Facebook's LibraCoin Will Catapult Cryptos Into the Mainstream, but at What Cost?

Facebook has just dropped an announcement on their long-awaited cryptocurrency, LibraCoin.

The coin is similar Ethereum, as it also enables smart contracts and the development of dApps using its own language, Move. It will also be backed by a large internal reserve to ensure stability.

So what impact will LibraCoin be likely to have on the cryptocurrency landscape?

Aside from owning some of the largest social networks in the world today, the sheer impetus that Facebook will able to throw behind LibraCoin will undoubtedly help it to skyrocket ahead of smaller competitors.

But the idea of a crypto backed by the Prince of Surveillance, Mark Zuckerberg himself, has already divided opinions. This is despite the fact that Facebook claims that it will only retain a single vote on the platform's investor-staked panel of directors, the Libra Association.

People routinely complain how invasive and creepy Facebook can be when it uses their personal data to target ads or tailor their feeds, and lament the fact they cannot escape the grips of social media because of its ubiquity; now imagine if the social media giant had unprecedented access to your payment history as well?

If there was any doubt, Facebook's intention to muscle into the payment processing industry has been confirmed by the announcement of a new corporate subsidiary called Calibra, set up to develop financial apps on the Libra blockchain. Their first project will be to develop a digital wallet to be integrated with Facebook products.

Remember, Facebook already owns WhatsApp and Instagram, two of the most widely used mobile apps in the West. The strongest social media equivalent in China, WeChat, has already integrated traditional payment services into their messenger app, with users' digital lives often existing entirely in an ecosystem owned by the Chinese conglomerate, Tencent.

If Facebook is able to monetize LibraCoin by putting a digital wallet in the hands of every single user of its myriad platforms, then they will unquestionably be able to thrust cryptocurrencies into the foreground of the financial industry and very likely normalise cryptos for the average user - just not in the way early adopters had expected.

Even though LibraCoin is built on decentralised principles, it is unlikely that Facebook will allow any real degree of anonymity for its users. This is unlikely to come anywhere close to fulfilling the vision of blockchain held by many of its enthusiasts.