Facebook is reversing its ban on some cryptocurrency ads

Facebook is reversing its ban on cryptocurrency advertisements and will now allow some preapproved advertisers to promote crypto businesses and services, like exchanges.

Facebook banned all crypto ads on the service back in January, around the height of the bitcoin price surge, to prevent people from promoting “financial products and services frequently associated with misleading or deceptive promotional practices.”

Now, advertisers that are approved by Facebook through an application process can promote crypto products, though ads promoting binary options and ICOs, initial coin offerings, are still banned. Interested advertisers may have to show Facebook “licenses they have obtained, whether they are traded on a public stock exchange, and other relevant public background on their business” in order to receive permission to run crypto ads.

The crypto bubble has declined considerably since late 2017, when the price of bitcoin was close to $20,000. (This morning, it’s just above $6,000 per coin.) That sudden rise in crypto created a mad dash by consumers who wanted in on the craze, and some shady businesses were trying to capitalize by promoting scams, hence the ban by Facebook. Others like Google, Twitter and Snapchat also banned crypto ads.

But crypto still has a lot of believers, and it easy to see why Facebook wants to sell crypto ads: It’s a growing, exciting industry with a lot of potential advertisers. So long as Facebook’s users aren’t getting scammed, the company would certainly love to take on the extra ad revenue.

Plus, Facebook seems to think the crypto craze is at least somewhat legit. The company started its own internal blockchain team earlier this year to explore the technology that’s used as the foundation for all cryptocurrencies. It seems likely that Facebook will take a hard look at cryptocurrencies in the process.