Rumors About A Potential Acquisition Of Coinbase... By Facebook!
As I previously wrote, Facebook relaxed their crypto ad ban yesterday. A couple of hours ago, though, in an analysis published on The Independent, a rumor about Facebook potentially buying Coinbase surfaced again.
It's not the first time these rumors appear, the first one was in the Economist a while ago.
According to the piece on The Independent:
Experts say that not only could the acquisition boost Facebook’s value and utility, the involvement of the technology giant would add legitimacy to cryptocurrency markets.
"It wouldn't surprise me if Facebook made an attempt to acquire Coinbase," tech entrepreneur Oliver Isaacs told The Independent. "Whether [Coinbase CEO] Brian Armstrong and the team would agree is another question."
Wether or not this rumor is true, I have no way to know.
But I can speculate on the upsides and downsides of such a move.
Upside
- broader adoption (2 billion Facebook users, versus the 10 million current Coinbase user base)
- more liquidity in the markets
Downside
- a big hit for decentralization as an utopian dream (Facebook is an epitome of centralization, IMHO)
- potential market manipulations via fake-news (a thing that Facebook seems to be familiar with)
The trade-off seems to be a bit too much for me, so I'd rather not see this happening.
Thoughts?
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
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I'm kind of sour on Facebook, so I'm not going to have much of an objective opinion here.
Even so, I can see where a Facebook acquisition of Coinbase could more greatly legitimize the cryptocurrency markets for one segment of society—the one which doesn't really care about decentralization (probably doesn't even know what it is) or about privacy (after all, they're doing nothing wrong but posting pictures of their latest adventures for their family and friends).
Those folks, the largely unplugged and thus uninformed will then wonder what crypto is all about and potentially go looking for it.
Those of us who made it to Steemit, at least in part, because of the decentralization and the belief that our data won't be sold to third parties (though I'm not clear what will prevent someone from doing it, or for that matter, any entity coming in and just getting it), aren't going to be happy even with the rumor, let alone the actual acquisition taking place.
So, the question becomes, what do we want more: potential big money, or decentralization with organic, but slow, growth. I wish we could have both, but history isn't very much in favor of that. :)
What would you even value Coinbase at? If I was Armstrong, its not the current valuation that would interest me, its the future valuation I would price my product on, and what is that value?
If bitcoin goes to $100,000 and I believe it can, then the total market cap is going to be something like 4-5 trillion dollars in my opinion, and if Coinbase has a strangle hold on the entry point into that market place, which in my opinion they do, that is worth way more than current valuations of Coinbase could ever suggest.
I suspect Coinbase would heavily regret accepting any offer of buy out, HEAVILY.
Guys, this is the time to get organized! Lets throw all our SBD and Steem into it and buy Coinbase. As a big middle finger by the decentralized social network to Facebook and friends! ;)
Well if you buy and sell on coinbase only... removing funds as you go, it may just be a good thing to boost adoption. But two things of my own come to mind:
F*** THAT! I don't want to see Facebucks trading on Coinbase.
I really don't want to see this happen either @dragosroua. Let's hope it's just rumour!
I refuse to believe :D
I donot know about others but i personally think it would be disaster to decentralisation. We already have bitmain controlling 42% of hashrate.
I dont think the world is ready for mass adoption of crypto yet. I rekon this would be a bad thing at the moment
God forbid. I'd have to stop using Coinbase. I hope it's just a rumour.