Will Telegram Renounce Its Public ICO Launch?

According to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), Telegram decided to give up on its Initial Coin Offering (ICO).

An anonymous source shared with the WSJ that the possible cause is that the popular messenger raised enough money ($1.7 bln) in two private ICO rounds, where 81 investors took part in the first round and 84 – in the second. One of the Telegram ICO participants was reportedly Sergei Solonin, the founder of Qiwi – popular payment service provider.

The money raised will be used for the benefit of Telegram. A portion of these resources will also be used to set up a blockchain platform called Telegram Open Network.

Telegram has recently been banned in Russia. After that, Telegram’s CEO Pavel Durov said the company would use Bitcoin to finance VPNs and proxies to provide back channels to Russian users.