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Exploring cryptocurrency: Facebook’s Libra

Libra: is it a cryptocurrency for the world’s unbanked, or just another data gathering exercise? Philippa Kelly explores Facebook’s planned foray into financial services and examines five things we don’t know about Libra

Libra image - FS Focus Sep 2019 Libras are said to be calm, rational and detached, symbolised in the Zodiac by the scales and balance. All good traits for a currency, perhaps. But at a time when fake news and hype can easily drown out impartial and rigorous analysis, perhaps we need to treat crypto developments like we do horoscopes – with a pinch of salt. Nice if it happens, but don’t bank on it.

The Libra white paper weighs in at 12 pages, in comparison to the nearly 200 news stories in the FT that have mentioned it since it was published and the nine million Google hits for “Facebook Libra”.