Full Circle: From Gram 2018 to Gram 2026 — The History of One Name

On June 1, 2026, Pavel Durov restored the original name of the native coin of the TON network — Gram. The same name under which Telegram raised $1.7 billion in 2018, lost to the SEC in 2020, and abandoned the project.

Eight years. Two launches. One token.

This is the detailed rebrand timeline, with the nuances — legal, technical, and human. What happened in 2018, why the name went away in 2020, and why it’s back now.

2017: the birth of Gram

In December 2017, Telegram published a technical whitepaper titled Telegram Open Network. The document was authored by Nikolai Durov — Telegram’s chief technical architect and Pavel’s older brother.

The idea: build a third-generation blockchain capable of millions of TPS, anchor it to a messenger with 200+ million users, and roll out payment infrastructure on top of Telegram.

Whitepaper architecture:

• Masterchain — the coordinator chain
• Workchains — parallel specialized networks
• Shards — dynamic load splitting

And three token types in the original plan:

1. Gram — primary native coin (name from “gram,” a small unit of weight — the image of small, easily transferable value)
2. Gram wallet-bound tokens — for native Telegram services
3. Gimmick tokens — Neo GAS analogue, technical overlay

Only the first made it to production — Gram itself.

2018: the $1.7 billion ICO

In February and March 2018, Telegram ran a private ICO — two rounds selling Gram to accredited investors:

• Round 1 (January–February): $850 million, $0.37 per Gram
• Round 2 (March): $850 million, $1.33 per Gram

Total $1.7 billion — the second-largest ICO in history after EOS ($4.2B).

Investors included top-tier VC firms (Sequoia, Benchmark, Lightspeed), Russian private investors, accredited high-net-worth investors across the US, Europe, and Asia. No retail ICO — qualified investors only.

Telegram said tokens would be distributed after the October 2019 mainnet launch.

2019: the SEC stops the launch

October 11, 2019, 8 days before the announced launch, the U.S. SEC filed suit against Telegram Group Inc. and TON Issuer Inc.

The SEC’s position: selling Gram to American investors constituted an unregistered securities offering under the Securities Act of 1933.

The SEC obtained a temporary restraining order halting token distribution two weeks before the planned launch.

In March 2020, federal judge P. Kevin Castel sided with the SEC and issued a preliminary injunction against Gram distribution. Telegram tried to appeal — unsuccessfully.

2020: Telegram walks away

May 12, 2020, Pavel Durov published a post:

“We have made the difficult decision to abandon TON.”

Telegram withdrew the appeal and signed a settlement with the SEC:

• Refund investors $1.224 billion (net of already-distributed amounts)
• Pay $18.5 million civil penalty
• Do not issue Gram tokens in any form for at least 5 years

Most investors received their money back in 2020–2021 (either the full amount or 72% if they opted into a discounted debt instrument).

That closed the “Gram by Telegram” chapter.

2020: the community picks up the code

Telegram abandoned the project but open-sourced the code (Apache 2.0). Several independent teams immediately started running forks:

• Free TON — launched in May 2020, led by TON Labs (Mikhail Pomortsev and team)
• NewTON — a parallel fork
• Several smaller forks — without meaningful adoption

Free TON won on the back of more contributors and faster validator bootstrapping. By August 2020, the network had stabilized.

The native coin was renamed Toncoin to legally distance from the Gram/SEC history. In September 2021, Free TON held a community vote and renamed the network itself to The Open Network (TON), keeping the coin as Toncoin.

The formal governance moved to TON Foundation — a non-profit headquartered in Switzerland (with operations partially shifted to the UAE by 2024).

2021–2023: the quiet recovery

The “Toncoin without Telegram” era lasted from 2020 to 2023 — nearly three years.

During this period, TON:

• Got listed on major exchanges (OKX, KuCoin, MEXC, Bitget, Bybit — 2022)
• Hit $5 billion market cap by late 2023
• Launched the Mini App platform via TON Connect
• Attracted non-resident developers through Foundation grants

Telegram formally kept its distance from the network but informally integrated a TON wallet into the messenger (Wallet by Telegram, 2023) and began supporting TON payments.

