U.S. SEC Proposes Open Token Sales, but Demand for the ICO Market Has Clearly Declined

Huo Xing Cai Jing reports that on August 28, according to Bloomberg, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has proposed rules this month to reopen public token sales to U.S. investors, allowing crypto startups to raise up to $5 million, and larger projects up to $75 million annually, without completing a full SEC registration process. Unlike the 2017 ICO boom, the new framework requires issuers to provide disclosure and may entail higher compliance costs; secondary market trading rules for tokens remain complex. The proposal also seeks to allow investment contracts attached to tokens to terminate once the issuer completes or permanently ceases its promised management duties to investors, rather than permanently binding the token. However, market demand has shifted: speculative capital is now concentrated primarily in Bitcoin and a few major tokens, perpetual contracts, prediction markets, and AI-themed stocks; the number of token financings involving crypto venture capital has significantly declined, with some large VC firms expanding their investment scope into AI, robotics, and other frontier technologies. In contrast, during the ICO peak in January 2018, monthly fundraising reached approximately $3 billion. Tom Schmidt, General Partner at Dragonfly, said the proposal is “clearly better than nothing,” but the more urgent issue is the regulatory matters the CLARITY Act—currently stalled in Congress—was meant to address, rather than fundraising. Carlos Guzman, Research Analyst at GSR, noted that ICOs in 2026 are vastly different from those in 2018; the era of raising funds based solely on whitepapers and visions has ended.