Australia has produced a handful of genuinely significant crypto projects and a much longer list of ones
that no longer exist. This is a directory of both — what each was built to do, who built it, whether it is
still going, and, because it is rarely the same answer, where the company behind it sits today.
Software for trading electricity and tracking environmental commodities — renewable energy certificates and the like — between participants on a grid.
Where it is now
Still a registered, active Perth company — the only project here of which that is straightforwardly true.
Ran one of Australia’s first large token sales, raising about US$34 million in October 2017, and took part in an Australian Government ARENA-funded trial in Fremantle. It has since broadened well past household energy trading into environmental-commodity tracking, and was still shipping product in March 2026. The Perth company remains active, though a Swiss company was incorporated in Zug in 2023 and both founders now live in Switzerland. POWR is an access token: businesses using the platform need to hold it, rather than it being the thing you pay with.
A derivatives protocol. Originally it let people mint synthetic versions of other assets; today it is mostly perpetual futures trading.
Where it is now
Nowhere. The Australian foundation was wound up in 2020 and Synthetix’s own terms of use name no company in any country.
The best-known Australian crypto project, and the one with the least left in Australia. The Havven Foundation was an Australian company limited by guarantee; Synthetix decommissioned it at the end of the 2020 financial year and replaced it with a set of DAOs. Its terms now describe "a distributed network of individual contributors who are located around the world", with disputes going to arbitration in London. Its sUSD stablecoin lost its peg in 2025 and fell to a fraction of a dollar; a proposal to retire it and compensate holders in SNX was before token holders in mid-2026.
Infrastructure for trading in-game items — a scaling network and marketplace aimed at game studios.
Where it is now
The company is genuinely Sydney and active. The IMX token is issued by a separate entity, Digital Worlds NFTs Ltd, whose jurisdiction Immutable does not state in its own materials.
Australia’s most valuable crypto company by some distance, and the clearest illustration that an Australian company and an Australian token issuer are different things. In 2026 it cut game-development roles, handed Gods Unchained and Guild of Guardians to outside studios, and shifted toward selling marketing technology to mainstream game publishers — a long way from the crypto-gaming thesis IMX was sold on. A US Securities and Exchange Commission investigation into the 2021 IMX listing was closed in March 2025 with no action taken.
A group of linked video games, with a token used for governance and for sharing game revenue with holders who stake it.
Where it is now
Dubai. Illuvium’s terms name a UAE free-zone company and a second offshore entity, are governed by English law, and send disputes to arbitration seated in Dubai.
Its founders are brothers of Synthetix’s Kain Warwick. Illuvium’s Australian development company is still registered, but in November 2023 Illuvium published a post explaining that it had weighed the UAE, Singapore, Cayman, the BVI, the United States, the EU, Hong Kong and Australia, and applied for a licence in Dubai instead — an unusually explicit public statement of a project deciding against Australian regulation. Through 2026 the team took wage cuts to extend its runway and narrowed to essentially one remaining game.
Lending to institutions — funds and trading firms borrow against collateral, and depositors earn the interest.
Where it is now
Miami. An Australian company still appears in its terms, but those terms are governed by Florida law with disputes arbitrated in the United States.
The one on this page that has grown rather than shrunk: Maple reports US$4.6 billion under management at the halfway point of 2026, up 81% on the year, and more than US$22 billion lent since 2022 — figures it publishes about itself rather than ones an auditor has confirmed to us. Its co-founder moved to Miami at the end of 2021 and the business has been run from there since. The original MPL token was replaced by SYRUP in 2024 at a hundred new tokens for each old one.
Redbelly Network RBNT
Operating
A blockchain built with identity checks at the protocol level, aimed at tokenising real-world assets under financial regulation rather than around it.
Where it is now
Sydney. A joint venture out of the University of Sydney and CSIRO’s Data61, still Australian.
The most conventionally Australian project on this page and the newest: a university and government research spin-out rather than a token sale. Mainnet launched in November 2024 and the token listed a month later. The AUDD stablecoin runs on it. CoinSpot and Swyftx both list RBNT, but at roughly A$10 million and under A$200,000 of daily turnover it is far below the size at which we index a coin, so we show no price for it here.
