Winklevoss twins could again work with Facebook

by



[ad_1]

"Facebook was a conflict, but it did not really define who we were as people," Tyler Winklevoss told CNN's Poppy Harlow in an interview for the Boss Files podcast. "Gemini is more about who we are, what we represent, what interests us."
But it was hard to ignore their story with Zuckerberg when Facebook announced its intention to enter the world of crypto with Libra, a digital play that bears the name of a zodiac sign. So, are Zuckerberg and the Winklevoss twins coming back?
The brothers do not see it like that. In fact, they seek to associate potentially with Facebook (FB) on the Libra. Whether or not they decide to team up with their former rival, the Winklevoss brothers believe that Libra is a good thing for the industry and a step forward towards a time when cryptocurrency is ubiquitous.

"I think there's a day in the future where we can not live without crypto, or imagine a world before crypto," Cameron Winklevoss said.

The brothers adhered to this vision at the very beginning of Bitcoin, while it was worth around $ 8, after collecting much of the wealth that they had gained in Facebook shares through their settlement with Zuckerberg. Bitcoin's value peaked at $ 20,000 in 2017 and now stands at around $ 10,000.
It was a daring bet to make an investment opportunity that the brothers first learned from a guy on an Ibiza beach after "a little tequila" But that paid off for the Winklevoss twins , making them, at least for a while, "bitcoin billionaires". (This also happens to be the title of the book on their life.)

With these returns, the brothers started Gemini in 2014.

Gemini allows users to buy, redeem and store digital assets – or cryptocurrency. Crypto-currencies are traditionally decentralized and largely unregulated. The Winklevoss brothers presented Gemini as a platform on which people can rely. They have therefore sought and obtained licenses in the state of New York as a so-called trust company, similar to many traditional financial institutions, and as a virtual currency exchange.

"We often say that trust is our product," said Cameron Winklevoss. "And we are basically trying to create a safe and easy way for this Midwestern person, if they want to buy a crypto, to do it, as they do at their brokerage account, as a part of Apple or a part of it. Amazon ".

Gemini is now available in 49 US states and Washington, DC, as well as in the UK, Singapore and several other countries. He is seeking regulatory approval in other parts of the world. Although the company does not publicly share the number of users or revenues, its staff now numbers more than 200 people working in offices in New York, Portland and Chicago.

Gemini's willingness to work with regulators is positioning the company well in the face of the increasingly pressing calls from US lawmakers for increased surveillance of cryptocurrency. This could also make the Winklevoss brothers a valuable partner for Libra. The demand for new regulations has been largely motivated by the announcement of Libra. Lawmakers fear Libya will grant too much power to Facebook, and quick membership in cryptocurrency by mainstream social media could destabilize supported by the government fiduciary money, like the US dollar.
The Winklevoss brothers said they had discussed with Facebook their membership in the project's governing body, the Libra Association. Facebook has already announced the 28 "founding members" of the association, including competitor Gemini Coinbase, but said it hoped to have 100 members by the launch of Libra in early 2020.

The brothers indicated that they were waiting to learn more about the project before deciding to join the association or register Libra on the Gemini exchange, which, according to them, is another possibility. The Libra Association told CNN Business that she was not commenting on ongoing conversations with potential members.

In the end, the twins do not think that Facebook will be the last big tech company to try to launch a cryptocurrency. Cameron Winklevoss is waiting for each of the companies FAANG – Facebook, Amazon (AMZN), Apple (AAPL), Netflix (NFLX) and Google (GOOGL) – enter the crypto.

"I think Internet companies need to have a cryptographic strategy, and I think a lot of them are thinking about their own parts projects, and they're probably looking at Libra and Facebook to see how it evolves as they develop," he says. said Cameron Winklevoss. .

A company well suited to such a room, he said, is Amazon.

"Amazon can probably ship parcels to anywhere in the world, even if the last mile is snowmobile or something like that," Cameron Winklevoss said. "What you can not get is paid for these goods, which is very ironic, namely that material objects can be moved around the world and that we can not get money in many places of the world. world".

These are just some of the ways the brethren expect Cryptocurrency to change the world, and they say there is more to come.

"We are at the bottom of the first run," said Tyler Winklevoss. "The game has not really started."

[ad_2]

Source link