Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#401

Post by cesarb » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:49 PM UTC

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #358

I wonder how they plan to keep the price of the Libra stable. I understand that by keeping fiat currency reserves, they can guarantee a minimum exchange rate below which the Libra can never fall. But how can they stop the Libra from rising? And once it has risen, how can they stop it from crashing back down to the guaranteed exchange rate?

> I understand that by keeping fiat currency reserves, they can guarantee a minimum exchange rate below which the Libra can never fall.

The way this works is that it's a guaranteed arbitrage opportunity: if the price of Libra somewhere falls below USD 1, you can buy Libra at that cheaper price, exchange it at Facebook for USD (at the fixed USD 1 price), sell the USD, and pocket the difference.

> But how can they stop the Libra from rising?

The way this works is the same thing in the opposite direction: if the price of Libra somewhere rises above USD 1, you can buy USD, exchange it at Facebook for Libra (at the fixed USD 1 price), sell the Libra at the higher price, and pocket the difference.

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#402

Post by swordsmith » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:49 PM UTC

avoutthere wrote: post #285

moosey wrote: post #233

If this succeeds, it will be a data collection tool the likes of which the world has never seen, which is why so many companies are willing to put their name on it. The data, along with ML/AI, and our contemporary understanding of the human mind, means that this is a major step towards control that we can't understand. Dr. Harari explains it better than I do in "21 Lessons for the 21st Century", but this tool is part…

> If this succeeds, it will be a data collection tool the likes of which the world has never seen I'm pretty sure that this type of data collection tool is in use today by the Chinese government.

> I'm pretty sure that this type of data collection tool is in use today by the Chinese government.

Yeah US is a bit slow to that party. Alipay and Wechat-pay has roughly a billion users (conservative estimate) in China. It's widely socially accepted.

Makes more sense in the case of China, which never had wide adoption of credit cards. In Libra's case...why should I ever use it instead of sticking with credit cards?

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#403

Post by bob_theslob646 » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:50 PM UTC

no1youknowz wrote: post #69

I'm not holding any coins. But I have an interest in crypto currencies for some projects I'm developing. Anyone who thinks this is going to replace ripple, I have some bad news for you. Ripples main focus is not for users purchasing goods across websites. Its focus is mainly for banks (to hold vast amounts of XRP) when sending sums of money to each other, to be able to convert fiat into XRP and then send that XRP bet…

>There is going to be a fee for sending currency across the network.

What do you think the cost will be? Cheaper than the typical 1-3% of credit cards or more in line with debit card (ach) fee ( .005%)?

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#404

Post by Jaim » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:50 PM UTC

mxuribe wrote: post #164

Wait, wait, wait...so... if "Satoshi Nakamoto" == "Mark Zuckerberg": print("Whoa, mind blown!") else print("Carry on. Nothing to see here.") jk

Western Union transfer costs 35 dollars to Argentina. Libra may be cheaper.

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#405

Post by Jaim » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:52 PM UTC

Jaim wrote: post #404

mxuribe wrote: post #164

Wait, wait, wait...so... if "Satoshi Nakamoto" == "Mark Zuckerberg": print("Whoa, mind blown!") else print("Carry on. Nothing to see here.") jk

Western Union transfer costs 35 dollars to Argentina. Libra may be cheaper.

Money transfers if international are prohibitively expensive. Lets see how this thingie works.

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#406

Post by randomvectors » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:52 PM UTC

gridlockd wrote: post #225

fnoof wrote: post #195

From the white paper: > "Libra’s mission is to enable a simple global currency and financial infrastructure that empowers billions of people." They do this by issuing coins in exchange for fiat money, which is held by the reserve. > "Interest on the reserve assets will be used to cover the costs of the system, ensure low transaction fees, pay dividends to investors who provided capital to jumpstart the ecosystem [...…

> Conceptually this is a bank, but with no interest returned to users, no financial oversight from governments, controlled by Silicon Valley's top companies. I disagree that this is "conceptually" a bank. Facebook's business model isn't lending out the reserves. If it was, banking regulation would apply. Also, in a modern bank, reserves are maybe 10%, and you get less than zero percent interest after inflation for th…

> At this point, I think I'd honestly rather put my money with Facebook than many of those actual banks out there.

This is so ridiculous that I don't even know how to argue with it.

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#407

Post by blueadept111 » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:53 PM UTC

Yawn. This is a tempest in a teapot. Why would anyone bother to use Libra? People buy crypto mostly for speculation, hoping that it will go up (or at least not lose value over time, due to inflation). A stable coin that's pegged to major currencies is no better than the major currencies. It's also no worse. It's boring, and most people won't care.

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#408

Post by zxcb1 » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:55 PM UTC

_bxg1 wrote: post #200

Terrifying, really. The world is hurdling back towards a feudalist society, with corporations instead of kings.

What happens to the data (and metadata), will all users be transparent to these corporations?

Isn’t there a risk of this turning into a social credit system?

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#409

Post by ancientworldnow » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:55 PM UTC

otabdeveloper4 wrote: post #373

_bxg1 wrote: post #200

Terrifying, really. The world is hurdling back towards a feudalist society, with corporations instead of kings.

No. Your ideas of what 'feudalism' implies are totally wack and ahistorical. Feudalism was a time of laissez-faire, political liberty and anarchism. "The vassal of my vassal is not my vassal" was the motto of feudalism. It was a reaction against the centralization and coercion of the old Roman Empire. How is this anything like Facebook et al?

Weird that someone who is trying to be such a pedant incorrectly suggests this was a period of anarchism (a political system centered the absolution of government and unjust hierarchies). Maybe you meant anarchy, which is also a stretch historically speaking.

Re: Facebook reveals its cryptocurrency Libra

#410

Post by pierlu » Tue, Jun 18, 2019, 3:56 PM UTC

fnoof wrote: post #195

From the white paper: > "Libra’s mission is to enable a simple global currency and financial infrastructure that empowers billions of people." They do this by issuing coins in exchange for fiat money, which is held by the reserve. > "Interest on the reserve assets will be used to cover the costs of the system, ensure low transaction fees, pay dividends to investors who provided capital to jumpstart the ecosystem [...…

It will be interesting to see how the well known economy concept of "Optimum currency area" (see Robert Mundell, 1961) would apply in that case of a stable money anchored to a mixture of dollar/euro/yen. If it is like what happened to Euro in the face of a systemic crisis, that should be labor mobility and low wages for low-productivity countries.