Prologue

In this report, we are not only going to introduce you to the next promising project in the crypto space but also show you what is happening behind the crypto curtain.

They say 2017 was the year of ICOs. Legit ones or not – they managed to attract huge amounts of funding. Today, many crypto enthusiasts accuse ICOs of partially causing the current crypto meltdown by mass selling collected ETH.

While that selling definitely plays a role, we believe it is just a huge market correction after huge growth, which happens periodically in crypto.

According to the largest ICO database out there, $5.6B was raised via ICOs in 2017.

2018?

$13.2 billion.

And there are still 3 months left until the end of this year.

Let the numbers speak for themselves.

Regular people are far less interested in ICOs these days than they were a year ago.

So… who’s betting billions in crypto?

Your neighbour Joe?

Nope.

In this case, we are talking about all kinds of investment funds, private ventures and other big bois with deep pockets.

The best time to invest is when everyone is selling. You can pick our favourite projects at bargain prices and invest in ICOs with huge discounts.

Tokenisation of businesses is unavoidable. Sooner or later it’s going to make the dot-com boom look minuscule.

Whales are preparing for one of the largest shifts of money from FIAT to digital tokens.

The question is: are you going to be with us, on board, BEFORE it happens?

Crypto industry is booming behind the curtains and only a few take note.

We know that for many of you it might seem like this bear market is never going to stop.

It’s hard to believe that the trend reversal will happen anytime soon, but if too many people bet on the market fall then there is not much capital needed to change that trend.

Back in early January 2018, the majority was betting on never-ending crypto-mooning. These days the majority of bets are on a never-ending bear market.

If you are here to invest long-term in the next Amazon, Adobe or eBay of crypto you might want this crypto winter to take a bit longer so you can buy as many coins and/or tokens of our favorite projects dirt cheap.

Let’s look at the charts of:

Basic Attention Token

Request Network

Kyber Network

The list goes on… the point is that we are reaching the lowest-lows and that buying window is not going to last forever.

The current market gives us an unusual opportunity to make incredible returns on our investments again.

Need proof?

Let’s take a look at Amazon’s stocks around the time of the dot-com boom.

After the bubble burst, you could buy AMZN for $7.5 per share! Now it trades at $1900…

Adobe? Pretty similar chart

How about Oracle?

Do these crypto and stock charts look similar?

History repeats itself, but crypto will be back on its tracks way faster than the stock markets.

Firstly, crypto has participants all over the world which means people trade 24/7 and companies compete more on a global scale than ever before.

Secondly, we are witnessing an almost ten-year-long bull run in traditional stock markets. Let’s take a look at S&P chart

The question is not if that market is going to crash, but when. Big money is being made but once someone pulls the trigger then… oh boy.

We strongly believe that people from traditional stock markets will try to hedge their money in gold and… crypto. This might happen tomorrow or a few years from now. One day it will happen, but that’s when the crypto space will be finally regulated and prepared to handle that enormous volume of money coming in.

Crypto, as a new asset class, will attract billions raising the value of our carefully handpicked projects.

Players like Coinbase know that very well.

They are massively hiring. On 15 September 2018, they announced a new office with a staff of 100+ which caters to institutional clients.

In an interview with CoinDesk, Adam White, general manager of Coinbase Institutional said:

‘When we saw the market begin to correct, which we all expected, institutions didn’t lose interest. They look at it as an opportunity to enter when things are not too frothy.’

Do you think they don’t know what they are doing and are throwing money into the fire by hiring hundreds for offices in Manhattan?

Honey, please.

Obviously, they know very well what they’re doing and they have very good reasons for it.

***

Without a doubt, the second most irritating thing in the crypto aside from red colors in our portfolios are Know Your Customer (KYC) requirements. Whether you like it or not (yeah, rather the latter), you most certainly have faced them at almost every exchange and you are definitely going to face them again.

In order to interact, buy and withdraw crypto these days your profile needs to be verified.

And that’s not a pleasant thing to do.

You have to upload your ID, selfie and sometimes even bills to prove that you are really who you say you are.

Who likes that?

No one.

Why do users view KYC as a necessary evil?

Users don’t trust the services they send their precious information to.

Users don’t know where that data goes and how it is processed and stored.

Users don’t like having to go through that process on every crypto exchange out there and beyond.

And what happens to things that no one likes?

Solutions are being developed to avoid them and make them obsolete or at least as minimalistic as they must be.

Now, imagine you could pass KYC once in a secure way and be able to get instantly approved or accepted into any exchange or ICO that requires verification.

Not only would it save your hair from going grey but also grant you peace of mind that none of the data you provided is stored on exchanges or newly started ICOs.

