Telegram gives up his project to establish his own block chain under the name TON and a crypto currency called Gram. Telegram boss Pavel Durov sharply criticizes the USA in his justification for the abrupt end.
Bitter belly landing for Telegram and the project of an own crypto-currency, which is covered with a lot of advance praise and capital. In a blog post Telegram founder Pavel Durov announced that the work on the block chain TON and the crypto currency Gram would be stopped with immediate effect. “Unfortunately, a US court has prevented TON,” writes Durov. Two weeks ago Telegram had already offered early investors compensation payments, but at the same time had announced the launch of Gram and TON in April 2021. Now the project will officially become a billion-dollar grave, 1.8 billion US dollars of venture capital is said to have been raised in advance.
Why Telegram is giving up TON and Gram
Telegram had published little information on its block chain and crypto-currency strategy. Durov now describes the concept as a decentralized way to exchange ideas and money. He said that the concept was based on the pioneers of Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), but in 2.5 years of development work, they had managed to surpass them in terms of scalability and speed. But then in October 2019 the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) intervened and prohibited the sale of Gram in the USA. The decision was based on the fact that Gram is a security token and is therefore subject to compulsory registration. A US court confirmed this view and, according to Durov, went even further. The judges therefore prohibited the sale of Gram worldwide, as US citizens could otherwise succeed in acquiring a stake in TON.
Born in St. Peterburg, Durov left Russia in mid-2010 due to problems with the state apparatus. Telegram now has more than 400 million users and is considered the messenger service that owes its popularity to particularly sophisticated encryption technology. Durov is in exile and is now not sparing with criticism of the USA. In his opinion, the USA is taking the right to rule the world. By controlling the US dollar, they control the global financial system. Via Google and Apple, the USA could remove apps from the range of products on offer at any time. And so TON and Gram have failed due to the US veto, although the project was welcome everywhere else in the world. 96 percent of the world’s population is ganged by the 4 percent who live in the US and elect decision-makers there, Durov said. If the US were to ban coffee and ask Italy to close coffee houses because they could be visited by US citizens, everyone would probably agree, Durov makes a bold comparison. In Gram and TON he sees parallels to a gold mine, where TON is the mine and Gram is the gold. But now the investors who developed the gold mine have been forbidden to sell their gold.
What the end of Gram means for the crypto industry and Telegram
Despite all the harsh criticism of the USA, Durov still owes an answer as to how investors will now be treated. According to earlier media reports, talks are underway of a repayment of 72 percent of the investment sums, which would mean around 1.3 billion US dollars. As a private company, Telegram does not publish any business figures, so it remains uncertain whether this enormous sum can be raised. Durov expressly warns against giving money or information to projects that advertise with its name or TON. His team has completely withdrawn from TON and Gram and if the technology now appears elsewhere, no support will be provided.
The crypto scene is once again seeing the SEC take an anti-crypto position. The SEC has already sentenced several times crypto-currencies after the launch to fines and compensation payments because of unauthorized ICOs. The Telegram case once again makes it clear that legal cryptographic business in the USA is a sensitive area. Meanwhile, attention is now turning back to Facebook Libra, hoping to get the green light from regulators to launch a crypto currency on one of the major social networks. Facebook Libra had recently announced a change of course, finally abandoning the principle of decentralisation. Durov closes his open letter with best wishes for all those who are committed to decentralization, balance and equality in the world.
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