Bitcoin Forum

Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) acquired high popularity during 2017 and 2018. While multiple ICOs collectively raised nearly $7 billion in 2017 alone, the total funds raised by ICOs in 2018 was double of that amount.

In short, what we are trying to say is that ICOs are now quite popular among investors as a promising and high-profit investment tool.

But there is still a big red flag of trust that makes potential investors worried about ICOs. Since ICOs and cryptocurrencies are still unregulated or unaccepted by many governments, relying on them as an investment option is not something every investor is comfortable with.

Are you also planning to invest in the ICOs this year? Here are the five things you should know before investing in an Initial Coin Offering.

1. ICOs are not Exclusive

First thing you must know about ICOs is that they are not exclusive to any particular company, team, investor group or audience. Anyone and everyone can use the ICO method for raising funds for their new company, project or product. The only prerequisite to conducting an ICO sale is that you must have a team who knows how to create and launch a token.

2. Tokens have different types

Token is the general term used for referring the cryptocurrencies launched and sold by companies during an ICO sale. If you are thinking of investing in an ICO, you must be aware of the different types of tokens and their significance. Utility tokens are the most common types of currencies used by ICOs, as they give access to a particular utility in the company/project. Other types of token include security tokens, asset-backed tokens, native tokens, etc.

3. ICOs are prone to fraud/spam

While ICOs are backed by blockchain project, it doesn’t necessarily guarantee that the particular ICO will be safe and free of any kind of spam. In fact, a large number of the total token sales being held today are a fraud. The good thing is that there exist red flags which you can consider to identify a bad ICO. These include lack of publicity, an unprofessional website, team not disclosed, poor quality whitepaper, etc.

4. ICOs are still struggling with regulation

Like I said before, not every country and government is positive when it comes to investing in the ICOs. So, you should consider that as well before you plan to invest in one.

5. There are good ICOs out there

From my own personal experience in the industry, what I’ve realized is that there are also many good ICOs who are actually trying to do something genuine, finding a solution to a real problem and creating profits for the investors. However, finding them out of the jumble of bad ICOs is something that requires patience and a lot of research.

Pieta is one such ICO. Pieta is a cryptocurrency based on ERC20 standard of Ethereum. The Pieta coin is the native coin of the Pieta ecosystem, which is a mining platform being developed to be powered by solar energy. You can find out more about Pieta at https://pieta.network

investing in ico just like a gambling and that very similar when you are playing with casinos. As long as the investors can deal with all of the risk in ico and that's their decision whether they wanna to invest their money in ico or not.
And if you are saying so many negativities about icos and why you are promoting your pieta network. is there something different that makes your ico better than what you have been writing?
it looks so funny to see that you are blaming ico while at the same time you are promoting your ico. 
Another promotion thread?  ::)

ICO itself is not a bad thing. The point of this article is that ICOs have now become more like just a source for fake companies/people to generate income in the name of a new project that will never hit the floors. But, there are good ICOs also out there. So, basically, what we are trying to say is if you invest in ICO, make sure to identify and invest in good ones. Pieta is a good ICO, which you would know if you had read the project whitepaper.

Scams created bad impressions about ICO'S, But i believe that once the ecosystem is regulated the ecosystem will boost its morale again. We really feel bad if most investors fall to different crypto scams because it can slow adoption and people will begin to distance from this industry.

The very potentials of ICO as a fundraising tool was already achieve. But due to fraudulent activities by some greedy people the trust in ICO's was slowly fading away, and giving the room to the new fundraising method called IEO.  In my case i was already scam three times in ICO. that resulting of losing my hard earned money. that's why these time i'm very careful in terms of choosing a project to invest.

It was popular in the past year but currently it was lacking trust level due to more scam and useless new crypto projects so anyone who want to find the better project need to extensive knowledge about the project research and don't get fooled by their marketing strategies and discount offers.

