"If investors want to make a reliable investment, they should choose AIO," said Anti Danilevsky, founder of Kick Ecosystem

The creation and popularization of decentralized crypto exchanges and launchpads have become a new milestone in the development of cryptocurrency investment. And if earlier it was mainly professional investors and businessmen who decided to invest in crypto startups, today this function is available to almost everyone: from a schoolboy to a pensioner. However, the cryptocurrency market is still risky, and the number of spam projects in this sector is simply off the scale. We discussed the main trends, problems, and prospects of cryptocurrency investment with the founder and head of Kick Ecosystem, Anti Danilevsky.

Anti, how do you assess the state of cryptocurrency investment? Have more investors been willing to invest in startups, or has it declined after the ICO boom?

A.D.: There are a lot more investors-this is a fact. At the same time, the number of ways to invest in crypto startups has also increased: from direct placements of tokens on Uniswap to mini-presales of several hundred thousand dollars on sites like Coin list.Crypto investment is a very promising direction, so we, for our part, completely rewritten our KickICO platform and introduced a completely new way of conducting token sales — Auction based Initial Offering (AIO). On Monday, May 17, the QUASA investment campaign was launched on the site. On the first day of the collection, the project attracted a little more than $9 thousand and this is without marketing and PR. If you look at what amounts are poured into meme tokens, such as KISHU or Safemoon, it becomes clear that the crypto audience remains in the mood to buy HYIP tokens.

What new forms of crowdfunding are used in the world of cryptocurrencies today?

A.D.: Today, there are several forms of cryptocurrency crowdfunding. This includes ICO (Initial Coin Offering), which was especially popular in 2017-2018, but in fact, only a few were able to build a profitable business at the expense of investors. Most of the projects turned out to be an outright scam. In 2020, there was such a direction as Initial DEX Offering (IDO). In the case of IDO, investment fees are organized directly by the token issuer, and they can be initiated by absolutely any market participant. The keyword is any. That is, decentralized sites practically do not check the project's reliability, do not request documentation. I believe that IDO cannot be used in such a risky market as cryptocurrencies.

To protect investors from scam companies as much as possible, the team and I have restarted the KickICO platform. Here, companies can raise funds through AIO's know-how. I will say right away that AIO is my invention, and we have already received a lot of positive feedback that it is not only safe to participate in this type of tokensale, but also gambling. I will give an example of a verbatim quote from one of the participants: "I do not know what kind of token this is, but I like to interrupt other people's bets and win!".
We gamified the tokensale process, which certainly pleased our audience. However, the main task of AIO is to form the natural price of the token, so that after entering the secondary market, its value would not fly into the abyss, and investors would not lose thousands or even millions of dollars after the pre-sale.

In other words, is IDO a more convenient form of attracting investment for startups?

A.D.: Yes, the form may be more convenient, but the lack of control allows all scam projects to raise funds. In addition, due to the high price of ether, the commissions for participation in IDO are sky-high, they do not allow micro-investors to participate. For market participants, the most appropriate form is AIO. In addition, we conduct compliance of authors and their legal entities that conduct tokensale, and this reduces the risks of scam exists. If the campaign was fraudulent, then the organizers of the scam will be easier to find. I believe that IDOs are for the most part just as bored as ICOs, because there is no responsibility there.

How is the price of the AIO token formed? Is fraud possible here? For example, applications for the purchase of tokens will be submitted exclusively by employees and owners of the company to artificially raise the price. Is it real?

A.D.: The author of the tokensale specifies how many tokens he wants to sell, and in how many days. For example, this is 900,000 tokens that will be sold for 30 days. In this case, 30,000 tokens will be put up for sale every day. Buyers bid on what price and how many tokens they are willing to buy. Those whose bids are higher will buy tokens. Those whose bids are lower than others will not buy tokens. At the end of the day, the orders that are collected in the glass are executed. Thus, the market price of tokens is formed, since the participants of the tokensale themselves choose the price that they are willing to pay for the coin of a particular project.
To minimize market manipulation on the part of the company, we have introduced a mandatory KYC procedure that allows you to identify each user. Of course, you can try to create a whole army of fake traders, but this is not rational. Bidding takes place within a few hours, and the registration of new participants will take a certain period.

What criteria do you use to select projects for listing, or can any project launch a campaign on the KickICO platform?

A.D.: Almost any project that has a registered legal entity, which is an issuer of tokens, and whose tokens are not securities can place a campaign on the KickICO platform. We check the reality of the authors, their companies, and study tokenomics. However, we are not judges and do not assume the responsibility to decide who should raise funds and who should not. Therefore, if the project is real, it will be allowed.
The goal of KickICO is to create a community that will analyze campaigns, write reviews, and decides for itself what is worth supporting and what has too high risks. While these mechanics are not working yet, but they will work shortly.

The KUSD semi-stablecoin is now announced on the KickICO platform. What is it and what is its nature?

A.D.:This is a coin that we need for internal payments between ecosystem participants: counterparties, partners, brokers of our KickEX exchange, and so on. In the future, fees on the KickICO platform will be carried out in KUSD, and payments in BTC, ETH, and other coins will be converted to KUSD.

Tell us about the company's plans for the next 3-5 years

A.D.: In the next five years, we plan to develop the ecosystem into a top business, raise the KickEX trading platform to the top 10 exchanges in the world, form a network of stock exchange brokers around the world, conduct hundreds of campaigns on KickICO totaling at least $1 billion, enter the American market, and then bring the company to an IPO. In a word, we are ready to conquer the world.