An investment firm listed on London's alternative market has invested in the initial coin offering of messaging app Telegram.
TMT Investments, which is a backer of Uber rival Taxify among other tech firms, revealed it's one of a number of investors to back Telegram's token pre-sale.
The ICO has already raised $850m before it becomes widely available to the public, documents filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission over the weekend show.
The value of TMT's investment is estimated to be around the half a million dollar mark.
“We are delighted to have gained early access to this pre-ICO offering, which is also our first blockchain investment," said executive director of TMT Alexander Selegenev.
"Our investment focus at TMT is on identifying truly scalable companies at an early stage that have outstanding management teams. We believe that the Telegram pre-ICO meets all three of these requirements and provides our shareholders access to this opportunity through publicly traded TMT, and ahead of any general public ICO which Telegram may pursue later in the year”.
It's the first blockchain investment for TMT after announcing it's intentding to launch a dedicated fund for backing the technology, a move which sent shares rocketing.
Shares in TMT were up nearly two per cent as markets opened on Wednesday morning.
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