Facebook Inc. has signed up more than a dozen companies
including Visa Inc., Mastercard Inc., PayPal Holdings Inc.
and Uber Technologies Inc. to back a new cryptocurrency it
plans to unveil next week and launch next year.
This means each of these companies will pay $$$ to run a "node" for this currency and have full visibility into the transactional behavior of the users of the coin.
The term "cryptocurrency" is applied a bit too liberally in the space, but what are the odds that Facebook's coin is censorship-resistant? Will Facebook help enforce US monetary imperialism, or will it thumb its nose at US sanctions? (e.g. allow a US Facebook user to send Libra to Iranian Facebook users)
Now, there could be a surprise plot twist in which these megacorps stand up for individual liberties. There have been stranger things.
I'm interested to see the how existing crypto exchanges will handle this currency, if it can be traded on them at all. The market that develops in the cryptosphere around Libra will certainly liberate any attempted sanctions on the coin itself, unless Facebook can prevent free trading of the currency on exchanges.
The term "cryptocurrency" is applied a bit too liberally in the space, but what are the odds that Facebook's coin is censorship-resistant? Will Facebook help enforce US monetary imperialism, or will it thumb its nose at US sanctions? (e.g. allow a US Facebook user to send Libra to Iranian Facebook users)
Now, there could be a surprise plot twist in which these megacorps stand up for individual liberties. There have been stranger things.