ProsperiProp appoints Grant Thornton for ICO in bid to boost investor confidence

Ahead of its initial coin offering (ICO) planned for this Friday (15 September), South African African fintech startup ProsperiProp announced today that it has appointed international auditing firm Grant Thornton to audit its business processes and financial results.

Through its planned ICO startup wants to allow investors a chance to invest in international property. ProsperiProp aims to raise between $60-million and $120-million through the ICO in its own PROPX tokens, valued at one dollar a piece. The company will itself retain $80-million of tokens.

Today’s announcement comes just days after ProsperiProp announced last week that it had delayed its ICO to this Friday, following concern that China’s ban on ICOs — which took effect on 4 September — would result in reduced interest in the ICO from investors.

Read more: SA startup ProsperiProp delays ICO following China’s ban on token offerings 

Llew Morkel (pictured above), CEO and founder of ProsperiProp, said Grant Thornton’s appointment would help address concern that investor confidence in ICOs had dropped off following China’s ban.

“We want to go out there and say ‘guys we’re legit’,” said Morkel. “We want to tell people that this is something you can believe in.”

ProsperiProp’s decision to bring auditors on board was motivated by concern that investor confidence in ICOs after China’s ban

However Morkel believes that Chinese authorities’ decision to ban ICOs has little to do with concern that some might be fraudulent. “They just want complete oversight (over ICOs),” he said.

Following China’s decision to ban ICOs on 4 September, the price of Bitcoin has taken a hammering of late, falling from a high of $4868 on 1 September to under $3900 on 13 September at 2pm GMT.

But Morkel said ProsperiProp had “turned” this unfavourable situation around, as its ICO would provide a safer haven for investors as it would allow investors to exchange at least seven cryptocurrency coins for the company’s own — more stable — PROPX token.

*Correction: The article initially quoted ProsperiProp CEO Llew Morkel as saying that the decision to bring Grant Thornton on board was motivated by concern that investor confidence in ICOs had dropped off following China’s ban. Morkel did in fact say only that the appointment of the auditors would improve investor confidence following China’s ban. Ventureburn regrets the error.