Coinbase’s Wild $375M Echo Gamble: ICOS Back with a Vengeance! 🤯

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In the grand cosmic comedy that is cryptocurrency, the mighty US exchange known as Coinbase has decided to splash out and buy Echo, a curious platform where communities band together to fling money at shiny new ideas and startups. Because nothing says ‘responsible investing’ like a mob mentality with wallets. 🤷‍♂️

Oh, and Coinbase flung $375 million at Echo, that brainchild of crypto wizard Jordan Fish, aka Cobie in the digital wilds. They made this announcement on Tuesday, as if Tuesdays were suddenly the new golden hour for mergers. 🚀

But wait, the day before, Coinbase literally sent $25 million in USDC to Cobie’s wallet to snag and burn a non-fungible token (NFT) and resuscitate his UpOnly podcast. Because in the universe of crypto, why not turn digital cash into digital flames for a chat show revival? Inner peace is so last millennium. 💸

“I certainly didn’t think Echo would be sold to Coinbase, but here we are: Today Coinbase bought Echo for about $375 million,” Cobie scribbled on X, probably with a emoji of a shrugging potato or something equally absurd. 🥔

Ethena was the first project to raise with Echo-and what a whirl it was! 🌪️

This takeover happened less than two years after Cobie unleashed Echo in beta back in April 2024, with the noble quest to let communities pool their pennies for private funding romps. Eight months later, and voila-$51 million raised, 131 deals sealed, including for Ethena, inventors of that synthetic dollar doodad behind USDe, one of the speediest expanding yield-chugging stablecoins. Because who needs boring old dollars when you can have ‘synthetic’ ones? Genius. 😉

According to Cobie, Ethena nabbed the honor of being the very first to fundraise via Echo, proving the platform’s laser focus on early-stage gambles-where risk meets absurdity in a beautiful, bewildering dance.

In May, Echo dropped Sonar, this nifty software gizmo that lets founders throw their own token parties on blockchains like Hyperliquid, Base, Solana, or Cardano. Because, frankly, the ancient art of initial coin offerings deserved a remix. 🎉

Echo will remain standalone…“for now”-plot twist! 🔄

Post-acquisition, Echo struts as a “standalone platform under its current brand for now,” as Cobie tweeted on Tuesday, with Sonar slated for cozy implantation into Coinbase. This, he hinted, might brew fresh ways for founders to charm investors, while said investors snag shiny opportunities on Coinbase. Like matchmaking for money-rom-com edition on the blockchain. 💛

“Integrating Echo’s tools will help us enable more direct community participation, joining projects with capital, entirely onchain,” Coinbase declared, all starry-eyed:

“While we’ll start with crypto token sales via Sonar, we plan to expand support to tokenized securities and real-world assets over time, leveraging Echo’s infrastructure.” Because why tokenize just digital stuff when the entire planet’s fair game? Earth: Now mintable. 🌍

Are ICOs back? And is the kraken hungry again? 🐙

Snagging Echo rings in a trend of community cash-raising, harkening back to the ICO frenzy of 2017-when everyone was a millionaire overnight, or so the stories go. A Tiger Research report from Oct. 16 notes that public sales are creeping back in alien forms, thanks to launchpads like Legion, Buidlpad, Sonar, and Kaito.

“The ICO boom peaked in 2017 but rapidly contracted as it lost credibility due to fraud and opaque information,” they quipped, as if explaining why unicorns suddenly had horns made of scamium. The market pivoted to secretive private sales, but now public ones are clawing back. Suspicious? Hilarious! 😏

“However, public sales are recently resurging in new forms,” the report adds, nodding to Sonar and its ilk. “Short-term hype around public launchpads may cool down. However, public launchpads are expected to persist due to structural demand. They serve as a tool for projects to secure early users and liquidity,” it concludes. Translation: Hype may fade, but desperate apps and thirsty tokens will endure. Survival of the silliest competition? 🏆

As we ponder the twisted fate of these public token jamborees, some Trump-administration-linked bigwigs have been shouting for an ICO encore. “We want to make ICOs great again,” crowed Zak Folkman, co-founder of the Trump family’s World Liberty Financial luau, back in February. Because if anyone can revive 2017’s party, it’s political theater colliding with crypto chaos. 🎩

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2025-10-21 15:45