Garage Sale
Remember Facebook’s Libra from a few years ago? Well, if you don’t let’s take you through a quick recap. Libra was planned to be a global digital currency made to help the billions of people around the world who lacked access to basic financial services. The currency would be a “stablecoin” backed by a basket of sovereign currencies such as the dollar, the euro and the yen. More than that, the currency planned to have an “association” around it, that would, in effect, act like a bank. This bank would deviate from the norm and hold the power to print its own currency against the commodities and assets it would hold. Specifically, Libra’s bank wanted to function in a permissionless manner, and provide a global currency whose value would be stabilized by other currencies like the dollar. In short, Libra sought to bank the unbanked world.
Today, Libra is officially dead. It’s been over two years since it was first announced and nearly nothing has occurred. While the crypto currency space has taken off, with more and more tokens and protocols popping up, Libra has been nowhere to be seen. The final blow to the Libra project (more recently labeled Diem) came when the U.S. Federal Reserve put pressure on Silvergate, the banking partner they needed to launch the token. What do you think about Facebook’s idea and could a crypto emerging from a private company ever see success?
I am not a financial advisor and my comments should never be taken as financial advice. Investments come with risk, so always do your research and analysis beforehand.