ShareRing SHR
Operating
Reusable digital identity — proving your age or who you are once, then reusing that proof without handing over documents each time.
Where it is now
Melbourne. Four active Victorian companies, and the only project here that talks about its AUSTRAC obligations as a matter of course.
Started life as a sharing-economy app in the 2018 token wave and is one of very few from that cohort to have survived by becoming something else entirely. It now sells identity and age-verification software, with deployments in Thailand and the United Kingdom. The original token was migrated to a new contract. CoinSpot lists SHR, but at around A$2 million it is the smallest token on this page by a wide margin and well below the size at which we index a coin, so we show no price for it here.
Session SESH
Operating
An encrypted messaging app that works without phone numbers, paid for by a network of operator-run nodes.
Where it is now
Switzerland. The Australian non-profit still exists, but development moved to a Swiss foundation set up in 2024.
The only project here that left Australia for a reason it stated publicly and that had nothing to do with tax or licensing. Its developers moved the work to Switzerland after Australian Federal Police officers visited an employee’s home in 2024 asking about the app and one of its users. The original OXEN token was converted to SESH on a new network. None of the major Australian brokers we check carries SESH, so we show no price for it here.
Where they actually are now
Founded in Australia and Australian today are different facts, and for most of this list they have come
apart. This is the short version of the column above — useful if what you want to know is who you would
be dealing with.
The company is genuinely Sydney and active. The IMX token is issued by a separate entity, Digital Worlds NFTs Ltd, whose jurisdiction Immutable does not state in its own materials.
Dubai. Illuvium’s terms name a UAE free-zone company and a second offshore entity, are governed by English law, and send disputes to arbitration seated in Dubai.
Miami. An Australian company still appears in its terms, but those terms are governed by Florida law with disputes arbitrated in the United States.
Redbelly Network RBNT
Sydney, 2021
Sydney. A joint venture out of the University of Sydney and CSIRO’s Data61, still Australian.
ShareRing SHR
Melbourne, 2018
Melbourne. Four active Victorian companies, and the only project here that talks about its AUSTRAC obligations as a matter of course.
Session SESH
Melbourne, 2018 (as Loki Network)
Switzerland. The Australian non-profit still exists, but development moved to a Swiss foundation set up in 2024.
The 2017 and 2018 token sale wave
For about eighteen months, Australian startups raised tens of millions of dollars by selling tokens before
the products existed. Almost none of it survived. These are the ones large enough to have been reported at
the time, and what became of them — included because the pattern is more instructive than any single story,
and because these names still turn up in search results as though the projects were live.
Project
Raised
Ended
What happened
CanYa CAN
A$12M
2018
A marketplace for hiring freelancers, paid in crypto. Australia’s second-largest token sale at the time, and dead within the year. Its founder went on to start THORChain. The canya.io address now serves an offshore online-casino affiliate site.
Intimate ITM
~A$12M
c. 2019
A payments and reputation layer for the adult industry. Reported as the last Australian token sale of the 2018 cycle to complete. The token contract now shows a total supply of zero — the supply was destroyed rather than left to trade.
Horizon State HST
A$1.4M
August 2019
Blockchain voting, used in a South Australian fisheries council election. The Victorian company shut down after a lawsuit its management said would make it insolvent. The token halved in a day. A differently-registered Queensland company has carried the name since.
Mycelium MYC
US$4.5M
c. 2023
Perpetual swaps trading, originally under the name Tracer DAO. Brisbane-built and well regarded in its moment. It ceased operations and its treasury was voted to be burned against the token. The site that ran the burn no longer holds a valid security certificate.
Perth Mint Gold Token PMGT
—
March 2023
A token backed one-for-one by gold held at the Perth Mint. Discontinued by its operator, which cited investigations into the Mint involving AUSTRAC and United States regulators. Roughly A$3.5 million of gold was outstanding; holders were moved out.
Auscoin ASC
—
April 2019
A token paired with a nationwide rollout of Bitcoin ATMs. AUSTRAC suspended the registrations of two associated exchanges following the founder’s arrest, and they could no longer lawfully operate. The drug-trafficking charges against him were discontinued in September 2024 after nearly six years.
