Which one allowed people from the cryptocurrency industry to make the most money?

2017 was an incredible year for the initial coin offering. According to various sources, the total amount of funds raised through ICOs in 2017 ranges from 4 to 5.6 billion dollars in fiat equivalent.

However, according to the same reports, less than half of the total number of ICOs held in 2017 were successful, and 25% of the total amount was attracted by only 10 projects.

This statistic proves once again that potential investors need to be very careful when choosing a startup to invest in.

Although ICOs are not regulated, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) can step in. For example, Telegram raised 1.7 billion dollars in ICOs in 2018 and 2019, but the SEC filed emergency action and received a temporary restraining order due to the alleged illegal activity of the development team.

And in March 2020, the US District Court for the Southern District of New York issued a preliminary injunction, and Telegram had to return 1.2 billion dollars to investors and pay a civil fine of 18.5 million dollars.

Summary. The failure of the ICO concept is explained by a mismatch between the interests of managers and investors. Often companies have a product that is at a very early stage of development, while mostly non-professional investors who do not understand the topic invest in it.

Compared to ICOs, the initial exchange offering (IEO) space has become a more transparent and less risky way to make money. The risks are lower because each project that offers its tokens goes through a selection process, and the listing of its tokens is guaranteed.

For example, in May, projects for the initial offering of tokens attracted funding for 1.2 billion dollars, but in June this amount fell by 88%, to 125 million dollars. In the beginning, almost all IEOs had shown hundreds or even thousands of percent of growth, but in the end, many were at a loss.

At the same time, most projects start raising money even before an IEO. This allows creators to receive development funds. Investors receive coins at a lower price first, so that they can subsequently benefit from its growth.

Since the rate depends on demand, creators and investors are doing their best to promote their coin. The reward program helps with this task.

It is a campaign to promote a project. IEO creators give coins to bloggers, translators, commentators, and other people who help make the coin more famous. The types of work that will be rewarded are specified in the terms of each specific campaign.

Summary. As one can see, it is possible to earn cryptocurrency without investments by performing simple tasks.

Another industry gained popularity in the summer of 2020 — decentralized finance (DeFi). These are applications, exchanges, services for issuing loans, opening deposits, and much more.

While cryptocurrencies aim to make global payments accessible to everyone, DeFi takes it one step further by bringing cryptocurrency and finance together.

Many DeFi projects have their own cryptocurrency. Mostly, these are tokens issued on the Ethereum blockchain.

One of the most popular projects is Maker. It is an Ethereum-based cryptocurrency project in charge of the DAI stablecoin. It is the second-largest project in the DeFi space after LINK. This token is among the select few to be sold at a high price per piece.

According to the data, the MKR was priced at nearly 1700 dollars in 2018 and is now worth around 632 dollars. Many analysts believe the MKR project is worth looking out for as DAI promotes financial freedom, has almost no volatility, and is integrated into over 400 apps and services (e.g. wallets, DeFi platforms, games, etc.)

Alas, the bull cryptocurrency market of 2020 continues to gain traction. On October 25, the volume of blocked funds reached a new all-time high of 12,445 billion dollars.

It should be noted that all DeFi projects that showed unreasonably high growth in the formal cost of their tools get eliminated. Only those who, according to an understandable and economically sound scheme, present their investors with an opportunity to earn, remain.

This is a normal course of events because after an initial surge of interest, fraudsters are eliminated and an operating core remains.

Summary. As you can see, DeFi tokens have caught the attention of many people and this interest is expected to grow in the future. With DeFi we got to know prediction markets, lending, and the ability to get rewards through betting.

Whether the aforementioned trends will continue until the end of 2020 remains to be seen.

Storing and trading cryptocurrencies may be the best choice for those who already have the funds and knowledge in the crypto industry. Inexperienced and newbies are likely to fail and should prepare for this now.

This also applies to IEO — one should not invest in a project without carefully studying and analyzing it.

If we talk about the future interest in cryptocurrencies, most likely it will be associated with the emergence of regulation. The release of digital financial assets in accordance with the new laws will become the basis for further investor interest in the field of cryptocurrencies.

The development of this area will be significantly influenced by the emergence of digital currencies of central banks (CBDC), for which space will be "cleared" at the expense of commercial cryptocurrencies.

For example, central banks around the world are now showing interest in issuing CBDCs. So far, the leader among the largest countries is China, which has already conducted the first test distribution of its digital yuan to the population.