Many of us have been fooled by ICO's and it should be the reason why we have to apply our knowledge on researching to identify which is a worthy investment to avoid facing the same situation. Despite of seeing scams we should never judge the power of ICO's because most of them are still profitable and we can't underrate it. In order to find the best ICO then you should learn from your experience and apply it, that lesson will guide you and help you. Some of us usually believe on their words but trust me it is their way to fool you so make sure before you trust because investing will always be risky.

I agree with people who said ICO is similar with gambling and mostly they all fail. Before I join ICO project I see their goal isn't realistic or not and how the built communication with members. I try see ICO from other perspective and I might be wrong. Always careful with your fund and good luck to you.

Correct. There are lots of good ICOs but they are outnumbered by illegal and scam projects. Im not saying ICO is worse but based on the fact and the community experiences I could not vouched for some good ICOs. Only those pioneered ICO coins like eth, neo are worth ICOs which we can see great perspective until now. But for the new start up, better think of investing if you dont want to end up zero value at all.

Problems with ICO is probably the trust of potential investors thats why the investors more likely to shift on IEO which is much safer than this crowdfunding type.

Maybe now the ico project is being avoided by some investors because its image has been damaged by a fake ico, so that the current ico project is not developing even near extinction. But now there is ieo as a substitute for ico, so investors re-warm the crypto industry. Ieo is more attractive to investors because they are already on the trading market. But I think there is actually still a good ico, it's just that it's hard for us to distinguish between good and fake, that's all the problem.

No matter how hard i look at it, investing in ICO is now a gambling call and moreover who still invests in them? last time i checked almost all ICO investors moved to IEO already, they are both risky but IEO is safer if from top exchanges

   Investing in ICO's was gambling before, it's gambling today. You invest in start-up, in people who have idea, or product,
and they wish to make something from that but they need funds to start with the project.
   IEO's are safer, but there are no guarantees with IEO's like there are no guarantees with ICO's. All we can do is to research
a project, try to search for flaws in their WP, team, and if we don't see any we can invest, but scammers are better in masking
and new scams are close to perfection.

Although you stated good facts but the simple and wholehearted truth is that investors are highly skeptical about any ICO project nowadays. By the way, it has been a while I heard of any ICO project coming up rather IEOs are flooding everywhere. ICO scams etc can't be forgotten in a haste because everyone learnt the hard way. Let's be frank, investors would rather risk IEO in exchanges where there will be no exit scam than in ICO where team will take ages to list among other things.

The benefit in IEO is that we can easily find the good and bad IEO as if the developers will spend money on their project and will list on best exchange then it will mean the developers care for their project and their users and it becomes guaranteed that the trade volume of that coin will be higher while if the developers do not care to list the IEO on best exchange and only searching and listing on small free exchanges then it shows that the developers do not do much for their project and the future of that project is not guaranteed.

ICO is dead in 2019/2020 sorry. There are no more intresting projects

The truth is nobody is interested in ico's anymore, the bad ones killed it for the few good ones, any project hosting an ico will not have investors because too many of them have turn into scam,
i don't know why it is very hard to see a project do self funding without ieo/ico! if we have so many self funding project the rate of scam project will reduce because it will be hard to ruin a project you invested your personal money to develop, and this idea will give investor confidence to invest on such project.

Above all that OP said, if they have no working product and have not put in their own finances to support the project then stay away from it because it's likely going to end up as scam. Also, don't fall for the promises of huge return on investments, most of them are just trying to lure the silent greed of men which is in almost everybody

Investors should also know that ICO coin has different purpose, and people should know that it is very risky now to invest because most of the time it does not hit the softcap meaning it is either the team wont send back those investments or those investments wont be able to earn a profit for a long period of time.

The days of ICO's are gone people are no longer interested in them because of the Scams that happened in the past. Only few exchanges have been successful with IEO's.

I personally never invested in any projects that were not ready with the product. Most of the hyped ICO's are now struggling to deliver their products.

I dont think anyone wants to invest in ICO's these days, People have understood that ICO's doesnt make people rich right now, they only make the angel investors rich and usually the creators bail out if there is too much hype. Even IEO's not running because even exchanges are not that trustworthy.

