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Initial Coin Offering Regulation Concerns
Following Google’s ban on Cryptocurrency’s advertisements effective June 2018, the Initial Coin Offerings are starting to experience bearish trends characterized by significant value shed offs on Cryptocurrencies, the unit of account in ICOs. These trends come in the wake of the U.S. lawmakers’ concerns about ICOs: Advocating for unexplained policy formulations to guide the ICOs. Washington, on 7th March 2018, raised these concerns about ICOs during the DC Block Chain summit presentation posing a set of concerns about the ICO offerings, currently on offer in many developed financial markets.
James Sullivan, the Deputy President Department of Commerce and International Trade Administration portfolio was the presenter at the summit. He demonstrated that the U.S government was in full support of Blockchains’ role in raising finances for start-up organizations in stock exchanges. He was, however, of the idea that all stakeholders should collaborate in streamlining the trade. His allusions were premised on the U.S. Securities and exchange commission report “Statement on Potentially Unlawful Online Platforms for Trading Digital Assets” that warns investors of fraudster platforms characterized by unregulated activity.
In the summit themed “Examining Cryptocurrencies and ICO Markets,” Republican Bill Huizenga and Democrat Brad Sherman, in a rare show of unity, raised concerns on lack of concrete policies and regulations on ICOs. Unlike the IPOs that were guided by a series of market regulations, requirements and restrictions, ICOs were just operating on self-regulation. Brad Sharman pointed out that ICOs will enable terrorists and outlaws to launder money across borders and affect national securities of America and various nations. On enforcing this sentiment, Bill Huzeinga called for intensive oversight on ICOs and the entire Cryptocurrencies operation.
Reading Between The Lines
The markets did not react to these concerns. Instead, the Cryptocurrency markets were bullish amid increased activity in ICO offering across the globe. Pundits were of the opinion that the Washington concerns had evoked growing investor confidence in ICOs as a real investment option solely by the U.S. government’s recognition. They forecasted that the future trends are likely to be bullish as investors anticipate a highly lucrative and regulated market in the foreseeable future.
Additionally, the Pundits pointed out that the U.S administration was exhibiting clear commitment in collaborating with the market players in policy formulation. The effort was evident as Jihan Wu, Co-Founder of Bitcoin, made a presentation that neutralized the anti-ICOs atmosphere following SEC report of possible fraud. Jihan’s acknowledgment that ICOs were crucial in creating capital for startups and mid-level firms whose money was in the form of Cryptocurrencies resonated with James Sullivan’s assortment that the entire Blockchain has to be improved through concerted efforts.
What to expect
The ICOs will be regulated in the near feature as the U.S. has recognized the role they play in business capital creation. The financial markets will react positively to policies that will be formulated by the administration to streamline and regulate the operations. More investors will be interested in ICOS. The summit will result in a series of discussions that will see U.S. institutions that regulate the financial sectors and legal spheres develop a set of regulations. Most importantly, it is evident that the Cryptocurrencies and ICO Markets will not be declared illegal as the U.S. government is exhibiting positive intentions of regulating and developing these ventures.
The dominant Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, registered signs of improvement in the financial markets on Thursday’s, 15th March 2018, afternoon trading session. Interestingly, this improvement is not precipitated by Google or Facebook withdrawing their ban notices on ICO trades: They have not withdrawn the ban. As Thursday’s trade session nears closure, the Bitcoin is trading at $8,241.52 having achieved a high of $8,788.00 and a low of $7,682.00 in the second half session. Other Cryptocurrencies such as Ether, Bitcoin, Zcash, Dash, Litecoin, Monero, etc. just to mention a few are following suit and registering improvements in the second session: Having shed-off value in the morning session following damaging publicity earlier this week.
What This Means For Initial Coin Offerings
From the Investors perspective, 15th March 2018 afternoon trading session recovery is a promising indicator of future surges in Cryptocurrency coins and token prices. Appreciation of Cryptocurrency values signals investors to participate in ICO trade in financial markets, as the value of tokens/coins will increase leading to higher returns on investment.
Firms who are offering initial coin offering are skeptical about the future of their biddings. With the growing descent from quotas criticizing all Cryptocurrency related activities and many governments deliberating on the way forward in regards to policy formulation, the market is likely to experience more shocks. However, the resilience of the market is quite evident and more firms will consider this factor. Firms like Basic attention, Aragon, and Status Um have raised around $35 million; $30 million and 270 million in record times will inspire more firms to seek funds on ICOs. Most notably, FileCoin, a startup company raised $200 million through an ICO and similar success stores will encourage most forms to issue ICOs.
Additionally, the markets will experience more significant precautionary measure as investors become more aggressive in interrogating the firms’ business ventures to determine their viability. Investors will not only be attracted to the possibilities of Cryptocurrency price surges in the future but also the businesses’ structures. Internal organization, goals, mission, vision, budgets, location, targeted markets, and legal factors will complement the expectations in interest payouts as a factor to consider when investing in ICOs.
The firms will streamline their mode of operations to appeal to prospective investors. Just like the firms that bid their stocks in stock exchanges, these firms offering ICOs will formulate a code of conduct for themselves in anticipation of enactment of regulation laws by governments. These firms will be readily accessible to the public, and they will adopt a culture of openness.
