The prolonged bear cryptocurrency market, coupled with reports of scams, has not dampened investors’ interest in initial coin offerings (ICOs) this year. Contrary to expectations, token sales volume for the first nine months of 2018 alone doubled compared with the total ICO volume last year.
ICO Volume in First Nine Months Reaches $12.3B
Despite the massive correction in January, interest in ICOs continued this year. In fact, token sales for the first nine months of 2018 reached $12.3 billion, according to a report released by Fabric Ventures, a venture capital fund focused on blockchain projects.
For comparison, ICO volume from Jan. 1 up to Sept. 30 is almost double the total token sales for the entire 2017. According to data from CoinSchedule, the total ICO volume last year is only $6.56 billion.
Number of ICOs Already Surpasses 2017
In terms of the number of initial coin offerings, the first nine months this year already surpassed last year’s number of fundraising activities. Fabric Ventures’ report says that there are 981 ICOs from January to September of 2018 compared with last year’s 900.
As expected, not all of these ICOs are successful. The report revealed that 567 ICOs or 58 percent are said to be failures, defined as “token sales that either reported a full refund of token sale proceeds to participants, or failed to disclose any data on the completion of fundraising at all.”
2018 ICO Trends
Europe is the leading region in 2018 when it comes to ICO volume. Led by the continent’s well-known crypto hubs such as London, Zug, Berlin, and Tallinn, European token sales for the first nine months reached $4.1 billion. For comparison, ICO fundraising activities only raised $2.3 billion in Asia, while US token sales reached $2.6 billion during the same period.
The reports also detailed the distribution of these new funds. Decentralized infrastructure projects claimed the largest share with 40.4 percent of funding going to the segment. It is followed by consumer/decentralized application projects at 15.4 percent, finance at 14.1 percent, and trading at 10.2 percent, while the remaining 19.9 percent is just classified as “Other” by the report.
