Facebook announced Tuesday its long-awaited cryptocurrency plans, "Project Libra," a fresh type of digital money intended for billions of individuals using their applications and social network. If the scheme is effective, customers will quickly be able to shop and send the currency on Messenger and Instagram, known as Libra, as well as use it with a broad selection of other retailers such as Uber, Spotify,, and MasterCard.
Facebook did not specify precisely when and how customers will get ahold of the currency, but managers suggested that it will first be distributed in mid-2020 on Messenger and WhatsApp. The firm has also announced a new digital wallet called Calibra, which will be operated as a distinct subsidiary by Facebook and will provide customers with a manner to store and spend Libra.
The digital wallet, which won’t be available to the public for months, will display the value of users’ Libra in their local currency and provide a design similar to popular digital wallet Venmo for transferring money.
Facebook provided an image of Calibra’s design—including a three-wave symbol that serves as the Libra’s equivalent of a dollar sign.
According to David Marcus, a former PayPal executive who is leading Project Libra for Facebook, one of the initiative’s main goals is to reach the 1.7 billion people worldwide who lack access to the banking system.
“It’s an anomaly that the Internet has no protocol for money,” Marcus tells Fortune, adding that Project Libra will also provide more competition in financial services, along with increasing access to capital.
While Facebook has been driving the project, the company is framing its role as one member of a federation of dozens of companies and non-profit organizations that will together manage the currency through a Swiss foundation.
Corporate members of the organization, known as the Libra Foundation, will be required to contribute a minimum of $10 million to help the currency gain traction, an effort that will likely see users receive a small amount of Libra to test it out.
Initial members of the foundation are Facebook and 27 other partners, including Visa, MasterCard, PayPal, Coinbase, and venture capital firms like Andreesen Horowitz and Union Square Ventures. Marcus hopes as many as 100 partners will be onboard by the time the currency debuts, by which time the group will have crafted a formal charter that sets out voting rights and other rules.
The Libra blockchain—like other blockchains—will provide a tamper-proof record of transactions on the network. But, unlike Bitcoin and other public blockchains, only authorized bodies—in this case, foundation members—will be allowed to run a node.
In addition, members will also maintain the supply of Libra in response to demand—meaning they will issue new Libra as needed, and destroy the digital currency when people redeem them.