What This Price Increase Means To Regulation Authorities, Google, Facebook, And The Service Industry
The matter of fact is that Google and Facebook services are dominant across regions and have billions of users globally subscribing to them. ICO market analysts had allayed fears that with the damaging bans, the prices of the crypto coins would crash leading to the collapse of ICOs. Investors, Business entities, business developers and financial analyst can now conclude that it is only the policymakers in governments who can directly determine the performance of ICOs in the coming days. Pundits purport that it is difficult to foresee the level of increase in trade volumes in ICO Markets, following intense public outcry for regulations, but one outcome is expected-increased activities albeit depressed.
According to a new report, South Korea is contemplating reversing a ban on Initial Coin Offering in the coming months. The Korean time’s reports of a plan by the authorities to allow ICO and digital token based fundraising and make it possible for domestic investors to make advancements in Blockchain based technologies
The media company, which is one of South Korea’s most popular newspaper accounts of an ongoing discussion, between South Korea’s tax agency, the justice ministry and other concerned government offices, acknowledges possible talks on plans and conditions for a possible revitalization of ICOs in the country.
September’s Decision
If the discussions bear fruit and everything goes as planned, the country could witness a major reversal of the ban announced last September.
Financial regulators had previously banned raising money via any form of virtual currency including initial coin offerings and recommended regulation over the same. The decision in September by the South Korean authorities was attributed to the fact that there existed risks and possibilities of financial scamming. The announcement by China in the previous weeks may also have influenced South Korea’s decision.
Even after announcing the ban, the administration was reluctant to implement the ICO rule and was yet to impose any company into returning ICO funds. But this did not stop the migration of local blockchain startups into crypto-friendly countries and environments like Estonia and Switzerland. However, South Korean citizens remained free to invest in foreign ICOs.
According to Kang Young Soo, an official overseeing Cryptocurrency trading policies, the decision was yet to be made on whether to reverse the decision made in September or not. He, however, acknowledges that they were considering a third party view on the same. Mr. Kang had admitted in a recent industry forum, of plans to advance the blockchain technologies while regulating crypto trading.
Other sources familiar to the country’s tax code confirmed the rumors and expect a U-turn of September’s decision soon as the nation resolved and fixed the legal groundwork regarding crypto trading.
What To Expect?
Well, various sources have given a hint on what to expect. One, the source advised ICO-enthusiasts to expect an imposition of capital gains tax, VAT or both. The source also admits of a possibility of levying corporate tax from crypto exchanges and regulation by issuing of licenses. He, however, acknowledges that the matter was still in discussion and various agencies, including banks and tax agencies, were being brought to the table for transparency. In any case, the government cannot implement the policy on its own without tracking capital inflows into ICO.
ICOs make sense for startups because of their little paperwork and the fact that they let companies solicit money directly from the investors. The ban that didn’t limit trade oversees still worked for the startups, as they were able to raise funds overseas.
Even as the ban was implemented, investors with interest in ICOs grew significantly. This forced the government to rethink its decision. The proposed policy changes are a great deal for investors when it comes to transparency.
Cryptocurrency Markets Bearish
On Thursday Morning, the Cryptocurrency markets plunged to new lows, or below $8000, in a delayed reaction to negative publicity from Google. This publicity is raising skepticism in the already volatile markets where investors have been experiencing short-term shocks since 2013 when China started discouraging her nationals from participating in the trade.
The market leader Bitcoin’s lost 13.25% of its value in the wake of the ban; this loss has cumulatively seen Bitcoin shed off a mind-boggling approximate of 43% of share value from January 2018. According to market data, the Bitcoin Market was trading at $14,111.98 as the year began. On the other hand, Ethereum and Ripple currencies’ values are down by 14.54% and 16.58% to trade at %593.6 and $0.66 respectively. Summarily, according to Coin Market Cap report, all but two Cryptocurrencies’ stocks are trading in lows ranging between 11% to 26%.
Google Follows Facebook Move And Bans Gambling Advertisements
Google, a US-based global leading search engine, and advertisement firm issued a statement in March 2018, prohibiting “bad advertisements” effective from June 2018 on the AdWords platform. Google’s, in a document released to the media, stated that Cryptocurrencies’ information which includes; Cryptocurrency exchanges, Cryptocurrency trade reviews, Initial Coin Offering (ICO) and crypto wallets are “bad” advertisements as they are speculative and largely lack policy regulations. Google further stated that cryptocurrencies are emerging threats to Google services users and they have a “moral and ethical obligation” to protect Google users from “deceptive and misleading promotions.”
Google has followed in the footsteps of the arch-business rival, Facebook. Similarly, Facebook had, in January this year, banned all Cryptocurrency advertisements in a move that was geared to restore Facebook to its intended purpose of enhancing social relationships in the world; these social relationships had systematically being replaced by advertisements, which were unwarranted.
Financial Analysts Forecasts
Market analysts are sharply divided on the impact of the negative publicity from Google and Facebook. On one side, the market analysts state that Facebook, which is a vital advertising platform in the world, with almost similar market influence to Google, initiated the ban and the markets only experienced short-term bearish trends before reverting to bullish growth. Following this analogy, these market analysts predict that Cryptocurrency markets will regain their bullish patterns that will see more ICO traded in the coming months. However, they cannot predict when the markets will recover. Will it be a matter of days, weeks, months or years? Amongst them, it is suspected that some investors are propagating these sentiments to lower the value of the significant cryptocurrencies in anticipation of massive ICO buyouts.
On the other hand, some market analysts allude that this recent negative publicity is one too many and the Cryptocurrency markets will never recover. Their perspective premised on Google’s prominent social standing globally. It is widely believed that Google has nailed the last nail and investors will be rushing to sell off their shares anticipating further losses.