Initial coin offerings bypass rules to raise millions of dollars

New York

A NEW crop of technology entrepreneurs is forgoing the usual routes to raising money. The entrepreneurs are not pitching venture capitalists, selling stock in an initial public offering or using crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter.

Instead, before they even have a working product, they are creating their own digital currencies and selling "coins" on the web, sometimes raising tens of millions of dollars in a matter of minutes.