to be an escrow or some level of trust involved as either party could scam the other. You can do this btw, if there is a market or demand for what you have. For example, IOTA was traded OTC for roughly 2 years before hitting the exchanges this past June. Happy trading, gl

They are not selling coins they are selling tokens, which you can hopefully redeem for the coin.

When... well IF it that coin gets released. Confusing? Yes! :)

Say it out loud!

You can see on the HitBTC exchange site, A lot of them are still IOUs token, That means if it is the future token and not the real asset from the project itself. it pretty strange to see the price will go high as fast as possible. A little bit scammy for me.

I didn't know about IOU, so I'm glad to know
and i hope that polo and bittrex will add this option too.

They are trading IOU, "IOU market is about trading coins purchased by traders in the ICO and that so far have no own network" https://liqui.io/IOU (https://liqui.io/IOU)

I have bought some WTT token at the ICO. Token are not released yet.   I see that the IOU are traded on HITBTC at a higher price.  Am I able to sell the IOU there for BTC at the price of today? once i get the token from the Ico, i will deposit it and be able to withdraw my btc?
Or am I able only to buy IOU from HITBTC and trade those, without beeing able to sell in advance my real WTT Tokens?
It is not very clear. I fear that the truth is the second option, but if there is a chance i would like to take it

I did not know about IOU. Thanks. Judging by your experience, these pseudo altcoins are more expensive than real coins? Traders pump up the price or it is in the main lower than the ICO prise? Because whales get a lot of bonus coins and big discounts when opting for tokens.

Certainly no. Because selling tokens before it releases will make ICO fail. How can people buy their tokens of you are selling? You must accept this condition if you wanna join in bounty campaign