This is Part 1 of an eleven chapter series. You can save time by downloading the full ebook: Download our free ebook instantly by clicking here.
Introduction
In 2017 the world was introduced to a new method of start-up finance, the ICO. The emergence of the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) has now translated into over US$1 billion of blockchain funding in less than 12 months.
As a derivative of this astronomical growth, it has also created millionaires around the world in literally months. The flow on effect from increased liquidity, positive market performance, and triple digit growth has now drawn interest from mainstream investors and speculators.
While the ICO market will continue to be a darling of the speculative investment community for years to come, it will not be without a number of failures, scams and underperforming tokens.
Our goal is to arm speculative investors with the tools and knowledge to make educated and analytics-backed decisions before reaching for their wallet.
We hope you enjoy this guide to ICO investing and wish you every success in the market.
About this guide
Who are we?
This guide has been prepared by Picolo Research, a leading blockchain ICO research team with the goal of providing transparency and ratings to the initial coin offering market.
Our philosophy is backed by 12+ years of investment experience across IPO’s, equities markets, venture capital and blockchain.
Picolo’s humble beginnings started with the emerging companies segment of micro-cap stocks (also known as pink sheets). Pink sheets are early stage companies seeking to list on the equities market and are generally in the infancy of their commercial cycle.
Our experience in these various markets has allowed us to experience a range of analysis and due diligence processes. Applying these same processes to upcoming blockchain ICOs provides a solid foundation of initial analysis and leads to a high conviction ability of pass/fail of the prospective investment.
Our intention with this guide is to empower the wider community of crypto enthusiasts and speculative investors with the ability to conduct their own analysis of Initial Coin Offerings in a simple and efficient manner.
Who is this for?
The Beginners Guide to Investing in ICO’s is for any person (technical or not) who seeks to gain exposure to the Initial Coin Offering market. The content of the publication is catered to those seeking a speculative investment into an upcoming ICO and is wanting to gain an understanding of the commercial viability of both the underlying company and the product/ service which it is taking to market.
This guide will show you the exact methodology we use to determine whether we (or our clients) invest in a potential ICO.
What will this guide not tell you?
This guide will not go into detail relating to the transactional process of actually investing in the ICO. Depending on the type of investment you are seeking, there are many processes that will differ from each ICO. For information on the physical process of actually transferring currency for tokens, please seek blog posts on Reddit or Steemit.
Chapter 1: Filtering the market
As of July 2017, there are over 130 active and upcoming ICOs in the market. It is impossible to screen them all and hence, we have developed a method of filtration to understand where the real opportunities are.
There are a number of different resources that you can use to gain some insight in to which ICOs are the biggest and which of those are attracting the most attention (we will detail these shortly).
So what are you looking for when filtering for potential Initial Coin Offerings?
New ventures seeking to raise a minimum of $5 million of crypto Companies with vast market and product information
Those who are being talked about extensively by the crypto community
ICO’s which are gaining sufficient coverage and exposure by various research houses and media agencies
The preceding methodology is used as it ensures that the filtering process is identifying those opportunities which are backed by the crowd, have a significant amount of informational collateral and are advanced enough to gain exposure through various social and traditional media channels.
Where is the community talking about it?
Reddit ICO Crypto
This subreddit has a user base of approximately 5000 and contains public information from its subscribers regarding active and upcoming ICOs.
Bitcoin Talk (Altcoin)
The Bitcoin Talk sub forum for Altcoins contains a huge amount of information regarding active and upcoming tokens to be issued. There are thousands of posts every day.
Where can you gain insight into research?
Picolo Research
A shameless plug of our independent research portal providing you with transparent and easily digestible information + ratings on upcoming ICOs. www.picoloresearch.com
Smith + Crown
An established research house that selectively produces reports on upcoming ICOs.
ICO Rating
A rating agency for ICOs that provides a Stable/Risky analysis of select upcoming token offerings.
How do I know if they have enough information?
There are a number of things each new ICO should have. If this list falls short, think again.
- A professional looking website
2. An available white paper and explanation of the project ICO details
3. Management information
We will be explaining shortly what you do with this collateral when you find it, but for the time being, ensure that you can tick the box before spending any more time on it.
End of chapter 1.
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