Facebook’s ‘GlobalCoin’ Crypto Will Be Tied to Multiple Currencies: Exec

Yet more details have emerged about Facebook’s upcoming cryptocurrency, said to be called GlobalCoin, and this time they come directly from the company.

Speaking to German business magazine  WirtschaftsWoche earlier this week, Laura McCracken, Facebook’s head of financial services and payment partnerships for Northern Europe, confirmed that the planned stablecoin will not be tied to any single fiat currency, but will instead be linked to a basket of currencies in order to prevent volatility.

The executive also added to recent reports that GlobalCoin would be revealed later this month, saying that a white paper for the token would be published on June 18.

McCracken was talking to the magazine at a trade conference in Amsterdam.

The confirmation comes after reports listing some of the executives said to be working on the effort. These include MIT’s Christian Catalini as chief economist and Sunita Parasuraman, manager of the Switzerland-based foundation leading the token project.

Facebook may further set up physical portals for users to purchase the cryptocurrency, as well as charging third parties as much as $10 million for the privilege of supporting the network as nodes, according to The Information.

Elsewhere, Russian news site RBC reported Thursday that head of oil firm Rosneft, Igor Sechin, told the St. Petersburg Economic Forum that Facebook’s cryptocurrency could possibly be used in oil transactions “in the near future.” Sechin, however, seemed to be talking generally about how big U.S. tech firms like Google, Apple and Facebook are making moves into the energy industry.

He added the skeptical note:

“At the same time, someone might get the illusion that technology giants will make the energy market fundamentally more transparent and efficient, becoming a panacea for solving the acute problems of modern times.”

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