Facebook earlier said that its cryptocurrency, Libra, was set to launch sometime in 2020, but there appears to be some hitches in the process, with the launch possibly being delayed. And now, American payments processor Paypal has announced that it is withdrawing from the Libra Association, which is made up of members including Mastercard, Uber, and Visa.
According to a new report, PayPal has said that they will continue to support plans for Libra, with an eye on working together in the future. Pointedly however, they’ve chosen to focus on their core businesses for the time being:
“We remain supportive of Libra’s aspirations and look forward to continued dialogue on ways to work together in the future.”
This comes after a number of challenges that are already facing the cryptocurrency. Earlier this year, a U.S. lawmaker called for a delay in the launch, pointing to Facebook’s chequered past with privacy and data concerns. Authorities in France have also expressed their stance against Libra, while certain quarters in the U.S. have stated their objections against big technology players stepping into the finance sector.
The Libra Association issued the following response:
“The type of change that will reconfigure the financial system to be tilted toward people, not the institutions serving them, will be hard. Commitment to that mission is more important to us than anything else. We’re better off knowing about this lack of commitment now, rather than later.”
There are now 28 members left in the Libra Association, with Mastercard and Visa also reportedly considering their continued membership. This further throws a spanner into the works for the Libra Association, who also has plans to launch Calibra—an e-wallet to store the currency in.
