{"id":2244,"date":"2023-08-24T13:10:19","date_gmt":"2023-08-24T13:10:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/icobench.com\/?page_id=2244"},"modified":"2023-08-25T00:16:42","modified_gmt":"2023-08-25T00:16:42","slug":"ico-statistics","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/icobench.com\/stats\/ico-statistics\/","title":{"rendered":"70+ ICO Statistics You Need to Know in 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"
Initial coin offerings (ICOs) have emerged as a novel way for early-stage ventures to fund their projects. Since garnering widespread adoption in 2017, ICOs have raised over $50 billion for crypto startups across the world.<\/p>\n
Getting a clear picture of the global impact of ICOs can be challenging as information is scattered across a variety of reports and sources. That’s why we’ve done all the legwork to bring you over 70 ICO statistics you need to know, including success rates, earnings data, and more.<\/p>\n
ICO Statistics Highlights<\/span><\/h2>\n
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ICOs have raised over $50 billion<\/b> since their inception.<\/li>\n
Over 80% of ICOs during the 2018 boom were scams.<\/li>\n
ICOs have a survival rate of 10%.<\/b><\/li>\n
The largest ICO \u2013 EOS \u2013 raised $4.2 billion<\/b> in 2018.<\/li>\n
The biggest ICO scam, Bitconnect defrauded investors of $2.6 billion.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Key Statistics About ICOs<\/span><\/h2>\n
The concept of an ICO was first introduced by J.R. Willet in 2013.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
In an initial coin offering (ICO), a company creates a new digital asset, called a token, and puts it up for sale to investors using blockchain technology. In 2013, Willet used this method with MasterCoin, later rebranded as OMNI, and raised $500,000 worth of Bitcoin. The funds were used for development, payment of bounties, and other important tasks.<\/p>\n
Following the success of OMNI, a wave of ICOs emerged. These were enabled by Ethereum, which managed to secure over $15 million of its own in investment in August 2014.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n
In 2015, Ethereum\u2019s introduction of a standard for implementing tokens (ERC20) further streamlined the ICO process. From just 9 ICOs in 2015 and 74 in 2016, the market surged to over 1,000 ICOs in 2018.<\/p>\n
Between 2017 and 2020, ICOs delivered over 3.5 times more capital for Blockchain-based startups than traditional venture capital (VC) rounds.<\/b><\/p>\n
ICOs are digital tokens issued by early-stage ventures in exchange for crypto assets or fiat currencies. They represent a new way for early-stage ventures to raise capital\/funding.<\/p>\n
Compared to other traditional ways of raising such as venture capital and angel finance, ICOs offer several advantages:<\/b><\/p>\n
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ICOs are completely decentralized as they are powered by Blockchain technology.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n
Entrepreneurs don’t need to give up significant equity to raise capital.<\/li>\n
Funds can be raised relatively quickly from a global pool of investors.<\/li>\n
Anyone can invest in ICOs as there aren’t any securities laws limiting funding to wealthy accredited investors.<\/li>\n
ICOs are open to all entrepreneurs and not just those with connections to early-stage investors.<\/li>\n
Unlike IPOs, an established business model isn\u2019t a requirement to receive investment.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
ICOs are different from other traditional financing methods due to the following:<\/b><\/p>\n
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Tokens<\/b>: Units of value issued in the form of currency, utility, or security tokens.<\/li>\n
Whitepapers<\/b>: Published information on the issuer, project, protocols, token supply, pricing, and distribution.<\/li>\n
Online marketing<\/b>: The primary communication and distribution channel for ICOs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
The largest ICOs tend to use utility tokens with no explicit rights to the ownership or the future cash flows of a firm.<\/b><\/p>\n
Currency tokens include cryptocurrency, that can be exchanged and stored. Security tokens are traditional securities backed by a blockchain infrastructure. Utility tokens (the most common type of token), grant investors rights to access a product or service.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
According to Crypto Vantage, ICOs have raised over $50 billion for startups as of December 2022.<\/b><\/p>\n
In a 2020 study of over 5,036 ICOs between 2016 and 2019, ICOs worldwide raised well over $13 billion. Statista pegged this figure slightly higher, reporting a figure of over $14.8 billion for the same period.<\/p>\n
In 2017 alone, an estimated $4.9 billion was raised through ICOs according to Cruchbase and Wall Street Journal. By 2018, this figure jumped to $33.4 billion, more than the total amount raised by venture capital investment on internet projects.<\/p>\n
Breaking down the figures, $90 million was raised from 29 ICOs in 2016. This surged to $7.5 billion from over 1,253 ICOs in 2018.<\/b><\/p>\n
However, in 2019, this dropped to just $370 million raised from 109 ICOs. By 2022, this decreased to $117 million raised from 217 ICOs. According to researchers, the sharp decline in ICOs was brought on by challenges such as project failures, scams, and a lack of regulation.<\/p>\n
Another potential explanation for the decrease in the number and volume of ICOs after 2019 is the development of new crowdfunding models. These new models seek to address some of the key challenges of ICOs.<\/b><\/p>\n
Examples include:<\/p>\n
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Security Token Offering (STO):<\/b> A financial instrument offered through DLT<\/li>\n
Initial Exchange Offering (IEO):<\/b> A crypto token or utility offered and managed through an exchange launchpad.<\/li>\n
Initial DEX Offerings (IDO): <\/b>A crypto token or utility offered and managed through a decentralized exchange.<\/li>\n
Token Generation Event (TGE):<\/b> A blockchain-based project or platform that raises capital through the sale of its native tokens to investors and supporters<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
A 2020 report analyzed 981 ICOs that took place in 2019 and found the following:<\/b><\/p>\n
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The UK, Singapore, and Taiwan were central hubs for ICOs in 2019.<\/li>\n
Overall, the total number of ICOs fell by 60% from 2018.<\/li>\n
88% of ICOs were based on the Ethereum blockchain.<\/li>\n
A majority of the tokens that were issued in 2019 ICOs were not traded on secondary markets anymore by July 2020.<\/li>\n
Of the ICOs for which data was available (24%), $3 billion was raised, with the largest ICO being BITFINEX (Taiwan) which raised a total of $1 billion.<\/li>\n
43% of ICO issuers had an actual product on the market, while close to a third did not.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
2023 data on Foundico, an aggregation platform for over 3,000 ICOs and pre-ICOs revealed that:<\/b><\/p>\n
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A majority (36%) of all ICOs on the platform are finance projects, followed by trading (13%) and payments (10%).<\/li>\n
The most common project platform is Ethereum, accounting for over 72% of ICOs.<\/li>\n
The US takes the lead in terms of the highest number of projects, with 451 in total. This is followed by the UK and Singapore with 383 and 304 projects respectively.<\/li>\n
The most funds are raised in the US, followed by Singapore and the UK.<\/li>\n
Since January 2023, over 120 ICOs have been published.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
<\/p>\n
Data from ICO Drops shows that there are currently 13 active ICOs on its platform and that there have been over 100 ICOs since March 2023. Some of the top-performing ICOs for the period include:<\/b><\/p>\n
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Arbitrum, which raised $123.7 million.<\/li>\n
World Coin, which raised $240 million.<\/li>\n
SUI, which raised $52 million.<\/li>\n
Neon, which raised $ 45 million.<\/li>\n
Republic Note, which raised $49 million.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Data compiled by Cryptorank on a total of 4,554 public token sales between 2014 and 2023 shows that ICOs account for 18.4% of all public token sales.<\/b><\/p>\n