Several countries coming out against Libra ever making it on their home soil.
In addition, the idea of a form of money ending up in the hands of a private company rather than governments puts the “monetary sovereignty of countries at stake.”
“I want to be absolutely clear: in these conditions, we cannot authorize the development of Libra on European soil,” Le Maire said.
What ? Like the US $ ? The GBP £ ? The EU EURO ? - ALL in the hands of Private Companies !
I have to say though that “libra” or anything else ending up in the handds of someone like Zuckerberg is truly scary - he needs to be shackled from teh way he already abuses power, not encouraged to grab more !
I’m still trying to wrap my brain around the ramifications of allowing a company like Facebook to maintain what could be a global currency. Scary indeed.
The German government delivered another blow to Libra - according to its new strategy the cabinet in Berlin stated that while the block chain technology holds great potential, it should not be used to develop private forms of money.
“A core element of state sovereignty is the issuance of a currency, we will not allow private companies to do it,” German Finance Minister Olaf Scholz commented on the government’s decision.
The German stance reflects similar concerns expressed by France and the skepticism in Washington.
Facebook reassured world central banks that Libra, the new stable coin the social media giant plans to launch in 2020, will not replace sovereign currencies like the U.S. dollar or the Euro, and will not threaten the central banks’ control over money creation.
David Marcus, the Libra project director said in a tweet that Libra is not the digital equivalent of printing U.S. dollars or minting new euros. “The simple existence of Libra does not create new value”, he added.
But it has the potential to disrupt fiat currencies for over 1 billion users. The value will be found in the ecosystem that Facebook creates around the cryptocurrency.
EU finance ministers have agreed that private digital currencies like Libra – the crypto coin Facebook plans to launch in 2020, should not be allowed in the European Union until all possible risks are identified and properly addressed.
I think the governments are in control here. As long as they control the businesses which control the networks and Internet access, there’s not much the retail crowd and proponents of cryptocurrencies can do. All the governments need to do is throw their weight around, and then it’s game over.
With current degree of power that modern governments exercise I would say it is impossible to expect from them they will part with control over monetary system. Basically it is a direct threat for their existence.
I believe there are genuine privacy issues surrounding the giant tech firms especially Facebook. Until these are resolved huge projects like Libra are going to be opposed. They’ll not be wholeheartedly welcome by both private players and governments.