I know that the following post will be labelled as FUD and the NEXT team will hate me for this. But given their very bold statements and their history of underperforming and burned funds it is just fair to warn every interested investor that this is a very high risk investment - based on the complete history of the NEXT ecosystem since end of 2017.But given the fact that this is the 4th funding round from the same (for anonymous) "team" for the same platform (PayAccept excluded - considering the PayAccept ICO it would be the 5th round) I can't watch this anymore. Hence I started writing this up.I did some
DD on this project because I was interested in it. I will cross post this among various threads to give everyone a fair warning regarding the
Next.Chain ILO.
This is probably (?!) not a scam. But most certainly the most persistent
"fake it till you make it" attempt in crypto right now. Everything I gathered and summarized down below is true and verifiable. And there are many more red flags. This is just a brief collection of the timeline of Next Exchange/PayAccept/Next Chain.
If you invest:
This is extremely high risk with a good chance of a significant de-evaluation of your investment. Just ask the people who bought the NEXT token in 2018/2019 or NEXT coin in 2020 how much it is worth now, compared to their initial entry price.tl:dr The founder stated that the Next Exchange will take on Binance. The Coin will be the Bitcoin killer. The Chain will be the Ethereum killer. Their swap will be the UniSwap killer. Across the whole "ecosystem" they will offer in the future crypto-fiat payments and stocks of course. They went from ERC to their own chain and coin, back to a token. They went from centralized > hybrid > defi. From PoW to PoS. They offered masternodes and shared masternodes. But, all I can see in >3 years with 4 funding rounds is that they promised almost everything in crypto with only achieving a fraction of it. Instead, new projects with funding rounds popping up when the former one seems to reach a dead end: Next Exchange > PayAccept > Next Chain.
Here is the rough timeline of the Next.Exchange, PayAccept, and now Next.Chain:
- end of 2017 / early 2018 ICO of the NEXT ERC20 token for the planned NEXT exchange located in NL
- 2018 The planned CEX is marketed as a hybrid exchange now with PoW and masternodes. This aligns with the current crypto hype. The exchange is not public. Deadlines get pushed forward.
- 2019 NEXT ERC20 token to NEXT coin swap. Because NEXT has its own blockchain now = NEXT Chain (wait till 2021 for an update on this one). This aligns with the current crypto hype. The exchange is not public. Deadlines get pushed forward.
- 2020 NEXT Coin IEO. After the ICO of the ERC20 token and the swap to the NEXT Coin for token owners, the team sells some of their own coins during an IEO. Trading for coin owners is not enabled yet. The exchange was announced to be public right after the IEO. But the exchange is not public. Deadlines get pushed forward.
- 2020 Crowdfunding on their exchange for a few early users to cover the potential Dutch National Bank application, which is roughly €25k - says the CEO/founder. However, till today the DnB rejects the application. Hence, Dutch citizens can't use the exchange due to regulations. Also only crypto to crypto is possible due to this unregulated state. There is no public info what happened with the collected money - roughly €25k. But the exchange is not public. Deadlines get pushed forward.
- 2020 The Dutch founder announced "PayAccept" an European crypto payment provider. He says both companies have no connections. However, former NEXT Exchange roadmap plans appear in the PayAccept roadmap now (EMI license for example). Also he team is the same. Same office, etc. Btw. PayAccept is DEFI and staking is coming. This aligns with the current crypto hype. Telegram and Twitter numbers are artificially inflated.
- 2020 Somewhere here the exchange is finally public (for real, after 2 or 3 short attempts that went nowhere in the past - hence I didn't mention it till now). Trading is limited to some few pairs. However, there are many ongoing technical issues (till today) with user funds stuck in limbo and very limited support (one person at this moment). But the exchange is public. No more deadlines, however also only minimal development.
- 2020 PAY ICO to fund this new project, while the old project with 3 funding rounds already is still in development. Hence, this is the 4th funding round. They are selling the PAY ERC20 token, which is soon the PAYT token because the founder picked a token name which was already in use. Interesting fact - even with their own NEXT Chain blockchain and exchange the PAY token is ERC20 and the ICO runs on several other exchanges. Their "own" Next Exchange is left out. ERC20 sells better than some unknown blockchain token. Presumably. The platform is not public. Progress is not transparent.
- 2020 Huge surprise: the original NEXT Exchange team, except the Dutch founder, left Next Exchange & PayAccept. The medium post from the founder is just one side of the story. We never heard from the group who left what happened. The reasons remain unclear. From now own there are almost now details about current team size and members across the whole ecosystem. All new known members from now own are former telegram community members. The PayAccept platform is not public. Progress is not transparent. The Next Exchange platform gets from time to time some minor updates. No real progress.
- 2021 PoS instead of PoW announced for the NEXT Coin (shared) masternode owners. This aligns with the current crypto hype.
- 2021 NEXT Chain is the new focus now. NEXT is DEFI now. This aligns with the current crypto hype. Swaps are incoming and everything else that is the hit in crypto right now. Nothing is public yet. Largest development for NEXT Coin holders, who swapped from NEXT ERC20 token to NEXT coin in 2020: soon they can swap their NEXT Coins to new NEXT tokens again. It's a closed loop now. The money is obviously on Uniswap and other exchanges and not on their own. And in order to be able to trade them there the coins need to return to their former ERC state.
- 2021 NEXT Chain token ILO (Initial Liquidity Offering) by the NEXT Chain team (same team as NEXT Exchange or PAYACCEPT). The 5th funding round of this "team" in roughly 3 years. The NEXT Chain token from the current ILO is the above swapped NEXT Coin. The team will sell 6mil of their remaining 9mil NEXT coins. They will offer additional 2mil NEXT tokens on Uniswap after the ILO. Current NEXT Coin holders can't swap till the ILO is done and the team moved (i.e. sold) 8mil of their own COINs on the ETH blockchain again. At least this is the current plan.
tl:dr The 5th funding round in 3 years of a highly unsuccessful crypto "team" is about to start. The "team" is very non-transparent. The founder right now does not like to attach his name to all 3 projects based on current telegram chats. He is communicating anonymously among is various channels and the actual homepages. The remaining team consists of long term telegram members. The team aims to capitalize 8mil of their 9mil coins in this current 5th funding round. NEXT Exchange is barely working after 3 years. PayAccept exists only as a few screenshots. And there are many more red flags I didn't write up here.