“I think this unfortunately overshadows the more important technology story.” “Right now it’s much easier to get more focused on the short-term ICO money stuff,” says Chris Dixon, a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz. But notably, the long-betting investors in this space see today’s numismatic delirium as a distraction. The topic is all the rage on Wall Street. Established venture capital firms like Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, and Union Square Ventures are pouring millions of dollars into cryptocurrency hedge funds. The smart money is also playing in this pool. In a photo recently posted to Instagram, Floyd Mayweather, the boxer, sits on a private jet surrounded by stacks of dollar bills, touting the sale of tokens for a prediction market called Stox-a moment some saw as proof that ICO hype had reached peak zaniness. There’s even one for dentists (DentaCoin). A gentlemen’s club in Las Vegas (Legends Room). Digital advertising (Basic Attention Token, adToken). There are now tokens funding every conceivable endeavor: Decentralized cloud storage (FileCoin, Storj). Hundreds of projects have collectively raised more than a billion dollars through “ initial coin offerings” (ICOs). (Hence, petsdotcoin.) At press time, the total market value of all virtual currencies had rocketed past $135 billion, up from just under $20 billion at the beginning of the year. The sector has attracted maniacal investor interest this year, giving these e-coins absurdly inflated valuations that have inspired endless comparisons to the “dotcom” era. In case you haven’t been keeping track, digital tokens are a new asset class, powered by cryptocurrency networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum. In that respect, my funny-money vanity project is a tiny part of a movement of profound economic significance. But if I had tied those bits to some worthwhile business idea, petsdotcoin might have offered investors a radical new way to fund me, track their stake, and participate in a miniature, virtualized, in-app economy. Despite that expense, my tokens are valued at 0 Ether, or $0.00, as the program reminds me. Their creation cost me $1.57 in Ether, the cryptocurrency that fuels the Ethereum network. Twenty-seven seconds and one block confirmation later, I am the proud owner of 500 newly minted “petsdotcoin” tokens.
0 kommentar(er)
