The last battle of Durov

For everyone who believed in the cryptocurrency Telegram, a happy end came

On April 30, the confrontation between the Telegram messenger with the American femid and the securities and exchanges (SECs), which was imperative without measure, passed into a new phase: it was added to another year.

Some experts appreciated this postponement as a subtle strategic move, which increases the chances of Pavel Durov’s company to the final positive solution of their issue. Others fell into despondency on the basis that the de facto creators of the Ton network lost to the pressure of the state and, thereby, caused damage to the strategic goal-the onset of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth as a result of a rampant blockchainization and bitcoinization of everything and everything.

For my part, I will try to convey to the reader a different idea, which, it seems to me, not only corresponds to common sense, but also allows you to effectively fight the illusions that entangle the epic of Ton from the moment of its birth.

Nothing revolutionary, only business

In short, my key thought is this: the battle of Telegram with Sec and American justice is the absolutely private affair of Mr. Durov and his business. This battle is marginal and has nothing to do with technical progress, nor, even more so, to the prospects of popularizing the ideas of cryptorview in the world. That's why

The best that the public can do today is to forget about Ton and focus on more important things.

I'll try to argue and justify my position.

I'll start with a brief chronology of events. In December 2017, the CRYPTOVEST news agency, specializing in encryption technologies, was produced, judging by the subsequent events, the authorized leakage of information about the new Duorov brothers - Ton (Telegram Open Network, open telegram network).

The blockchain Ton and its token Gram positioned themselves as a revolutionary breakthrough, eliminating the inability of the main cryptocurrencies (bitcoin and ether) to captivate wide masses. Bitcoin and ether are too slowly processing transactions too slowly, too complicated for understanding and are not oriented to the market of goods and services. Ton / Gram promised to solve these problems due to the improved technology (advanced in terms of scalability of variation of Proof of Stake) and the presence of a unique launching pad - 200 million users of Telegram messenger. Ton / Gram is designed to turn Telegram from a platform for messaging into a full -fledged “Internet of money”.

Now let's look at the historical context in which the Durov brothers project arose.

In 2015, the ideals and illusions of the first wave of Satoshi’s supporters Nakamoto naturally gave way to the natural nature of man. The initiative was intercepted by crowds of uneducated, but cunning swindlers, who replaced crypto projects based on a disinterested contribution of volunteers, ICO gesheft, the primary proposal of coins, subordinate exclusively to the goals of personal enrichment.

In the next two years, several thousand criminal scams were launched in the ICO format (in English they are called SCAM - Kidalovo), which were crowned with a large -scale expropriation of money from a huge number of gullible investors.

Success of scammers ensured the attractiveness of cryptotechnologies in the eyes of the public while there is the same lack of the slightest understanding of how these technologies are arranged. The combination of these circumstances made it possible to distribute non -secured candy candy wrappers under the guise of cryptocurrencies, and to issue centralized databases for blockchain.

The peak of the price bubble, which ascended to heaven, the stock capitalization of shitcoins (ICO garbage tokens), fed to investors in exchange for their savings, came in December 2017, and it was at that moment that information on the launch of the Ton / Gram project leaked in the public field.

I hasten to warn the reader from the temptation to attribute to the leadership of Telegram criminal or simply doubtful intentions. In December 2017, when a decision was made to raise money, expectations in society were still enchanting and no one realized that it would not pass for a month, as the cost of the vast majority of garbage tokens in the cryptornka would depreciate almost zero.

It is significant that even in the conditions of mass euphoria, the Durov brothers abandoned the public ICO offer in favor of a closed collection of funds limited by qualified investors.

The choice of an alternative form of the contract was explained, of course, not by moral experiences, but for a forced necessity, which became obvious after the American Commission on Securities and Exchange (SECs), the only state structure in the world actually protecting the rights of investors, declared the ICO war in July 2017.

The new form of the contract was called a simplified agreement on future tokens (Simple Agreement for Future Tokens, SAFT). SAFT meaning: project financing is carried out in closed, non -public conditions. Only qualified, usually corporate, investors who give money for the development of the project in exchange for a promise to receive digital assets (tokens) at a certain moment in the future, when the project is launched and these tokens will be generated.

