Initial Coin Offerings

This paper examines the market for initial coin offerings (ICOs). ICOs are smart contracts based on blockchain technology that are designed for entrepreneurs to raise external finance by issuing tokens without an intermediary. Unlike existing mechanisms for early-stage finance, tokens potentially provide investors with rapid exit opportunities thanks to liquid trading platforms. The marketability of tokens offers novel insights into entrepreneurial finance, which I explore in this paper. First, I document that investors earn on average 8.2% on the first day of trading. However, about 40% of all ICOs destroy investor value on the first day of trading. Second, I explore the determinants of market outcomes and find that management quality and the ICO profile are positively correlated with the funding amount and returns, whereas highly visionary projects have a negative effect. Among the 21% of all tokens that get delisted from a major exchange platform, highly visionary projects are more likely to fail, which investors anticipate. Third, I explore the sensitivity of the ICO market to adverse industry events such as China's ban of ICOs, the hack of leading ledgers, and the marketing ban on FaceBook. I find that the ICO market is highly susceptible to such environmental shocks, resulting in substantial welfare losses for investors.

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PID https://www.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3166709
PID https://www.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0233018
PID pmc:PMC7241798
PID pmid:32437413
PID https://www.doi.org/10.3790/978-3-428-58023-1
URL https://academic.microsoft.com/#/detail/2802806608
URL https://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0233018
URL https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID3328034_code2433926.pdf?abstractid=3166709&mirid=1&type=2
URL http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3166709
URL https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3166709
URL https://doaj.org/toc/1932-6203
URL https://academic.microsoft.com/#/detail/3034551829
URL https://www.ssrn.com/abstract=3166709
URL https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0233018
URL http://dx.doi.org/10.3790/978-3-428-58023-1
URL http://europepmc.org/articles/PMC7241798
URL http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0233018
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Access Right Open Access
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Author Paul P. Momtaz, 0000-0002-7040-2764
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Collected From PubMed Central; Datacite; DOAJ-Articles; Crossref; Microsoft Academic Graph
Hosted By Europe PubMed Central; PLoS ONE; SSRN Electronic Journal
Publication Date 2020-05-01
Publisher Elsevier BV
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Language UNKNOWN
Resource Type Other literature type; Book; Article
keyword Q
keyword R
keyword keywords.General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
system:type publication
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Source https://science-innovation-policy.openaire.eu/search/publication?articleId=dedup_wf_001::82735336138b7bca5494559fb9bfb0de
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Last Updated 26 December 2020, 16:57 (CET)
Created 26 December 2020, 16:57 (CET)