Translated material
Telegram tragedy
Who will become the buyer of the messenger after the collapse of the cryptocurrency project Durov
No wonder they say: if you were hinted at the guest that you have sat down, it is better not to nervous the worried hosts and immediately lie down.
It was only necessary for me that it was no longer necessary to discuss the commercial initiatives of the Durov brothers, as on you-the world was shaken by a new extravagan: we learn from the lips of Pavel Durov that the Ton/Gram project is closing, investors will not wait for any cryptotototototototototokenes, they will not receive the telegram campaign, and any attempts to launch something without him, Durovsky, and they are in charge-they lie down and lie. Provocation.
The last press release of the owner of Telegram ( *in Russia the service is blocked- *ed. ) Steamed in a traditional style for him, a letter-up-up metaphor about a white tailcoat and a crowd in an unsightly form:
For two and a half years, “our best engineers” worked on a new generation blockchain, but the American Themis cut the wings of a dream;
If it seems to you that the decision of the American court is absurd, then it seems to you correctly;
The United States control in the world everything regarding finance and technology, so the world is powerless before their arbitrariness;
“Telegram active participation in TON is completed”;
“You can see sites using my name or brand Telegram, or Ton abbreviation to promote your projects. Do not trust them with your money or data. None of the or former members of our team is involved in any of these projects. ”
“I want to complete this post with a wish for good luck to all those who strive for decentralization, justice and equality in the world.”
To some kind of cryptonophyte, who overslept the last 10 years, the pamphlet of Durov may have seemed inspiring, but in normal people the text caused only one question: “Where is the money, Zin?!”
Well, that is, good people gave us 1 billion 700 million for a promise to launch Ton blockchain and give out GRAM tokens, we spent half a billion and are now authorized to say: you will not have any blockchain! And there will be no tokens either. But there will be a "wish good luck to everyone who strives for decentralization." Why? But because the evil American judge decided so. Force Major, my friend.
Well, there will be no tokens, and it will not be. Bad, of course, but not fatal. The main thing now is to deal with money. What about 1.7 billion invested? As of January 2020, 405 million (24%) were spent of them, and taking into account the April proposals of Durov on a refund for investors - 476 million (28%). However, there is not a hint of reporting, but even the slightest desire to tell someone something and show. This is not a royal thing - to report to investors.
The question of reporting is by no means idle, because
The development of the coolest blockchain even on the upper bar is $ 20 million. Where then did the missing 456 million go?
If it seems to someone that 20 million for the development of blockchain is not enough, I will bring only one argument-from fresh ones. In March 2020, the first round of the public investment of the XX Network project of the legendary David Chaum, the procession of the crypto -revolution, which made a good half of the main discoveries of modern encryption (blockchain technology, payment systems Ecash and Digital Cash, blind signatures, group signatures, mixed networks, from which was then born then born, was completed. Tor, the solution to the problem of "dining cryptographers" and many more differently).
Sitting brought the XX Network $ 14 million, and the developers' team led by David Chaum, without hiding happiness, said that the promotion of the world's first blockchain and cryptocurrencies that are resistant to quantum calculations will now go with seven-mini steps and the network beta testing will begin in the fall.
Nikolai Durov, of course, is not David Chaum, but this is still not enough to understand where the investors' money went. In January 2020, during interrogation as part of a trial in the SEC claim against Telegram, Pavel Durov said that over the past year, $ 218 million were spent. Moreover, it was spent on the Ton/Gram project and the Telegram messenger, because the accounting of both projects is common.
If we assume that investors initially gave money only for the development of Ton/Gram,
Telegram coverage due to invested money in the eyes of any court is a criminal act. For this, even the name was invented: "Inappropriate spending of funds."
Two weeks ago, I suggested that the investors were most likely not to interest Ton/Gram at all, because after collapsing in January 2018, the crypto -romance bubble in thinking people did not have illusions about the popularity of the next blockchain.
Accordingly, investors, giving Durov money for the development of blockchain, hoped to profit from the development of the flagship business - Telegram itself. And if so, then 90% of investments launched on the development of the messenger infrastructure should not cause objections.
In any layer, the price of the Ton blockchain without Telegram is three kopecks on a bazaar day, which showed us lightness with which Durov abandoned his pseudo -revolutionary brainchild.
However, there is another nuance. In June 2015, in an interview with The Kernel, Pavel Durov complained that he had to spend 1 million dollars a month from his own pocket for the maintenance of the Telegram messenger.
Money from investors raised in early 2018. It turns out that over the past two and a half years, 30 million dollars should have gone to Telegram according to the old estimate. And in fact, 456 were spent.
It is reasonable to assume that this money went for the purchase of additional equipment and scaling the Telegram network due to the influx of new users.