The reader should not build illusions: the only purpose of SAFT is a bypass of the SEC ban on the organization of ICO, who showed themselves in the vast majority of cases as an unscrupulous fraud and the shameless deception of ordinary investors. All the talk that SAFT qualitatively changes the legal basis for financing, and the participation of exclusively “qualified” and “accredited” investors relieve risks - this is cunning for the poor.

For the poor in the literal sense of the word: the criterion of a tight wallet is key to obtaining proper qualifications and accreditation. There are no stretches in my statement, because the same criterion permeates the financial and exchange industries at all levels. If you try to open a brokerage account from the street, you will set up many restrictions in front of you: a ban on derivatives trading, a ban on the use of complex option strategies, a ban on a marginal account, a ban on shares trafficking in a short, etc. To obtain the desired level of admission, you will have to fill the broker with diplomas and certificates proving your competence.

However, you should deposit 50 thousand dollars or more at the brokerage account, all the doubts about your qualification from the broker and the regulator will remove as a hand. At the same time

Any trading restrictions will also disappear: speculate at least until blue!

The only thing that makes the SAFT agreement is changing poor investors who do not understand anything in cryptocurrency, on wealthy investors, just as well in these technologies do not understand. Is it worth it to be surprised that the SEC trick with SAFT took on hostility just like the ICO agreement before?

1 billion 700 million dollars collected by Telegram, as a result of a closed offer, supposedly should have been created to create a TON network, a blockchain with a GRAM token, accompanying infrastructure and integration with a messenger. However, the reader should not have any illusions in this matter.

Investors, of course, could not understand the cartoon, hypercubic routing and the Ton virtual machine, however, turn their heads, compare and perform arithmetic operations at the level of primary school classes, they undoubtedly knew how to. This means that investors initially knew that money was raised even with a generous estate of 20, or even 30 times more than required to develop and launch the Ton network itself.

Offhand: in 2017, the Cardano (ADA) project raised $ 63 million at the initial placement. This money was enough for the developers for the eyes to create the most advanced blockchain in the world, using the same consensus as Ton (Proof of Stake).

Cardano, of course, was unique, but there were dozens of other examples of successful development of blockchain projects comparable to Ton / Gram and on ambitions, and in technical potential, for incompetibly less money.

Not a gram to investors

So, we will proceed from common sense and assume that investors perfectly understood the real cost of the cost of the Durov brothers project, but readily gave money with excess. Obviously, they were counting on something else. What?

One version is defended by Judge Kevin Castel in his verdict of March 24, 2020. We read the decision: “The court believes that the SEC with a high degree of probability may prove that the agreement on the sale of 2.9 billion GRAM tokens GRAM 175 for $ 1.7 billion is part of the total GRAM sale scheme in the secondary market, which will be implemented by the efforts of the Telegram team ... The court believes that this scheme is the sale of security without compulsory registration.”

In other words, investors gave Telegram money in exchange for the right to get GRAM tokens in the future at a price, significantly lower than the likely cost of these tokens in the secondary market. According to the judge, investors counted on quick earnings, because they could sell their tokens thirsty for the public in the first days of GRAM release to the exchange.

If we decide to agree with the judge, we will have to close our eyes to the fact that the collection of investors for the Ton project did not happen at the peak of the exchange bladder in December 2017, but in February 2018, after the total collapse of exchange rates on exchanges (in January 2018).

Investors of the Durov brothers already knew about the disaster, but they still gave the money.

Apparently, they made a bet on the fact that the year will pass (it was such a period that was initially allotted to launch the Ton blockchain), the passions will settle, the crowd will forget about its losses and joyfully trample the ram on a new haircut circle.

It seems to me alone what to consider people who invested almost two billion dollars in Ton, naive Simplias - a matter, to put it mildly, excessively self -confident?

I offer readers an alternative hypothesis in which, at least, worldly wisdom and common sense than in the verdict of judge Castel. I believe that Ton investors GRAM chances to repetition of the 2017 cryptopouder were evaluated adequately. Rather, they assessed the lack of such chances.

