Cobie hints that private funding platform Echo may release an ICO product

Echo founder Jordan Fish, commonly known as Cobie, hinted the project is working on the idea of launching an Initial Coin Offering product.

"Our ICO product is not yet even announced anywhere, I think this is the first tweet that even mentions it," Cobie posted on X. "Our ICO product will not have any carry at all. But it will look very different from the current Echo, which is to enable community investors access to private venture offerings."

Echo is a platform for members of the crypto community to collectively invest in projects at similar terms to VCs. It has been used for raises for projects such as MegaETH , Initia , Ethena and Fogo . Until now, the platform has focused on seed or early-stage investments in projects with vesting periods so moving into ICOs — where the tokens are instantly tradeable — would be breaking new ground for it.

“[To be honest] I don’t really have a comment," Cobie told The Block. "We just want to make stuff so that people can fund decentralised projects without selling most of it to one or two entities. Fundraising happens at various stages of a projects lifecycle and we currently only cover the really early stages. There isn’t [in my opinion] a very good way to do a launch sale today, your best bet is probably CoinList but this is quite limiting for several reasons."

"So I think there’s maybe something we can do to fix that dynamic and give a better option to people. But as always I might be wrong and we may fail. I am honestly surprised we got this far. But I am thankful things are going okay and will keep trying to do stuff until it stops working,” said Cobie. “Big love to you Timothy, please give my love to your wife and children,” he added, despite the fact that I am unmarried and childless.

A return to ICOs

While ICOs had their heyday in 2017, they have returned to the public conversation in recent months. A number of industry experts said the more welcoming regulatory environment in the U.S. may lead to the resurgance of public sales, according to The Block Senior Reporter Yogita Khatri's funding newsletter .

Once ICOs are back in action, they could shift the focus away from the memecoin craze, said Matt O'Connor, co-founder of the newly launched "merit-based" ICO platform Legion, at the time.

Such a move away from memecoins may already be in the works, with crypto traders and investors getting more and more frustrated with major memecoin flops and rugs. The Libra token promoted by Argentinian President Javier Milei saw $100 million of liquidity pulled from decentralized exchanges, leading to a witch hunt on X and already one resignation . Judging by the community's reaction, it may prove to be the final straw.