No need 5 things to know about ICOs. For me, we need 1 thing only. What is that? The fact that ICOs just produce worthless altcoins + rarely investors are interested to put their money there. This fact is more than enough to avoid you invest in ICOs.

You created a thread today to promote your project's ICO, but the sale was completed on November 14th
By the way, your token is already registered on the exchange, but why is the volume so small?

If you search carefully then you will find that ICOs do not just create worthless altcoins but their whole details show that they are created a beneficial platform for the crypto community which will bring convenience for all of us. There are a number of scam projects which we all know but many other legit and beneficial fails because the developers are not much expert either in creating what they promised or in doing perfect marketing which is must required for the success of all projects.

ICO are almost forgotten this year and very few people choose to invest in this form because the risk is too great and always makes participants nervous. I think it's best to stay away from ICO projects because you certainly will not be able to make a good profit. Currently, IEO/IDO/STO is an investment trend that is more interested in people and will definitely help you to make a profit if you know how to research.

However, at this time the market is still not stable, so you need to be more careful because if you participate in a bad project, your risk will increase.

The sad reality of investing in new projects now. That's why if those potential project will be able to skip ICO and just do private partnership with different compabnies that may help them please do so ,so you'll have to join in the market as many investors now deny public ico and simply prefer those projects who wants to propose and develop with them.

Most people are focused in IEOs nowadays because of the automatic coin listing. People are tired of waiting for a long time for ICO tokens or coins to be listed. Most investors care about the value of a coin or token more than it's use case or final product.

Very good points. But there is one more that I have been implementing since 2018, namely stay away from ico even though there are good ones. One thing that I do not want to go back again to participate in ico because some of them are good in development but do not provide benefits and some are slow in development but instead provide benefits. From this, I no longer want to join ico, no matter how good the project. What I know now is that the market price is the original price, not when it is fitted.

Yeah but it is just so difficult to spot them.
It really differs about the will of the management behind it.
Some of them really have the fund but just needed help to push the project into a different level.
What I mean is, there is already a company that is ongoing. But it cannot go forward due to lack of funds.
Since they are not being backed by their government so they are forced to create another option. And that is ICO.

The heyday of the ICO is over and the ICO is almost dead now, at the moment I don't see any ICOs that are considered good. So investing in ICOs at this time is unwise, even gambling is better than investing in ICOs.
Because anyone can create a coin of their own, junk coins and junk ICOs are everywhere, which undermines investor confidence. I think there should be stricter rules for ICOs and development teams to stop spam and fraud projects.

Your assessment of ICO is very inaccurate, because valuable altcoin was also born through the ICO program, so before assessing ICO it would be better for you to do your research first, rather than assessing everything the same.

Inaccurate when his intention is 2015 ago or when the ICO just come. But it will be accurate when his intention is now, can you give an altcoin who has successfull to lounch the project through ICO?

The prospect of the current ICO project is likely to still be advanced and successful. The OP said the ICO could still be a profitable investment, but in reality out of 100 projects only 1-10 were legal or real. investment in ICO for now cannot be ascertained, in fact I say other than capital, analysis or research. You must pray and be lucky.
Even the IEO project as a revision of the ICO can also be said only delusional for crypto-world, there are many manipulations and not transparent. can be said as a professional con artist.

Yes it is true, anyone can do that if they have people who know how to make and launch tokens. Therefore I am of the opinion that cryptocurrency is a free market where anyone can participate or make something according to what they can do. And in ICO we have to be more careful in choosing projects and at least we need to know some ways to differentiate which are projects that can be turned into scams and which have potential.

Thanks for pointing these out, but on a more serious note, I think the era of ICOs are gone and forgotten, they served their purpose wherein only few projects were legit and a greater number scams thus paving way for IEOs. The fact is, ICOs aren't worth it again as no one is willing to risk their funds in the hands of any team; even if there is an upcoming ICO which looks good, the chances of succeeding is slim because investors are now wise.