PlayChip PLA
—
c. 2020
A token for the betting operator PlayUp’s apps. The token is untracked at zero with no circulating supply. PlayUp itself survived the collapse of a US$450 million sale to FTX, and agreed in 2025 to sell its Australian business to a Brisbane bookmaker for A$18.6 million.
Liven LVN
~US$10M
token only
Rewards for spending at restaurants and cafes. An unusual outcome: the business is alive and still sells hospitality software, but the token is at zero with no circulating supply and the company’s current site does not mention it at all.
Blockbid BID
—
c. 2021
A Melbourne crypto exchange with its own token. The company’s ABN has been cancelled. The marketing site outlived the company.
Not an exhaustive list of failures, and inclusion is not an allegation against anyone — most of these ran
out of money rather than doing anything unlawful. Where a regulator or a court was involved, the entry says
so and says what the outcome was.
The one that went to court
Qoin — a $14 million penalty, January 2026
Qoin was marketed to Australian small businesses as a token they could spend with thousands of merchants
and readily exchange. ASIC took its issuer, BPS Financial, to the Federal Court. In January 2026 the court
ordered $14 million in penalties — $2 million for running a financial services
business without a licence and $12 million for misleading and deceptive conduct — restrained the company
from unlicensed financial services for ten years, and ordered it to publish adverse publicity notices in
its own app. Justice Downes described the conduct as serious and unlawful.
It remains the clearest Australian example of what a local token marketed on local promises can cost the
people holding it. More on it in our dead coins rundown.
Before you buy any of these
Australian origin is provenance, not a quality signal, and it does not bring Australian consumer protection
with it. Every exchange we review is AUSTRAC-registered, and that registration
covers the platform you buy through — not the token itself, and not a foreign entity that issued it.
The tokens on this page are among the smallest we track, and
four of the five we price here are now more than 95% below their peaks —
the drawdown table puts that in context. And an Australian project is still a
CGT event on every disposal, exactly like any other.
FAQ
Which cryptocurrencies were founded in Australia?
The ones still trading are Powerledger, Synthetix, Immutable, Illuvium, Maple Finance, Redbelly Network, ShareRing and Session. Synthetix and Immutable are the two most widely held. A larger group from the 2017 and 2018 token-sale wave no longer exists at all, and they are listed further down this page.
Does buying an Australian-founded token give me Australian consumer protection?
Almost never, and this is the single most useful thing to understand here. Founding a project in Australia and being an Australian business today are different facts. Synthetix wound up its Australian foundation in 2020 and its own terms now name no company in any country. Illuvium applied for a licence in Dubai. Maple Finance runs on Florida law. None of these is an AUSTRAC-registered exchange, none holds an Australian financial services licence for the token itself, and buying one through an offshore platform leaves you outside the Australian system entirely.
Can I buy these on an Australian exchange?
Five of the eight, yes — the ones where we show a live price. Powerledger, Synthetix, Immutable, Illuvium and Maple Finance are all offered by at least one AUSTRAC-registered Australian platform, and each one’s coin page lists which. Redbelly, ShareRing and Session are not priced here. CoinSpot does list the first two — Redbelly at around A$10 million and ShareRing at around A$2 million — but both are far smaller than anything we index, and none of the major Australian brokers we check carries Session’s token at all.
Why did so many Australian projects from 2017 and 2018 fail?
The same reason the global cohort did, with no local exception. Token sales in that period raised money on a whitepaper before a product existed, from buyers who had no way to assess either. Australia’s corporate regulator had not yet tested its powers over tokens, so there was little between a promise and a buyer. The failures were rarely dramatic frauds — mostly the money ran out, the team dispersed, and the token was left trading at nothing.
Is an Australian project safer than a foreign one?
No. Nothing on this page is a recommendation, and Australian origin is not a quality signal — it is a piece of provenance, useful mainly because it tells you where to look when something goes wrong. The one Australian token that has been through an Australian court, Qoin, produced a $14 million penalty against its issuer rather than a good outcome for the people holding it.
General information only, not financial advice, and not a recommendation to buy any token listed here.
Company status, jurisdiction and token mechanics change; entries were checked in September 2026 against
company registers, court records, the projects' own published documents and reputable reporting, and each
profile links its main source. Tell us if something here is out of date.
