Initial coin offerings and value creation of token-based blockchain projects

Abstract

There is growing recognition that blockchain technology has significantly altered the ways people work and communicate. More and more start-ups are attempting to take advantage of blockchain technology. Specifically, these token-based blockchain start-ups often firstly launch a new Initial Coin Offering (ICO) project to raise funds for their development. However, with the popularity of blockchain technology, the potential of new ICO projects to mislead or deceive investors has increased considerably. More importantly, theoretical guidance concerning how token-based blockchain start-ups leverage blockchain technology to enhance value creation is still limited. Based on information disclosure theory, one of our studies provides a framework for detecting scam ICO projects. Additionally, we also illustrate how the differences in information disclosure approaches will impact ICO funding success. Furthermore, grounded in the socio-technical perspective and the rich data obtained from case analyses of blockchain-enabled online communities, the other study of this thesis develops a theoretical model to identify the core value drivers of blockchain-enabled online communities. Our findings can be used to increase investors’ awareness of deception in ICO projects and help investors to discriminate between ICOs with low vs. high information disclosure based on the ICO whitepapers. Furthermore, our findings can help token-based blockchain start-ups to have a better understanding of the disclosure quality of whitepapers and the importance of having whitepapers with high disclosure quality. Moreover, we also provide guidance to blockchain start-ups to better identify the core value drivers of blockchain and thus leveraging blockchain technology to enhance value creations.