https://discover.coinsquare.io/investing/te...m-open-network/https://discover.coinsquare.io/investing/te...m-open-network/Talk of the town
Telegram, which has not responded to CoinDesk's requests for comment, would, no doubt, be the most mainstream company to issue a crypto token to date, although the social messaging app Kik raised $98 million in an ICO in September.
"Many hedge fund managers are talking about the TON ICO," said BitBull Capital's Joe DiPasquale. "Telegram has owned the chat space for those in crypto, and our usage of the app is increasing due to its security and ease. It's become the platform of choice for crypto discussion, and they will have a lot of attention leading into their ICO."
Calling the presale's minimum investment of $1 million and cap on proceeds high and its one-year lockup long compared to other token sales before it, DiPasquale still continued optimistically, saying:
"They are likely to be successful with a raise given their success as a platform to date."
Other investors CoinDesk spoke with were reluctant to discuss the sale, with one citing a non-disclosure agreement required to view the primer and a technical white paper.
Rumors of the ICO plan started last week, and on Sunday a Russian-language slide deck marked "Ton_Draft" was posted on a Russian-language Telegram channel run by Fedor Skuratov, CEO of Combot, an analytics platform for the messaging app. TechCrunch was the first English language outlet to report the plan.
While the document CoinDesk received, and other investors have confirmed receiving, does not seem to be the most detailed account of the TON system (its footnotes refer to the technical white paper), the primer does provide a basic outline of what Telegram hopes to achieve with its crypto token.
Lofty goals
In the document, the company declares:
"The current state of blockchain technology resembles automobile design in 1870: it is promising and praised by enthusiasts, but inefficient and too complicated to appeal to the mass consumer."
As such, no cryptocurrency has gained truly mainstream success, yet Telegram believes, according to the paper, that a decentralized counterpart to everyday money is needed.
The primer states that the company is hoping to enable the easy exchange of micropayments among users and bots, something that's been of general interest throughout the blockchain space.
In an effort to do that, the primer explains that 5 billion grams will be generated, with 4 percent reserved for the Telegram team (with a four-year vesting period) and 44 percent to be sold during the ICO.
The remaining 52 percent will be "retained by the TON Reserve to protect the nascent cryptocurrency from speculative trading and to maintain flexibility at the early stages of the evolution of the system," the primer states.
According to a source with knowledge of the presale terms, the one-year lockup comes with a 60 percent discount.
The ICO is likely all or a part of the "three big announcements" Telegram co-founder Pavel Durov told his followers about on his public Telegram channel on New Year's Eve.
According to the primer, the sale will take place in the first quarter of 2018, with the SAFTs converting to grams in the fourth quarter.
The roadmap goes on to state that the first related product, "External Secure ID," will launch in the first quarter of 2018, with all other products to be rolled out by the first half of 2019. And the Telegram founders' control of the project will shift to a non-profit foundation by 2021.
This post has been edited by adba on 10 Jan 2018, 15:37
Telegram TON, პერსპექტიული კრიპტო
