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It bypasses SWIFT but only in the way bitcoin and similar cryptocurrencies do already.
statistically, so few people use bitcoin, that one might as well round to zero, so governments do not need to care. FB has 2.5B users whom they can easily manipulate, hence governments care.
There is basically no way that a self respecting first world country will allow this to happen. The national federal reserves in Europe are still responsible for international settlements, that gives a tremendous amount of power and oversight, they won’t allow a third party to take that away from them. Facebook may be able to buy off US regulators, but they won’t be able to convince the EU.
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I don't think governments 'dont care' but rather they are powerless to act effectively against Bitcoin. A ban would legitimize its utility to people skeptical of central banking. Because Satoshi is anonymous, there is no person or team to attack with legal or extralegal coercion. Only way to effectively take down bitcoin is to spend ~$1B building a huge mining operation with the purpose of launching a 51% attack, but…
> A ban would legitimize its utility to people skeptical of central banking i.e. a tiny irrelevant niche. I don't think banning bitcoin is a good idea, but a ban would be highly effective because nobody cares enough to risk fines or jail time over something they have no use for anyway.
I've lived in China and seen how this plays out. Facebook's new Libra Blockchain will be a centralized bank but way more dangerous.
It will allow for a worldwide social credit system. If Facebook decides to remove you for wrong speak or wrong think, your money and many services will be inaccessible.
Further, they have no mandate like the central bank does to increase employment. Their mandate is to make money for corporations. This will lead to global social unrest.
This will put some third-world countries in complete control by Facebook. I mean, whoever runs the currency, is the country. But in this case, it will be completely controlled, as it's also many of those countries main source of communication. Therefore, if Facebook's Libra is a countries main currency and social network, that country will be owned by Facebook.
Finally, the regulations on crypto and blockchain are still new. This is in Facebook's advantage as they can start lobbying to have these laws in their favor. They can argue for less transparency, as they are a bank, and this fits with their new privacy marketing message.
This is extremely subversive and Europe is already rightly pushing back. America will be next. On one hand, I love seeing the existing financial system panic when new technology comes out. On the other hand, under no circumstances will I accept a world where Facebook started the one world currency.
There is basically no way that a self respecting first world country will allow this to happen. The national federal reserves in Europe are still responsible for international settlements, that gives a tremendous amount of power and oversight, they won’t allow a third party to take that away from them. Facebook may be able to buy off US regulators, but they won’t be able to convince the EU.
Wouldn't be so sure that Uncle Sam isn't going to crack down even harder than the EU. Financial control is a big part of US power abroad and I can't imagine that the US government is going to tolerate a private entity taking that control away, and that's probably for the better. This entire Facebook currency thing sounds like something out of Shadowrun.
I put this in another thread but I've been shouting it far and wide today. I've lived in China and seen how this plays out. Facebook's new Libra Blockchain will be a centralized bank but way more dangerous. It will allow for a worldwide social credit system. If Facebook decides to remove you for wrong speak or wrong think, your money and many services will be inaccessible. Further, they have no mandate like the centr…
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Yeah, but those who are sanctioned by governments have much more incentive to use Bitcoin, so the fact that most don't use it is not important, what is important is its existence as an option.
It's not really an option. The hard (and VERY low) cap on transaction volume is a joke. If you think a Bitcoin is actually an option for actual banking for actual people (not just the current set of a few thousand gamblers), you are delusional. The current financial system DOES process more transactions in a millisecond than Bitcoin CAN in a week.
I am a cautiously optimistic person, but this is giving me the jeepers. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it doesn't feel right.