Social Proof is the New Market Cap

Cryptocurrencies are gauged by the size of their market cap. It’s a crude reckoner, but it’s good enough for most purposes. But what about projects that have yet to issue their coins or host their token sale? Increasingly, investors are turning to one metric that’s hard to fake and indicative of widespread support – Telegram followers
Today, for example, registration for Apex Network, which is holding its ICO on the NEO blockchain, closed in 15 minutes – and not before demand had crashed the website and forced Apex to issue an alternate registration link. With even the average ICOs oversubscribed, whitelist places are being offered to supporters who’ve already demonstrated their willingness to get involved with the project – such as by joining the Telegram channel in advance. ICOs are fast becoming an exclusive nightclub. Getting beyond that gilded rope calls for proving to the bouncer that you’re a VIP.
To help investors gauge which ICOs are gathering the most momentum, ICO Whitelists has set up a tracker page that records which crypto projects have added the most followers in the past 24 hours. As the site explains:

For the most popular projects, one Telegram group is no longer enough. Securities token platform Polymath, this year’s most hyped project, has already hit Telegram’s 50,000 channel limit. Its solution? Open another channel. With many crypto projects still months away from distributing tokens and being listed on exchanges, Telegram popularity has become traders’ estimator tool of choice. When there are 50,000 investors baying to buy in, it’s immaterial what’s in the white paper – hype and FOMO win out every time.

Do you think Telegram popularity is a useful metric for gauging ICOs? Let us know in the comments section below