Project Libra: A Bold Step for Cryptocurrencies and Payments

Project Libra: A Bold Step for Cryptocurrencies and Payments

This IDC Market Perspective covers Project Libra, Facebook's announced entry into cryptocurrency and blockchain. With its announcement of Project Libra, Facebook, along with 27 other corporate partners, presented a bold vision for blockchain and cryptocurrency and offered a novel approach to providing basic payment services to underserved communities worldwide. The plan for Project Libra as offered by the white papers released by Facebook includes some clever thinking regarding governance, volatility, and some of the issues that have plagued other cryptocurrencies, but the project still faces some significant challenges. Questions about regulatory concerns, developer acceptance, and consumer adoption still need to be answered. But Project Libra represents the first attempt by mainstream enterprises to use blockchain as the underpinnings for a serious financial services product."Project Libra is a thoughtful and substantive effort that ties what we have learned about cryptocurrencies in the past decade to the worthy goal of promoting financial inclusion," said James Wester, IDC research director, Worldwide Blockchain Strategies. "That being said, success is in no way guaranteed. There are plenty of issues that need to be addressed by the companies backing Project Libra, not the least of which are the concerns posed by Facebook being the primary driver of the effort. Success is in no way guaranteed."

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