The U.S. House Financial Services Committee will host a hearing on Facebook’s libra cryptocurrency next month, one day after the Senate Banking Committee holds its previously announced hearing.
Maxine Waters, chair of the powerful House committee, announced the hearing Monday, The Hill reported, after calling on Facebook to suspend development of the project multiple times last week. The hearing is scheduled for July 17, and no witness list has yet been released.
She told CNBC on Thursday that “It’s very important for them to stop right now what they’re doing so that we can get a handle on this,” adding:
“We’ve got to protect our consumers. We just can’t allow them to go to Switzerland with all of its associates and begin to compete with the dollar.”
The Senate Banking Committee announced on Wednesday that it would hold its own hearing on July 16, intending to ask Facebook’s team about the project.
The committee had already sent Facebook a letter last month outlining a number of questions revolving around Facebook’s privacy and consumer data storage practices.
Facebook unveiled libra last week, outlining an ambitious plan to form a governing council and use two tokens to form a nation-independent financial ecosystem.
The social media giant intends to help 1.7 billion unbanked individuals access financial services, as well as streamline payments through its Messenger and WhatsApp platforms.
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