Mark Zuckerberg has reignited his interest in digital currencies as Meta is reportedly looking to provide stablecoin payout functions on its social media platforms.
Fortune revealed on 8 May that the Big Tech firm was in talks with relevant crypto companies to map out ideas to introduce stablecoin payment features, according to five sources close to the situation.
Some of the early proposals for Meta’s stablecoin venture would be to introduce payouts of up to $100 worth of select stablecoins integrated into Instagram. While Fortune noted that talks are still in preliminary stages, sources revealed that the Instagram small payouts function would be more geared towards offering several stablecoins as opposed to one.
The report further outlined that Meta’s interest in stablecoins stems from the wider interest garnered across many traditional finance institutions. These firms’ interest is quickly growing due to stablecoins’ convenience and speed of transaction, as well as remittances being cheaper and regulation discussions gaining steam within major countries.
Spearheading Meta’s stablecoin approach is Ginger Baker, VP of Product, who has previously worked for crypto organisations such as Stellar Development Foundation, as well as within fintech with Plaid.
Furthermore, Meta has held meetings with Matt Cavin, who handles tier-1 strategic payment partnerships at Circle, the stablecoin issuer of USDC, and could potentially lead to USDC being piloted for the Instagram payout feature.
Meta’s digital currency past
To many, Meta’s interest in stablecoins will not come as a surprise as it has previously launched two digital currency projects that ultimately collapsed.
In 2019, Meta announced Libra, a blockchain network that curated a digital currency with the same name, which would be accessible for all Facebook users and other Meta-owned platforms to perform payments.
A year later, the project was renamed to Diem and Zuckerberg intended for this to be a stablecoin after expressing his interest in attaching the digital currency to the US dollar.
While Diem received the backing of companies such as Spotify, Uber, Coinbase and Shopify, its assets were almost completely bought up by Silvergate Capital, which subsequently collapsed in March 2023.
Zuckerberg confirmed the final nail in the coffin for Diem when he confirmed at a Stripe event on 6 May “that things dead”.
Despite collapsing, Diem represented a real threat to traditional finance and its payment systems. Speaking to Payment Expert in April 2023, Ricardo Correia, former Head of Digital Currencies and CBDC at R3, said the initial Libra announcement “served as a wake-up call for governments and banks”.
Correia explained: “Banks were concerned that people might opt to use Libra instead of fiat/central bank money, which would result in a reduction of payments going through the banking system. More importantly, however, it might have an impact on monetary policy more broadly.”
With Meta now seeking to introduce payout features to Instagram first, with a view to potentially expanding this function across other platforms like Facebook and WhatsApp, the Big Tech firm becomes only the latest large institution to realise the benefits of stablecoin payments.