If you use the figure from Durov’s interrogation - $ 218 million per year of project support, everything converges: 436 million in two years.
The missing 20 million can be attributed to lawyers who mediocre the case in the New York court.
In case of any formula for the counting before the Durov brothers, only one dilemma is worth: either to recognize the misuse of funds and go under an almost guaranteed losing court on criminal articles, or recognize spending on Telegram as a single project with Ton/Gram, and then you will need to either pay with investors with living money, or share shares in the Telegram business.
Personally, I have no doubt that this whole story will end only in court and only with a terrible scandal, therefore it is reasonable to assume that the main severity of the financial burden associated with the forced repayment of debts to investors will fall on Telegram messenger.
For the Russian audience, this issue is all the more relevant that Telegram is perceived in our Fatherland almost as the last bastion of the freedom of communications (running ahead, I will say that this is the complete nonsense of many worthy alternatives in the market).
Nevertheless, taking into account local specifics, we would most like to get answers to two questions today:
How do the Durov brothers are going to pay with their investors? And - what are Telegram's chances to survive after impending bloodletting?
Ideally, it would be good to listen to the heroes of the celebration themselves, but, unfortunately, all their actions in the last three weeks demonstrate the complete absence of a realistic plan to repay debts.
April 29, on the eve of the expiration of the deadline for launching the Ton blockchain, the ultimatum received an ultimatum from Durov: either they now take 72% of the money invested in the project two years ago (we will recall that in October 2019, in the previous ultimatum, the figure was 77%-5 additional percent were pushed, it is necessary to understand the interests, lawyers who represented the interests that represented the interests. Telegram in the court of New York), or wait another year and receive 110% of the initial investment.
A little mathematics: 110% of 1.7 billion - 1.87 billion, and 72% of the remaining today is 1.22 billion. In other words, Durov is going to earn $ 646 million for a year. If we assume that 1.22 billion is all the money that remained, then the promised profitability is 53% per annum. There is no such profitability in the investment world markets and has never been in life, so
We are talking either about the sale of something very valuable (most likely Telegram), or about an attempt to pull time and feed breakfast.
On May 4, a new thunder struck: Durov with a powerful hand pushes American investors from a fantastic feeder with 110% and leaves the only option - now take 72% of the invested money and let's go to the exit. For non-American investors, another non-ethnic Kondraty is inhibited in the sleeve: there will be no blockchains-tokens in a year, all the more there will be no share in Telegram, as many people hoped. Instead of all this, either take after the American colleagues in misfortune 72%, or renew the SAFT agreement concluded two years ago on credit at 53%.
The very next day - May 6 - the nut was finally wrapped: the new loan agreement is drawn up not for the full term (1 year), but as much as Durov wants. If there is money to pay off the debt in a month, it means that the interest will be charged in only one month, after which they also say goodbye to everyone.
If the reader finds it difficult to select a definition for such an attitude towards people who have invested a lot of money in your business, I am ready to suggest: arrogant twisting hands.
Not only is the conditions served in a peremptory ultimatical form, but every day something new is hidden, so that it becomes even more profitable for the lender. What, excuse me, is the base? And on the fact that the American court is a strangler of world freedom and traction of the progressive public for decentralization!
At this moment, it is appropriate to remind readers that there are hundreds of cryptocurrency projects and blockchains in the world, which, unlike Ton/Gram, pose a real threat of a fiat cash system in the world. For example, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Monero, Zcash, Dash, etc. However, the slightest claims of the American Femis against these undersherers of the foundations do not arise.
I explained the lack of claims in the previous article: there are decentralized, public, open, neutral and stable blockchains and their cryptocurrencies that have never collected money from investors. And there are geshefts of private business, which, using crypto -revolutionary rhetoric and legal tricks of the SAFT type, provide for themselves banal financing personally.
Ton/gram - from among the latter, so
The pathos of the last Durov’s episode for the American stranglers of freedom is crafty and inappropriate.
What are the chances of getting your money back in excess of the promised 72%? I must say that investors have no unanimity in the assessment of the cascade of daily changing offers emanating from Durov. To begin with, no one can determine these investors for certain, the information is still stored secret, and the public either builds guesses, or relies on the comments of those few who decided to get out of the shadows.
From what is known from the comments “from the inside”, it follows that part of the investors waved her hand and is going to pick up 72%in the near future, having written off 28%from the balance of gluttonous blockchainals.
Another part, presented, for obvious reasons, by American investors who were thrown overboard as unnecessary ballast, is going to go to court with a group claim in order to sue not only all his money, but also much more - due to fines.
The third group of investors has not yet been decided, but since there is nothing to choose from, sooner or second they will sooner or later.