Sounds like a dream?

A service like this already exists and it has the potential to disturb the Identity Verification sector for good. Let’s welcome the next undervalued crypto project:

Civic (CVC)

Back in the early days of the internet when you wanted to create an email account you were asked to provide tons of details. This required information including your name, employment and even the size of your shoes town you lived in.

As the internet grew, and competition to acquire new users continued to become more difficult, a more user-friendly process was needed. That’s why today we see ‘Sign Up with Facebook/Google’ buttons basically on every website out there.

Why do websites integrate with Facebook or Google rather than create their own registration process?

You probably know the answer: ease of use.

These days people are impatient. They want everything now, instantly, within a mouse click. The more obstacles and forms companies use in order to acquire new user the lower the conversion rate. Lower conversion rate results in lower leads/sales… and profits in the end.

That’s why companies constantly seek to improve their operations to make more money.

It’s that simple.

And the company that is able to provide these types of successful shortcuts is going to be pretty lucrative. Unfortunately, when it comes to services that handle money there is no ‘verify with Facebook’ button or any other sort of a shortcut.

Each of us has to go through the hassle of verification. Sending your private documents to companies all over the world. One by one. That is a huge issue that needs to be addressed.

Enter Civic. Civic harnesses the power of Ethereum Blockchain to become the next ‘Sign Up with Civic’ button for the financial sector and beyond.

Before we dig in, how big is the KYC sector?

The KYC process is a huge pain to financial institutions. In order to onboard a new client, a background check is required by law, resulting in approx. $15-$40 of costs per new client. This cost includes labor and all types of third-party providers who check the data against all different databases.

Thomson Reuters surveyed 1,023 financial institutions from all over the world asking for costs of running KYC operations. The answers are astonishing. KYC costs added up to $48M annually on average.

Let’s think for a while how many of them perform the same background check on the same person. Wouldn’t it be easier to perform a background check once and then share the positive/negative result with others connected to the network?

A ton of money could be saved that way.

Civic does exactly that.

You simply put your data along with your IDs on the Civic app. Once you get verified, you can get approved for exchanges, platforms, and services that partner with Civic by solely scanning a QR-code which usually takes no longer than five seconds.

Pretty impressive, huh?

What’s more impressive – it is not yet another fugazee whitepaper concept.

Civic has a working product with more than 100 partners that already use Civic for their services.

Among their partners, we can find WikiHow (Alexa Global Rank of #178 at the time of writing), which is a huge deal.

And yes, you can also use Civic to create an account simply by scanning a QR code

No logins. No password or email confirmations. Just a QR scan from your Civic app.

But, if I use the Civic app to sign up, am I not giving WikiHow all my IDs and data?

Nope. No need to worry about that.

First of all the data you provide is stored on your mobile device. It is not going anywhere. The data is also encrypted on your device, meaning that the simple service like WikiHow or more advanced crypto exchanges get the response from Civic saying whether your data is legit or not without getting into details.

Let us give you an example of how the zero-knowledge proof works here.

Civic put in a vending machine at the 2018 May Consensus.

Consensus is one of the largest blockchain related conferences in the world.

This was not yet another vending machine. That one was special. It sold beer.

Actually, it was a free beer but you had to install the Civic app and verify that you were over 21 (event took place in the US) to get a Budweiser.

Source

What the vending machine requested from the Civic app was only the proof of age of 21 or greater. Secondly the app only ‘told’ the machine whether or not the user was eligible for a free beer. It didn’t share the exact age of the user.

What’s even more important, the vending machine did not have to download or see your ID. It just received a signal.

This pilot program shows that Civic use cases expand beyond the online world. We are pretty excited about the other types of applications they will no doubt come up with.

Civic app user does not need CVC Tokens to interact with app. Fantastic!

In fact, its users don’t even have to know about their existence. This is a huge step towards wider adoption of Civic.

What drives the need for CVC tokens are its institutional clients which Civic’s CEO, Vinny Lingham, is after.

A company such as a crypto exchange or an insurance firm that uses Civic for its user verification will pay in CVC’s tokens.

Besides that, CVC represents a partial ownership of the company. Even if Civic accepted FIAT for services, we would still advocate for the project.

The Brain Behind Civic

The man behind this month’s pick is Vinny Lingham. Let the numbers speak for themselves that we have the right captain behind the wheel of this ship.

Born and raised in South Africa, this 39-year-old entrepreneur has a pretty impressive track record. If we had an internal London Letter ranking of CEOs’ accomplishments we would definitely place him in second position, right after Brendan Eich.