Blockchain: Is it a hoax?  111

• EOS (https://eos.io): EOS ICO happened in 2017. EOS cryptocur-

rency tokens were sold by a blockchain architecture start-up called

Block.one. ICO raised about $185m in just 5 days. The initial token

price was $0.925 and climbed to $5 within a few days after release.

Over the years since the ICO launch, EOS has gone as high as $22.89.

EOS claims to be a competitor to the Ethereum network by provid-

ing application developers with a comprehensive ecosystem compris-

ing of databases, account permissions, scheduling, authentication and

internet application communication tools.

• NXT (https://nxt-token.com/en/accueil-next-token-nxt-english): NXT

went through ICO in 2013 at an initial token price of $0.0000168. It

was one of the earliest ICO and NXT was one of the most success-

ful ICOs with one token selling for just $0.0000168 and raising about

$16,800 worth of Bitcoins at that time. The project used the funds to

develop a digital currency platform and also designed its proprietary

open-source consensus mechanism. NXT was trading at as high as

USD 2.16 around late 2017.

• ARK (https://ark.io): ARK ICO happened in 2016 with an initial

token price of $0.04. Ark’s goal was to create a decentralised digital

currency platform that allows for the quick integration of other cryp-

tocurrencies into its own blockchain. ARK ICO was successful and

returned over 35,000% ROI to investors when its token price climbed

to about $11.00 in late 2017.

• LISK (https://lisk.com): Lisk ICO happened in mid-2016 with an ini-

tial token price of $0.076 and raised about 14,000 Bitcoins worth

about $6m at the time. Lisk hit a long-time high of $39.15 provid-

ing an ROI of over 19,000% to investors, who purchased tokens at

the time of its ICO. Lisk was the first modular blockchain platform

enabling developers to create blockchain apps with Javascript and

operate these apps on side chains.

• Particl (https://particl.io): Particl ICO was launched in March 2017

with an initial token price of $1.50. It created a ROI of about 3,495%.

Particl token went as high as $52.40 around 2018; however, it is trad-

ing at $1.65 now. Particl was designed to offer total privacy to its

users. It offers cryptocurrency and a decentralised marketplace can-

tered on anonymous transactions to offer its users total anonymity.

Unsuccessful ICOs including scams and fraud

Although there has been a flux of successful ICOs that has made a differ-

ence in the financial and non-financial world, there are also multiple ICOs

that have failed to cause distress to society. We will walk through some of

the past ICOs as well as coins in this section.