ICOs are prone to fraud and scam, but then you went ahead to tell us to invest in Pieta ICO.  ??? That is very confusing to me and other fellow investors out there. Try something better than ICO or even IEO. Check out my signature for more information.

You should understand that the OP is providing solution to investors in other to build trust while he also send them to grave through the trust he might have gain from them. However, i think the community need to know ICOs are mostly used by crypto scammer and IEOs are now the best option.

The number of new projects turned into scams makes investors hesitant to invest in new projects and if the project does not do ico and they have their own funding to develop their projects I think it can reduce the existence of new projects that become a scam, but if the project new have their own funding so they do not need to do ico and I think this is not possible because the existence of ico is to get funding from investors in order to develop the project.

I have my list of 5 things to know before you invest in them

1) Don't invest at an early stage if you don't know to code or analysing the project's potential.
2) Make sure they have enough money to advertise.
3) They should have some bounties paid in bitcoins as well.
4) The team should be easily available on other social media networks accept telegram.
5) Don't invest in ICO's they're a scam.

In fact investors are starting to distance in ICO campaigns due to the widespread scam today. And it's because of the scammers who ruined the ico name today, And you're right regulation will restore trust but who will enforce it?

ICO's mainly popular only since 2017 and which time almost 95% projects was big success. But in 2018 ICO's was less popular because when came IEO's is a big trend for investors because it's a guaranteed exchanges. In the IEO's era i don't think ICO's will be strongly return. 

ICO has now become an IEO, and ICO is mostly a scam project, even IEO too,
but in IEO we can choose and know who is a really serious and good project, the Harmony example that was held in Binance was a huge success,
now ONE already in Binance to be traded

My first question is, are people still investing in ICO projects? Because I as a person say, believe they are dead and nothing will resurrect them again. By the way, your points are correct and appropriate wished it was during the ICO boom might have saved a lot of people. Nevertheless, I don't think any ICO project is worth it, ever again, as the risks involved is a huge one and of a truth not worth taking. I have counted my losses and moved on, have no business with them again.

Why are you so adamant?ICO may have reduced the attractiveness,but still there are promising projects.The main thing is to search and explore.Yes, I understand that a large number of ICO have upset investors, but in the long run there are really really needed projects that solve real problems of people. And such projects still attract investors despite the way to raise funds!

You’re trying to convince everyone to trust ICOs by giving such explanation.
But what you say above are theory.
We know that we have to do a selection for an investment on ICO. But the question is, how to do it?
Even the well prepared ICO, led to fraudent.
So how to select good ICO’s among these ICOs.

Your intention to make this thread is this https://pieta.network right?

So, just wondering what is the difference between the project that you are promoting with the ICO project in general?

in every investment it would also be better if investing in projects that have potential and project growth well, because it will benefit investors. so if the investment goes well, then the investor will benefit, so the investor must be able to find the right project to invest

I am afraid about the regulations, many ICOs now work only because goverments are not interested in regulating them, but what will happen after they come with regulations? Many projects will be banned due to violations of regulations, like many people were afraid that Ethereum become security.

 Indeed, at present, investor interest has significantly decreased due to the fraudulent activities of many projects, but I do not think that ICOs will cease to exist at all. You can already find worthy projects, but there are very few of them, and before taking part in investing, the project must be thoroughly researched and studied. These are good 5 tips that the author offers and they really need to be followed .

Not good time for investing with Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) right now because we have see many ICOs failed with lower price after listing on exchange market, many investor have left with ICOs investment project and give bad thing for investing, maybe looking other way for investing in IEO or new altcoin listed with big exchange market and keep get much profit.

The last but not least, it should be noted that ICO has declined in popularity, and we must know that IEO is more effective in attracting investor interest at this time. So if the project is not strong enough, too general, and does not have a unique niche it will be very difficult to form market confidence. This is exacerbated by the state of the market is saturated so that investors are more careful in using their funds, and prefer to invest in a safe way, namely by joining IEO held in a trusted exchange.

You can invest in IEOs on platforms like binance and ecxx, these exchanges vet IEOs before listing.