First released in June 2019 under the name Libra, the Facebook-backed cryptocurrency called Diem has a launch date for later this year.
The partnership behind Diem plans to launch a pilot program later this year. This pilot program will focus particularly on P2P payments and will be a small-scale launch to test the service.
For now, it is known that Diem will essentially be a stablecoin. Meaning that its value will not fluctuate according to the interest of users but will be tied to the value of a state-backed fiat currency.
Likewise, the Facebook-backed stablecoin plans to be a payment network between users and businesses where the value of the digital currency will be the same as the currency of the country it operates in. For example, a Diem in the United States will have the same value as the U.S. dollar, and a Diem in the United Kingdom will have the value of the British pound.
Facebook’s Diem cryptocurrency will be launched this year
The Diem Association, the Swiss-based non-profit organization overseeing the development of this stablecoin does not yet have a fixed launch date. But in addition, Diem is currently in talks with Swiss financial regulators to obtain an operating license.
The main issue that the stablecoin is facing would be the potential money laundering that can occur with digital currency. This is something that has concerned regulators, being a currency not controlled by the state but by a group of companies. This will largely depend on how each partner decides to implement the cryptocurrency in their systems.
Likewise, this will depend on whether Facebook decides to use Diem on its platform as private or not for users.
On the other hand, the path of Diem was not the simplest, after the notices of various regulators several companies that abandoned the project, the stablecoin changed its strategy and a radical turn in its structure to be more a service similar to PayPal.
First Facebook changed its Calibra wallet to Novi. Months later, at the end of 2020, Libra announced that it was changing its name to Diem. This new name brought a new strategy to reach out in a totally different way than what was originally presented.
Facebook bets on QR code
In the midst of the digital wallet boom, Facebook is starting to test its new solution with Facebook Pay between (Facebook) Messenger users in the United States.
This new service from Mark Zuckerberg’s company consists of the use of QR codes to request money between individuals within Facebook, similar to how payment systems between individuals work on other platforms.
This way, Facebook is expanding the Facebook Pay payment tools in other areas of its applications and services, being currently available for donations and for purchases within Facebook Marketplace. At least for the moment, it will work separately from the expected cryptocurrency wallet experience, although it may work together in the future. Facebook didn’t provide more information about it.
