Vodafone’s New Bitcoin Ad Shades Facebook’s Libra 

Popular telecommunications company Vodafone is embracing cryptocurrencies as a part of its operations, and it has chosen Bitcoin to be the perfect asset to introduce to its users. 

Earlier this week, the British multinational firm debuted its ad for German users on its Facebook page, in which it included Bitcoin for the first time. It’s unknown how this cryptocurrency adoption will work for Vodafone, but it is definitely great news for the space nonetheless. 

No More Libra Aspirations for Vodafone 

However, while Vodafone’s acceptance of crypto was greeted by many in the space, there were a few who believed that it was also a dig at Facebook’s native cryptocurrency Libra. Libra has faced quite a lot of challenges since it was announced by Facebook last June, and while the asset has the potential to become a global phenomenon, governments and policymakers around the world have expressed their doubt over whether they will be comfortable with allowing the asset to thrive in their countries. 

The pressure became so overwhelming that the Libra Association- the Swiss body created by Facebook to govern the asset- began to bleed members as early as last October. Vodafone, which was a member of the association from the start, decided to exit last month, claiming in a statement that it was doing so to focus on its M-Pesa peer to peer payments system. The system, which already logs up to 17 million users across the world, has been instrumental in changing the payment and financial landscape across several African countries, including Tanzania and Kenya. 

Facebook’s Digital Currency Hopes Continue to Hang On 

It is, however, worth noting that Facebook is still keeping its dreams for Libra alive despite the shadow of skepticism that has surrounded it since its announcement. As a matter of fact, Canadian e-commerce giant Shopify announced just yesterday that it would be joining the Libra Association. 

According to a confirmatory post by Facebook, Shopify is set to help bolster Libra’s objective of widespread economic participation. Shopify added that its action to join the network is in line with its desire to help solve the problem of unreliable cross-border payments across the world. It added that it had recognized the shortcomings of the world’s current financial infrastructure as far as scaling the needs of the Internet is concerned, and by joining Libra, it hopes to help challenge existing structures and bring an era of transparent fees and merchants’ security. 

It added, “Our mission is to make commerce better for everyone, and to do that, we spend a lot of our time thinking about how to make commerce better in parts of the world where money and banking could be far better. That’s why we decided to become a member of the Libra Association. This is one step, but not the only step we’ll be taking to be a part of the solution to this global problem.”