Critique the critique

I am less interested in Libra then I am interested in what people know about the subject. Here is:

Eric Posner  Professor at the University of Chicago Law School

The Trouble Starts If Facebook’s New Currency Succeeds

The key insight underlying Libra is that the transfer of money from person to person is similar to the transfer of information. “Moving money around globally,” Facebook declares in the white paper laying out the company’s vision for its new cryptocurrency, “should be as easy and cost-effective as—and even more safe and secure than—sending a text message or sharing a photo.” Money is information: When I send money to you, I’m telling the financial system that wealth holdings assigned to me should now be recorded as assigned to you.

This is not a bearer asset, Facebooki will not support bearer assets, Facebook. I give the author the advice I give to all: First, in your imagination, exactly duplicate a paper digital dollra, not emulate, but exactly duplice. When you have that in your head, then start talking about money.

But in its raw state, bitcoin was too hard to use—and this gave rise to intermediary firms that supplied “wallets,” platforms that were accessible to ordinary people. And the important process of confirming transactions (“mining” in bitcoin parlance) also turned out to be too complicated for ordinary people—giving rise to sophisticated and wealthy entities that performed this process.

The poster forgot the coin exchanges, open automated pricing pits that can exchange any number of coin types.  Libra has only the pits that are running as a node on the their blockchain, and those pits may be restricted, Zuck is hiding stuff here.

Again, the assets in the Libra Reserve will consist of national currencies and government bonds—at least at the outset. Every time you or I buy a Libra for, say, $1, a portion of that dollar will pay for a government bond whose interest goes to the Libra Association members, not to us.

I can buy bonds from a private dealer on the Facebook net with Libra.  So Libra already has a problem, its committee will lose business  if Libra is a true currency.   Thius contradiction is not widely understood, either Libra is a net currency, and has free exchange, or it is a security in an index fund.  Either way, Libra must be freely traded telse users will go off net or drop it entirely.

And Libra will be big. Facebook has 2.4 billion users, and if, as Facebook promises, they can costlessly, seamlessly jump from their Facebook accounts to their Calibra wallets to spend money, many of them will do so.

Big is a relative. Chinese yuan has one billion users.   And holding Libra is not a winning game since it sits in someone else's investment account.   So every time it is used, it is returned to deposit and regular tax dollars (or yuan) is obtained for a bank that actually pays interest.

Then there is the other problem, outside of Facebook is the internet, and over the internet ApplleID can be used as hard bearer digital asset for some 6 billion users.  And this threat is what Libra is all about.

Central banking has one resource it can use, adopt the same digital techniques.  The USA Fed can replace the paper dollar: give everyone an iPod, (or four), deploy automated S/L technology; and still be a central bank.  Banking is a lot easier than people think, central bankers either adapt or be replaced.