David Marcus, Head of Calibra at Facebook, testifies about Facebook’s proposed digital currency called Libra, during a Senate Banking, House and Urban Affairs Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, July 16, 2019.
Saul Loeb | AFP | Getty Images
Facebook is reportedly meeting with central bank officials on Monday to answer questions about the company’s planned digital currency libra.
Libra representatives are in Basel, Switzerland to meet with officials from 26 global central banks — including the U.S. Federal Reserve and Bank of England — according to the Financial Times newspaper.
The meeting is officially between Libra and the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructure, which is part of the Bank of International Settlements, the FT reported. The sit-down is being chaired by Benoit Coeure, a member of the European Central Bank’s executive board.
An ECB spokesperson confirmed to CNBC that a meeting on stable cryptocurrencies — otherwise known as stablecoins — was taking place in Basel, but didn’t confirm any of the attendees. Facebook declined to comment.
First announced back in June, the libra coin is aimed at making it easier to transfer money around the world, without having to go through financial intermediaries like banks. But the social media giant has faced a brutal response from global regulators and lawmakers over its cryptocurrency plans.
The digital currency is being developed by Facebook and a Switzerland-based consortium known as the Libra Association, which includes companies like Visa, Uber and Coinbase. It would be backed by a digital ledger different to bitcoin’s and, also unlike bitcoin, asset-backed in order to maintain a stable value.
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