During our presale, the Swiss FINMA decided to change its guidelines for ICO’s. Because compliance is our number one priority, we had no other choice but to postpone the ICO until further notice.

In the meanwhile, we’ve been running around trying to piece together all the moving parts to comply with the new rules as fast as possible.

Because ICO’s are in (mostly) uncharted territory when it comes to regulations, it’s not easy to organize one while remaining fully compliant with the rules. The rules aren’t entirely set in stone yet. So there are a lot of parties involved that we need to consult with.

However, with the help of our partner KPMG and a few other advisors, we’ve been able to tick the box on almost every requirement. Now there is only one final hurdle to pass.

Because this took over most of our energy in the past few weeks, we’ve been a bit more quiet than usual with sharing new updates. That’s why I wanted to give you a closer look at what has been going on and what you can expect.

What we’ve been up to since the delay

With the new FINMA guidelines, the requirements for a compliant tokensale have become a lot more stringent. We had a lot of things on our plate, but to give you a taste, we had to:

Get all the affairs in order before our local bank (Zarattini & Co Bank) would sign off on everything.

Adapt the smart contract of the token sale to prevent the GRAIN token would be classified as a security token.

To be extra careful, we had KPMG examine the content of the whitepaper again.

The final hurdle we need to pass is with regards to the organisation of our KYC process: We need to switch from our current provider to a provider with an SRO (Self Regulating Organisation) status with the FINMA. So we spent the past week talking to various providers and doing our due diligence to pick the most appropriate solution for us.

We’ve decided which provider to go with. So our technical team is implementing the changes in our tokensale system right now to connect the new KYC vendor to the process.

It’s important to note that this change to our KYC process won’t affect any presale participation. So if you’ve already contributed, you do not need to worry.

When will the ICO start?

Now that we’re completing the final step, we’re almost ready to go live with our ICO. That’s why we’ll be able to announce the official new ICO opening date at the beginning of next week.

I can’t disclose the exact date just yet, although I can say that it will happen early April. So sadly, we won’t be able to start the ICO in March, as previously stated.

Final thought

I know that for some of our community members, postponing the ICO has been as big of a frustration as it is for us. But when you want to build a sustainable company that will be around for decades to come, regulations are something you can not play around with.

That’s why it’s safe to say that the Grain ICO will be one of the (if not the) most compliant ICO’s you’ll be able to contribute to.

Talk soon,

Onno Hektor

CEO of Grain