I also think that Ton investors, if they themselves have not been calculated, then certainly consulted experts about the real cost of blockchain development with well -studied and, to put it mildly, not the most revolutionary consensus algorithm.

Ton investors understood that most of the $ 1.7 billion received not to blockchain, but to the development of Telegram messenger himself. Investors understood that the SEC, having absorbed Pitbul in the ICO, would not ignore SAFT, which means that it would certainly try to prevent the emission of Gram token. Investors understood everything, but they gave the money anyway.

Let's see how further events developed. The only tangible result of the first year of Telegram on the Ton network was the breakdown of all the obligations indicated in the agreement on the deadlines. More precisely, an alleged breakdown, because no one has seen an agreement in the eye, did not provide any reports on the work done by Telegram, and the names of investors were kept in the strictest secret.

In June 2019, a turning point took place in the world: Facebook introduced its own Libra cryptonet. Mark Zuckerberg, unlike the Durov brothers, for some unknown reasons, decided to play openly, for which he immediately paid: the United State Coalition of the United States and the European Union rolled Libra into asphalt without any trial and investigation. While Mark, intimidated to death, justified his audacity in front of the Senate Commission, the Minister of Finance of Germany and France on the fingers explained to naive cryptosterior: Libra will happen only through the corpse. Moreover, the corpse is not the Central Bank, but its own, Librovsky.

After the destruction of Libra, it became clear to everyone that Ton / Gram has no chances to survive.

Telegram traditionally continued the game in Silence, delaying the launch of the network until the deadline agreed in the agreement with investors (October 30, 2019). However, the Securities and Exchange Commission played ahead of the lead: three weeks before the launch of the network, October 11, 2019, filed a lawsuit with a demand to ban the GRAM emission and recognize the fundraising from investors illegal.

Cryptosterior was trying to put Pavel Durov in the pose of the Hero-Samobyans, urging him to ignore the presumptuous Americans who imagined themselves to be a world gendarme, but the carnival with Popcorne did not happen. Telegram announced the intention to defend its case in court and postponed the launch of the Ton network. Investors were offered either to immediately take 77 % of investments, or wait for the end of the freezing of the activity (April 30, 2020).

The number 77 % reflected the reality:

391 million dollars from the resulting 1.7 billion at that time Telegram had already managed to capitalize.

As I already said, the decision of the gods on Olympus predetermined the fate of the Ton network in the summer of 2019, long before the appearance of the SEC laws on Telegram. There were no doubtful parties in predestination, however, the course of the trial left no doubt that the time, or rather, his delay, also acts as a full participant in the performance along with Uncle Sam and the Durov brothers.

Everything went to the fact that Judge Kevin Castel will reach the announcement of the verdict to the deadline, but the coronavirus happened, the priorities of the state changed, and on March 24 the court prematurely confirmed the case of the CEC and banned the emission of Gram.

Libertarian utopias

The public, which continues to hallucinate for the connection of the Ton network with the fate of cryptorviews, offered Pavel Durov as many as four scenarios of further behavior, one more crazy than the other.

Scenario No. 1: ignore the judge’s decision and launch Ton, as if nothing had happened.

Scenario No. 2: to return the money to American investors, but not to return the rest and, again, launch the network.

Scenario No. 3: Do not do anything yourself, and let the network run the third -party team of developers, for example, Ton Community Foundation (TCF) or Ton Labs.

Scenario No. 4: Pay a fine and officially register the GRAM emission in accordance with American law.

The proposed scenarios are utopian as for selection. The first three bring the Durov brothers personally to the monastery, even in the form of a comfortable American prison. The fourth ignores the main thing - the motive that was guided by the SEC when arousing the claim against Ton.

As expected, all four scenarios Pavel Durov shallowed, according to good tradition, he reached the bending silence to the last day and on the night of April 30 put forward the new ultimatum to the investors:

The launch of TON is postponed until April 30, 2021;

Those who do not want to wait can take 72 % of the initial investment (in October 2019, 77 % were offered: that is, 85 another 85 added to 391 million dollars);

The rest will receive GRAM tokens if, of course, in a year it is possible to knock out permission from the SEC for emission. Well, if it fails, then

Investors will receive 110% of their initial investment in the form of ... shared participation in Telegram assets!