Based on the experience of history and common sense, it can be assumed that most of the undefined ones will bend to the judicial group lawsuit and will not lose. There is so much punitive potential in American jurisprudence that even if the group claim is limited only to American investors, fines will potentially be able to exceed full investments in the Ton/Gram project ($ 1.7 billion) many times.
In this case, Pavel Durov will definitely arise the question of the sale of Telegram, because it is difficult to imagine that there is at least one investor in the world who would agree after such a two -year epic to entrust the fiery fighters for world decentralization at least the dollar in exchange for naked promises.
Telegram on a barrel - only after that we will talk.
Now the main question is: how much can you help for Telegram and - most importantly - who will become the buyer of the messenger?
To begin with, there are no official assessments of the cost of the Telegram business and cannot be: the company is private, it was not previously put up for sale, so you can evaluate the Durov messenger only by analogy with competitors. For example, with WhatsApp.
In December 2013, WhatsApp had 400 million users - as much as TEELGRAM announces his client base today.
At that time, WhatsApp was estimated at 1.5 billion dollars. We assume that Telegram costs the same amount.
In the press today, different numbers of the cost of Telegram are walking - from 4 to 10 billion dollars. All this is pure speculation, which, again, is based on a precedent: at a cost of 1.5 billion WhatsApp, Facebook was acquired in February 2014 for $ 19 billion. This deal was the largest purchase of venture business in history.
It is significant that Facebook gave only $ 4 billion for whatsApp. 13 billion vents of the Sequoia Capital (owner of WhatsApp) received not money, but Facebook shares. Another 3 billion went to two founders of WhatsApp personally, but also by shares.
Suppose Telegram will be able to make a miracle and repeat the unique record of the Facebook transaction with WhatsApp. Suppose that outside the window is now not unprecedented over the past 90 years, the global economic and financial crisis, and the same blessed February 2014 with the Olympics in Sochi. But even in such a fantasy layout, Telegram will be able to help out $ 4 billion.
This money is definitely enough to redeem all investors at a rate of 72% of the initial deposits, and, probably, even enough for a ransom, taking into account 53% of the per annum, promised to those who agree to be reinstalled.
If, however, American investors filed a lawsuit with the group, especially if they are joined by colleagues in misfortune on this side of the ocean, as well as taking into account potentially murderous fines, the revenue from the sale of Telegram may not be enough for the best price in history.
Finally, the saddest thing: who wants to buy Telegram today, especially for that kind of money? You can formulate the question differently: who has such money for the purchase? After all, we need a merchant of the Facebook level, the annual revenue of which is $ 70 billion, and net profit - 18.
Do you know such? I am not. Unless Elon Musk, but today he has his own problems: you need to knock out the defrosting of the plant from the California state administration paralyzed by coronaviral self -isolation. It is necessary to finish the construction of a super -speed tunnel. I do not think that the South African visitor is ready to part with his childhood dream - a flight to Mars. In short, the mask is not up to Durov and not to Telegram.
Even in the air, hellish fantasies are hovering about the ransom of the messenger by Russian oligarchs or even, Lord, the Kremlin, do not bring.
As a counterargument, I propose to order a pass, go out to the Moscow street, look around, be horrified by the frozen everything and everything and think: is the state and oligarchs to the messenger today?
Well, the last nail in the lid: why can anyone buy Telegram when there are Signal and Discord?
Signal is the most popular messenger with audio and video support (which is not in Telegram), while with an open code and real through encryption.
Discord is a free messenger, long -minded by gamers, cryptocurrency and educational structures. VOIP, video conference, all things. Last summer, Discord had 250 million users.
But in addition to Signal and Discord, there are also a dozen crypto projects with uncompromising security messengers launched on blockchains built without any ICO and SAFT. I call the first one who came to mind - the Session messenger on the Australian blockchain Loki. There are not only no centralized servers in it and all messages are protected by through encryption, but any traces of metadata are completely destroyed so that even the temptation does not arise to look for information about the date, time, geopolition, computer equipment, etc.
The fate of Telegram has always been not easy, but today, due to the egregious strategic miscalculations of the leader (how could you ignore signals sent since the summer of last year by the American establishment, and bring the case to a hopeless trial with SEC?!) It is completely unenviable.
And so I weighed and this, but I did not find a way out of the impasse. Apparently, the low bell tower does not allow. However, only one scenario of the further development of events is visible from it - the one that mirror the story with VKontakte. In 2014, Pavel Durov could not stand the pressure of adverse circumstances, quit and left.
Then, however, there was where to leave, and the harmless pursuer did not particularly chase. Where to run today - alas, it is incomprehensible.