Mastercard’s CEO ditched Facebook’s Libra after multiple red flags

Mastercard’s CEO ditched Facebook’s Libra because of his concerns about compliance, monetization, and the social-media titan’s plan to insert itself into transactions, he recently told the Financial Times.

Ajay Banga signed up Mastercard to support Facebook’s digital currency and network, but dropped out — along with Visa, eBay, PayPal, and other partners — last fall. One reason was Libra’s leaders wouldn’t commit to abiding by laws around knowing their clients, money laundering, and data management, he told the newspaper.

“Every time you talked to the main proponents of Libra, I said ‘Would you put that in writing?’ They wouldn’t.”

It was also unclear to Banga how Libra would generate revenue, stoking his fears that it would make money in unscrupulous ways. “When you don’t understand how money gets made, it gets made in ways you don’t like,” he told the Financial Times.

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