The Facebook CEO will testify in two weeks before the House Financial Committee

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg will testify before Congress about his firm’s cryptocurrency project. Zuckerberg will speak before the House financial services committee on the launch of Libra.

The news broke earlier this week after a statement from Committee Chairwoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) Zuckerberg will testify on the Libra cryptocurrency and digital wallet Calibra on October 23. Democrats on the committee have pushed for Facebook to stop the development of its cryptocurrency. In July, the committee members sent a letter to Zuckerberg and the executive team at Facebook.

“Because Facebook is already in the hands of over a quarter of the world’s population, it is imperative that Facebook and its partners immediately cease implementation plans until regulators and Congress have an opportunity to examine these issues and take action,” the letter said.

Waters and her committee members have also proposed a new law that would effectively ban Facebook’s cryptocurrency. The “Keep Big Tech out of Finance Act” would set restrictions on any social media or tech firm in the financial industries. The law would bar any firms with $25 billion in annual revenue from creating their own financial networks.

Congress and regulators have raised steep concerns about the future of the cryptocurrency project.

Partners like Visa and Mastercard have considered pulling out of the project. On Tuesday, two key members of the Senate Banking Committee urged executives at Visa, Mastercard, and Stripe to “carefully consider how your company will manage” the risks of this project like money laundering and other considerations.

Meanwhile, Paypal has gone AWOL on the project.

Does This Create an Opening China Coin?

As we reported this week, the Chinese government has pressed for an accelerated timeline for China Coin. Given the expected impact that a Facebook cryptocurrency would have, China wants to beat U.S. tech firms to market. Facebook has more than two billion members, far above the size of China’s population.