[ad_1]
The world's largest social media company seems powerless to launch its own cryptocurrency.
Facebook has not yet announced its plans publicly, but the media has published reports on its cryptography ambitions over the past six months, sketching a partial picture of how the social network wants to capitalize on technology. of the blockchain.
In short, a team led by PayPal's former president, David Marcus, is building a secure cryptocurrency, designed to work within the company's existing messaging infrastructure (WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger).
The latest news on the project comes from the BBC, the British outlet reporting that cryptocurrency – called "GlobalCoin" internally – will be launched in "a dozen countries by the first quarter of 2020".
However, the signs that Mark Zuckerberg's company wanted to diversify into the fintech sector became apparent in 2017.
Below you will find an overview of what we know so far about Facebook cryptocurrency.
December 2017
In retrospect, the first sign that Facebook was ready to be very serious about distributed ledger technology appeared in December 2017, when David Marcus joined the Coinbase board of directors.
At the time, Marcus was the vice president of Facebook's messaging products. That would have included two of the largest messaging platforms in the world, Messenger and WhatsApp (which Facebook acquired in February 2014 for $ 19 billion).
Although giants in their category, none of the messengers of Facebook has the payment functionality enjoyed by his main rival: the Chinese WeChat.
But Marcus was president of PayPal, the leading online payment company in the United States. He is no stranger to solving this category of technical problems.
August 2018
More importantly, the next clue that Facebook was considering taking crypto seriously came in August 2018, when CoinDesk announced for the first time that Marcus was leaving Coinbase's board of directors.
Marcus was rebadigned to the blockchain in May 2018. At that time, a Coinbase spokesman told CoinDesk that Marcus had retired to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest.
December 2018
In December 2018, Bloomberg reported that Facebook was planning to build a stablecoin. Stablecoins are a controversial type of cryptocurrency that have friction-free regulations comparable to those of conventional crypto-currencies, without price volatility.
Long regarded as impossible without excessive centralization (and perhaps even then), they became one of the most popular forms of cryptocurrency in the last year. the infamous base.
At that time, the entry of Facebook was considered a product focused on WhatsApp, mainly focused on India. That may have been a part of it, or Menlo Park's ambitions may have expanded since then.
A source who visited Facebook told CoinDesk that any doubt that the company wants to do a stablecoin should be dismissed. The same source told CoinDesk to search Facebook for deploying the project with a large group of reputable cryptocurrency companies and executives supporting it, to dispel any doubts that it might be too centralized.
The following month, the New York Times announced that Facebook wanted to unify Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger. There are probably many strategic reasons for doing so, but for person-to-person payments, this also maximizes the universe of people who can trade the company's new cryptocurrency.
February 2019
In early February, Cheddar announced that Facebook had acquired a British blockchain company called Chainspace. Cheddar described this as an "acquisition". In other words, it was more about hiring people than acquiring Chainspace as a business.
That said, Facebook had also acquired old-time talent: with a multitude of blockchain-related job offers in early 2019.
Shortly after, rumors circulated that Facebook was looking for investors to support its cryptography efforts. At the time, many investors in Silicon Valley had "heard" that Facebook was raising money, but the details were scarce – especially given the comprehensive scope of Facebook's non-disclosure practices.
At the end of the month, the first indications of timing appeared. These dates have since been postponed, but readers have also been able to understand how the company works.
Multiple sources have confirmed to CoinDesk that the social media giant was really only talking about its blockchain behind closed doors in Menlo Park, physically, and only after everyone involved signed non-disclosure agreements.
Four people who had been informed about it told the New York Times in February that Facebook had already spoken to major cryptographic exchanges. In May, Coinbase and Gemini were specifically quoted by the Financial Times as two people discussing lists with Facebook.
April 2019
Facebook's announcement of the pivot of privacy protection was another major development. CEO Mark Zuckerberg fully commented on it at the company's annual F8 event for developers.
"I think it should be as easy to send money to someone as to send a photo," Zuckerberg said during his presentation.
Although it is not directly a crypto-currency ad, it fits perfectly into the story. Zuckerberg has described a future for Facebook where the public news feed is no longer the main attraction of the site. In fact, the site could become primarily a platform for millions of private conversations.
If this happens, however, end-to-end encrypted content would make targeted ads less achievable. By controlling a new kind of money, Facebook could create monetizable experiences that could offset the loss of advertising revenue.
Remember, however, that 98% of Facebook's $ 40 billion in revenue comes from advertising in 2017. In March, a Barclays badyst said that Facebook's cryptocurrency could bring the company $ 3 billion to $ 19 billion worth. here 2021.
May 2019
Rumors that Facebook was seeking funding for the project had entered the public sphere a tweet Nathaniel Popper, a reporter for the New York Times.
But the Wall Street Journal later corroborated this claim in early May, saying Facebook was looking beyond simple venture capitalists. Facebook had met with payment companies such as Western Union and Visa, the newspaper reported.
In the meantime, Congress began taking note of Facebook's efforts and the company then recruited two compliance professionals from Coinbase, with significant experience in banking and payments.
Other names began to publicly join the project, with CoinDesk announcing that a cryptoeconomics expert, Christian Catalini, of MIT, had played a role in the company.
Then Reuters discovered that the social media giant had registered a company in Switzerland, Libra Networks, with Facebook Global Holdings as a shareholder.
The name referred to what the Wall Street Journal had previously identified as code name for the effort, "Project Libra." This record can be seen here, although it simply describes a company working on a combination of financial services products, with blockchain as a component.
Le Temps reported that the person who runs Libra also manages Facebook in Switzerland, Majella Goss, who operates from a coworking space in Geneva.
Beyond the nickname GlobalCoin, the BBC announced that testing should begin by the end of the year and that the currency itself should be deployed in the first quarter of 2020.
Borrowing from Terabl's game book, the Asian e-commerce website, the BBC's history suggests that Facebook will seek discounts from online retailers for customers using GlobalCoin. This could be beneficial for retailers as well as for Facebook, as the payment services provided by credit card companies come with fees that hinder the profit margins of online retailers.
Facebook image via Tobias Dziuba / Pexels
[ad_2]
Source link
