An exploratory look at the role of ownership in initial coin offerings (ICO): Different audiences and ICO success

Initial coin offering (ICO) is a Web-3 based financing method for ventures, which allows them to use digital assets (e.g., tokens) to raise capital. During an ICO, the entrepreneur has control on ownership; they can choose to issue a very small number of tokens which would allow them to keep “their skin in the game” and retain ownership, or issue all the tokens they hold, which would distribute ownership to investors and have a community-decentralized orientation. While previous literature has identified several factors of ICO success, they have not delved into the role of ownership in ICO success. In this study, we explore whether retaining or distributing ownership during an ICO is more beneficial for raising capital. We find a two-pronged explanation. When looking at ICOs maintaining a higher level of ownership, entrepreneurs are catering to corporate-market logic investors, and we see a U relationship where the optimal percentage in which the entrepreneurs show they have skin in the game at the same time as giving enough to investors. But then, there are ICOs distributing most of its ownership in which entrepreneurs are attracting community-oriented investors, and as such, the higher the distribution the higher the investment. We propose that this is related to how there are different investors audiences’ that will value different practices and ideals and choose differently on what types of projects to invest in. Our research elucidates this new funding source. Nonetheless, future research should investigate these exploratory findings.