Facebook to call off its cryptocurrency business, sell assets

The Diem Association, the consortium that was founded by Facebook back in 2019 has started to wind down its business and has initiated to dispose of its assets. It was founded to create a future-ready payment network. With this, Facebook’s ambitious project to bring cryptocurrency to the masses has received a massive blow. Meta Platforms Inc. formerly known as Facebook launched this project in 2019 as LIBRA, intending to make this platform a tool to empower its user that makes transactions as easy as sending a text message. But soon enough it was met with firm resistance from the Washington officials citing financial stability and data privacy issues associated with Libra. Arguments such as misuse of this platform for money laundering and terrorism-related activities were put forward by the government officials. Now by selling off the assets possessed by it, the company is trying to get back whatever it could to recover losses. It has sold its technology to a small bank based in California that caters to cryptocurrency and blockchain companies for about $200 million.