2024–2025: Telegram and TON quietly converge

In 2024–2025, the line between “the independent TON network” and “Telegram” started dissolving:

• 2024: Telegram integrated Fragment usernames (via TON Domains)
• 2024: launched Stars — an internal Telegram currency, initially fully separate from TON, but later allowed Stars ↔ TON conversion
• 2024: Notcoin, Hamster Kombat, and the tap-to-earn wave brought tens of millions of wallets to TON
• 2025: Durov mentions TON in every Telegram quarterly update
• 2025: the SEC restriction on the Gram name expires (5 years from May 2020)

2026: MTONGA and the return of Gram

In spring 2026, Durov launched Make TON Great Again (MTONGA) — a seven-step program reactivating TON through Telegram’s resources:

Step 4 is more than cosmetic. It is the formal return of Telegram to the project’s identity. The Toncoin name was a legal shield during the years when Telegram couldn’t use “Gram.” That restriction expired in 2025, and Telegram reclaimed the original name.

Legal distinctions: Gram 2018 vs Gram 2026

Two different assets, legally:

Gram 2018 (blocked by SEC)

• Issuer: Telegram Group Inc. (British Virgin Islands)
• Legal form: investment contract (per SEC)
• Buyer agreement: SAFT (Simple Agreement for Future Tokens)
• Telegram obligations: launch mainnet, deliver tokens by a stated date
• Howey test: passed (per SEC) — making it a security

Gram 2026 (current)

• Issuer: none (decentralized network, native asset)
• Legal form: cryptocurrency (per IRS/FinCEN), commodity (CFTC)
• Buyer agreement: none
• Obligations: none — nobody is legally “required” to develop the network
• Howey test: fails — no investment contract, no issuer-promoter relationship

From the SEC’s perspective, Gram 2026 has nothing in common with Gram 2018 beyond the name. Telegram doesn’t issue it, doesn’t sell it, doesn’t control its issuance. Legally, simply a different asset.

What Durov himself says

In his June 1, 2026 announcement, Durov wrote:

“We’re returning to our roots and starting a new chapter. This is step 4 of 7 to make TON great again.”

Minimal public detail. But in the context of Durov’s prior 2024–2025 statements, the logic emerges:

1. Telegram as a platform should have a native currency, and that currency should be identifiable.
2. “Gram” is the brand that investors and users have associated with Telegram since 2018.
3. “Toncoin” is the community-era brand, associated with the TON Foundation, not Telegram.
4. Renaming to Gram is a signal: “Telegram stands behind this, not the Foundation.”

What this means in practice

For the regular holder — nothing. Balances, addresses, seed phrases, wallets, exchanges — all stay the same. See our holder checklist.

For the market — the rebrand reinforces the “TON = Telegram’s crypto” narrative. This drives the market cap up (a ~10% jump after the announcement).

For decentralization — a significant shift toward centralization. The network is now explicitly associated with one corporation. See our centralization analysis.

What’s next

MTONGA steps 5, 6, 7 are undisclosed. Reasonable hypotheses:

• Deep Gram integration into Telegram Premium and advertising
• A possible Telegram-native L2 on TON
• Trust-less Bitcoin bridge (Teleport)

For details, see our forecast on MTONGA steps 5–7.

Sources

• Telegram Open Network whitepaper (December 2017)
• SEC v. Telegram Group Inc., No. 19-cv-09439 (S.D.N.Y. 2020)
• Court Settlement Order (June 2020)
• Pavel Durov post, May 12, 2020 (“We have made the difficult decision to abandon TON”)
• Pavel Durov post, June 1, 2026 (rebrand announcement)
• TON Foundation blog (2021–2026)
• BeInCrypto, Unchained, CryptoBriefing — 2026 reporting

If you want to dive deeper into the legal side, see SEC vs CFTC: Toncoin classification in the US and our history of TON from Gram to 2026.