Since I don't feel like working quite yet... thought I would add some perspective from my standpoint and why although I understand the demands for transparency - I also understand and accept that there will be none.
To me, as an investor I have everything I need to know to make a decent bet on this project:
1) Demand for concept. As should be clear from both the initial success of this ICO and the amount of money (both investment and sales-wise) into silkroad, Overstock.com, etc. the crypto-currency world is desperate for an actual broad based marketplace in which to transact real exchange of goods. Couple that with the interest in smart-contract based systems and trustless-escrow processes and availability of anon/relative-anon transactions and you've got a 100K BTC+ idea.
2) Nature of coins themselves. Although I understand skepticism, the reality is that even of the 'good' or 'honest' coins... the majority fail due to a lack of initial funding. As a result of the armies of 'investors' whose only desire is manipulating fast gains in BTC/fiat, those that don't have a war-chest of funding that is not dependent on the current market price of the coin itself often die an early death. If the project managers have only access to funds which are dependent on the current exchange rate of their coin/BTC pairing, and further on the fiat/BTC pairing for actual expenditures (hotel, travel, marketing, etc.) what started out as an adequate amount (premine, ICO, whatever) rapidly turns into barely enough to send 2 people to one conference and then having to spend their time begging for donations - donations that have to come from bagholders who, in most cases, are already in the red.
3) The risk in general. There is a general misconception surrounding an ICO of a coin (partially due to naming) that causes people to draw similarities with an IPO in the stock market. In reality this is much more similar to your nephew wanting to start a comic book store and asking relatives for enough capital to buy a storefront, inventory, and hire 2 employees, etc. In many cases you have to accept that the money may simply disappear, and invest accordingly... however, in exchange you can still see returns - even in disastrous cases.
Waiting is much safer, however - since the BC/'BlackHand' (and the first multipool should be included in that list as well actually) was brought up here is where I sit in that: I mined intially from day one and held everything. I bought another 15BTC - at the time all I had - when everyone else was dumping... I then sold off a small portion of my bag when the pump occurred (although not as much as I wish I had in hindsight... I'd have 500BTC and the same amount of BC I held at the time by now)! My investment was sound, despite everything that went down because I invested very early. On the other hand, if I'd waited until I saw things working and bought in at 70K sats or something like that - assuredly because I didn't want to get left behind - then I'd be holding a 85% lost in my portfolio for a very long time... possibly forever (although I will hold my remaining BC forever, because now it's free - thanks to luck/early trust).
The bottom line is this... even if this were a scam, and the BTC was simply used to pump the coin and then dump it... with that much BTC for manipulation... it's gonna be one hell of a pump... and you should be able to capitalize on it. On the other hand, if the parties are driven by greed (which we can assume as aren't all of us?) and even if they were initially planning on running with the funds - wouldn't it make more sense to get 10K BTC rather than ~2500 BTC? It's clear that the amount of work required to deliver at least the first phases of this project (wallet/contracts/marketplace) is relatively simple to do... it's also obvious that if there's this much demand without those things being in place - then demand will only increase (along with price) - when it rolls out!
If you're worried, wait - if you can absorb the risk/loss for the opportunity to capitalize on this demand/hype then you undoubtedly already threw your BTC into this. If you're not sure, then look at it exactly the same as you would a lottery ticket or slot machine... where I live people dump millions every week into 1:1,000,000 long shots and they call it 'entertainment'... you might lose everything, you might double your money, or you might see 10,000% gains... but the only way you can guarantee that you won't see profits in this world is by doing nothing at all until it's over.
To me, as an investor I have everything I need to know to make a decent bet on this project:
1) Demand for concept. As should be clear from both the initial success of this ICO and the amount of money (both investment and sales-wise) into silkroad, Overstock.com, etc. the crypto-currency world is desperate for an actual broad based marketplace in which to transact real exchange of goods. Couple that with the interest in smart-contract based systems and trustless-escrow processes and availability of anon/relative-anon transactions and you've got a 100K BTC+ idea.
2) Nature of coins themselves. Although I understand skepticism, the reality is that even of the 'good' or 'honest' coins... the majority fail due to a lack of initial funding. As a result of the armies of 'investors' whose only desire is manipulating fast gains in BTC/fiat, those that don't have a war-chest of funding that is not dependent on the current market price of the coin itself often die an early death. If the project managers have only access to funds which are dependent on the current exchange rate of their coin/BTC pairing, and further on the fiat/BTC pairing for actual expenditures (hotel, travel, marketing, etc.) what started out as an adequate amount (premine, ICO, whatever) rapidly turns into barely enough to send 2 people to one conference and then having to spend their time begging for donations - donations that have to come from bagholders who, in most cases, are already in the red.
3) The risk in general. There is a general misconception surrounding an ICO of a coin (partially due to naming) that causes people to draw similarities with an IPO in the stock market. In reality this is much more similar to your nephew wanting to start a comic book store and asking relatives for enough capital to buy a storefront, inventory, and hire 2 employees, etc. In many cases you have to accept that the money may simply disappear, and invest accordingly... however, in exchange you can still see returns - even in disastrous cases.
Waiting is much safer, however - since the BC/'BlackHand' (and the first multipool should be included in that list as well actually) was brought up here is where I sit in that: I mined intially from day one and held everything. I bought another 15BTC - at the time all I had - when everyone else was dumping... I then sold off a small portion of my bag when the pump occurred (although not as much as I wish I had in hindsight... I'd have 500BTC and the same amount of BC I held at the time by now)! My investment was sound, despite everything that went down because I invested very early. On the other hand, if I'd waited until I saw things working and bought in at 70K sats or something like that - assuredly because I didn't want to get left behind - then I'd be holding a 85% lost in my portfolio for a very long time... possibly forever (although I will hold my remaining BC forever, because now it's free - thanks to luck/early trust).
The bottom line is this... even if this were a scam, and the BTC was simply used to pump the coin and then dump it... with that much BTC for manipulation... it's gonna be one hell of a pump... and you should be able to capitalize on it. On the other hand, if the parties are driven by greed (which we can assume as aren't all of us?) and even if they were initially planning on running with the funds - wouldn't it make more sense to get 10K BTC rather than ~2500 BTC? It's clear that the amount of work required to deliver at least the first phases of this project (wallet/contracts/marketplace) is relatively simple to do... it's also obvious that if there's this much demand without those things being in place - then demand will only increase (along with price) - when it rolls out!
If you're worried, wait - if you can absorb the risk/loss for the opportunity to capitalize on this demand/hype then you undoubtedly already threw your BTC into this. If you're not sure, then look at it exactly the same as you would a lottery ticket or slot machine... where I live people dump millions every week into 1:1,000,000 long shots and they call it 'entertainment'... you might lose everything, you might double your money, or you might see 10,000% gains... but the only way you can guarantee that you won't see profits in this world is by doing nothing at all until it's over.
Wow, that was a very well written post. Your point about early entry and lowered risk rang a bell for me. I am holding BTCD as a long term play, and although I have taken some profits here and there, I am still solidly in the black - despite the current bear market. And the reason is the same - I recognized the technology early on, did alot of research, and despite the 'unknown dev' situation I bought in early and low. There was plenty enough to go on. ( I am not nudging BTCD here btw, just relating my parallel experience. )
I see the reality here as being this: a functioning, non - vulnerable decentralized market has been the holy grail for a long time now. It has not happened as a community driven, open source initiative despite the resources (Open Bazaar) being in place. This project has the elements to make it happen. Anon backers do not faze me - I think it is actually quite wise in today's climate to have only a minimum number of public faces connected with a project such as this.