It was then that we got to the most exciting part of the intrigue of our narrative. Immediately after the publication of March 24, the decisions of Judge Kevin Custael, the Internet was cramped with remarks, allegedly broadcasting the discontent of Durov’s investors and their intention to pick up their money with any development of events.

It was worth, however, to Durov to send the investors a letter with his proposal, as the voices of approval were heard from all sides. Investors Durov’s proposal greatly liked it. Before that, the last doubts disappeared to me: it was such an outcome that investors initially expected!

So, we were ripe in order to dot I over I in all mental constructions that we erected in the course of the proceedings.

Why did Libra be removed? Because the crypto project of Tsuckerberg put under attack the entire financial system, the cornerstone of which is the state monopoly on the issue of money. Facebook with its two billions of users created a real threat to the power of the Central Bank, so Libra was destroyed quickly, decisively and without any trial.

Why did Ton be removed? I have no doubt that the SEC analysts were remarkably figured out in the situation with Ton investors and guessed about their true interest, but neither Ton, nor his investors, nor Telegram, nor the Durov brothers Uncle Sam.

There is only one thing it is important: to create a precedent that prevents any attempts to use SAFT loopholes in the future instead of ICOs. Both contracts violate the rights of investors (which are qualified and rich, that unprepared and poor), since they do not give any protection from the arbitrariness of the unclean brown blockchain explosions.

Cryptoravolution after centralization

Why is it time for the public to get out of the diapers of romantic naivety and stop identifying any large crypto project with the fate of cryptorview? Because Telegram and its Ton network have no idea of ​​cryptoorview ideals. Ton / Gram is a private business, and nothing more. By the way, judge Kevin Castel in his verdict wrote in black and white about this: “SEC does not believe that the bitcoins exchanged in the blockchain of the same name are securities. The information that served as the reason for the initiation of the claim (that is, information about the GRAM token - S.G.) gives us a completely different picture. ”

В переводе с юридического на бытовой это значит, что криптореволюция — это публичный, децентрализованный и инклюзивный блокчейн биткоина. А TON / Gram — это коммерческий продукт частной компании, пытающейся финансировать собственный бизнес за счет сбора средств у инвесторов методами, нарушающими законодательство.

Наконец, какую ставку делали изначально инвесторы TON / Gram? Как я говорил, они прекрасно понимали, что львиная доля собранных средств пойдет не на блокчейн и его сервисы, а на мессенджер Telegram. Инвесторы это понимали и их это совершенно устраивало, потому что, как бы это мягче сказать, в гробу умные инвесторы видели очередной шиткоин, пусть даже в исполнении братьев Дуровых.

Инвесторов с самого начала интересовал не TON / Gram, а сам Telegram! Потому что мессенджер Дурова — это настоящая бомба. Бомба, которая, только за последний год увеличила клиентскую базу на 100 миллионов: с 300 до 400!

Telegram, однако, — частный бизнес и о том, чтобы с кем-то делиться долей, Дуров и мысли не допускал. Держался до последнего. Вплоть до 30 апреля. Оттягивал, пока мог, но, в конце концов, обстоятельства вынудили. И — допустил. В письме к инвесторам Дуров заявил, что активов Telegram хватит на то, чтобы перекрыть все долговые обязательства, включая и 476 миллионов долларов, уже потраченных из 1,7 млрд первоначальной инвестиции, и лишние 10 %, обещанных инвесторам к 30 апреля 2021 года.

Как видите, у нас неожиданно случился полномасштабный хэппи-энд. SEC создал прецедент и защитил потенциальных вкладчиков в будущие криптопроекты. Общественность, хочется надеяться, разочаровалась в химере отождествления частного бизнеса с криптореволюцией. Инвесторы TON / Gram добрались до самого вожделенного — шанса получить долю в Telegram. Братья же Дуровы получили очередной год передышки, который можно продуктивно использовать для чего-то доходного и перспективного. Например, форсированного перевода мессенджера на рекламную модель.