Facebook: Novi Digital Wallet Is ‘Ready to Come to Market’

Facebook said Wednesday that the global payments system is seriously flawed and that the social media giant can fix it.

• “Change is long overdue,” Facebook’s David Marcus wrote in a blog post.
• Marcus, the former PayPal chief hired in 2018 to lead Facebook’s blockchain efforts, said Novi, the digital wallet subsidiary he oversees, is “ready to come to market.”
• “We feel that it’s unreasonable to delay delivering the benefits of cheaper, interoperable, more accessible digital payments,” he wrote.
• The blog post follows reports of increased headwinds faced by the Facebook-initiated stablecoin project. After a grand reveal in June 2019, Libra ran into a gauntlet of resistance from global regulators. The project was rebranded as Diem in December 2020. It has yet to launch.
• Only offering fiat currency within Novi would still provide value, Marcus wrote, though he added: “I strongly believe if there was ever a chance to create an open, interoperable protocol for money on the internet and truly change the game for people and businesses around the world, it is now.”
• Marcus noted that Facebook has secured licenses and approvals for Novi in nearly every state in the U.S., and said, “we will not launch anywhere we have not yet received such clearances.”