Unfortunately, my views of Iconomi have been re-aligned and the below of no longer represents the active company that stands. I am leaving this up for clerical purposes, but I no longer hold ICN due to the change to the eICN token. I believe releasing a shareholding-based assets in replace of $ICN, with little voting power is a disingenuous way to treat long-term holders.

The Irish Stock Exchange is rated #2 for funds listed worldwide.

I received a few requests to dive deeper into topics surrounding the ICONOMI project and figured it would make sense to discuss cryptocurrency joining traditional assets classes, such as ICONOMI’s recent soon-to-be exchange listing.

My last medium post, Why I back the cryptocurrency: ICONOMI explained its future audience and why the team are on their way to create a powerful platform to serve not the few, but the many.

The proposed soon-to-be listing on Dublin’s stock exchange will be the first step of the existing financial community joining the cryptocurrency neighbourhood, and I believe that they’ll be excited and rushing to add it as a part of their diverse portfolio’s, especially considering Bitcoin’s latest rally.

The Dublin stock exchange; power of liquidity

The Irish stock exchange operates 4 markets — the Main Securities Market for listing debt, shares, funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Some impressive notes to add are that; ISE (Irish Stock Exchange) is rated #2 for funds listed worldwide, (as of Q3 2017).

ISE’s current total market capitalisation report via Euro Next highlights a total €122bn total market capitalisation, (report available here).

But, why does an exchange like ISE have an important part to play in this cryptocurrency to FIAT world that we live in?

Well, the Irish Stock Exchange is used as a European gateway for companies to access investors in Europe and beyond. The ISE is used by over 4,000 issuers from more than 85 countries to raise funds from international investors. Columbus Capital, (ICONOMI’s partner) is connecting this existing FIAT system to a cryptocurrency related fund, making it a world first.

Funds have an incredible track record of making substantial growth alongside consistent revenue and Blockchain.ONE’s projected growth could be most resemblant of that to SPDR Gold Trust or MSCI Emerging Markets Index Fund. Each of these funds generate more than $225m in annual revenue — just think about that for a second when you add a management fee of 3%.

Why AUM Matters

Investment companies charge management fees that are a fixed percentage of AUM, (If you don’t know what Assets Under Management means, I recommend reading this Investopedia article here, however in short; it is mainly used to indicate the financial size of a fund).

Assets under management (AUM) are important because it highlights the strength of a fund, particularly in market capitalisation, (i.e. is Fund A, which has $100m AUM more attractive in comparison to Fund B’s? — whose AUM are valued at $50m). When looking at previous funds over time, it’s clear that market capitalisation has a vital role to play when trying to attract future investors and brokers; maybe, size does matter.

Columbus Capital’s AUM joins an elite club of proposed early-stage funds that have huge upside potential, and I strongly believe it is possible to see a cryptocurrency-related fund joining the 10 most profitable ETFs in the world over the next 10–15 years. Disclosure: I do understand that the 10 most profitable ETF figures are not up-to-date but I struggled to find the exact numbers with the same date, across the top 10, therefore I am using this 2012 article as a source.

Columbus Capital’s AUM joins an elite club of proposed early-stage funds that have huge growth potential

It’s also important to note that two of the most profitable ETFs (in regards to annual revenue) were generated from emerging markets.

Columbus Capital’s AUM growth will be somewhat similar to the S&P 500 Index, back in 1995, (see below index listing over time). S&P 500’s Index fund now has an incredible market capitalisation of $22.6 Trillion and I believe several cryptocurrency funds will see an almost identical trend-line while offering an unbelievably exciting return.

Understanding more about the ISE listing

Recently (9th November, 2017), a reddit user met with Columbus Capital, and expressed community questions as well as his own to Igor Erker.

A collection of some of the stand-out questions asked by u/benjaminbrick have been noted below:

Q: Someone posted an e-mail claiming that you plan to list on the Dublin Stock exchange. Can you confirm this?

A: Yes!

Q: What is the size of Dublin stock exchange and why did you chose it?

A: Besides Luxembourg and London, Dublin is one of the largest fund jurisdictions in Europe. If you are listing a serious fund you really need to be in one of these three places.

Q: Do you have any goals for getting BLX listed on any crypto exchanges, if not, is there any particular reason why not?

A: Yes. Hopefully this will happen next year.

Q: Will you be making more Digital Asset Arrays?

A: Yes! We are looking at creating a new DAA as we speak that will be on the ICONOMI platform. We are really excited about it and will share more details soon.

A full transcript of the conversation can be found here, but one thing that secured more positivity and confidence in this listing was their comment regarding their ongoing discussions with regulators.

“We have a team of agents that are working with us on our behalf. Our regulator is a Government appointed administrator and as you can imagine this makes things take a lot longer. In short — we don’t foresee hurdles at the moment, but the process is not straight forward. We were initially confident for a September/October listing and I know some of you picked up on that wording from an earlier AMA — we hope to make it available as soon as we can.”

ICONOMI continues to strive even in the times of uncertainty, the team’s partnership with Columbus Capital has helped them concentrate on the product while allowing time for Columbus to connect their new product to institutional investors — proving to be a very smart move.

This stock exchange listing will add an important and lucrative repeat revenue stream to generate management fee’s and will provide current investors with a lucrative buy-back structure, as promised. I am very much looking forward to the next 12 months.

Once again — Thanks for listening to my meandering thoughts.

P.S. It’s important to note that ICONOMI’s roadmap has a lot to look forward too, even though some of these dates have only been provisionally discussed through their official subreddit, there is still many releases on the horizon to look forward too. I’d recommend becoming a part of the Reddit community so you can stay up-to-date with news and learn more about what ICONOMI has to offer.