France and Germany jointly rejected Facebook's planned introduction of the Libra cryptocurrency on Friday, calling it a threat to a stable EU economy.

The virtual currency could undercut "the monetary sovereignty" of states in the bloc as well as posing risks to consumers and undermining financial stability within Europe, said French Finance Minister Bruno le Maire and his German counterpart Olaf Scholz.

The two ministers issued the criticisms in a joint statement at a meeting of Eurozone finance ministers in Helsinki. It came in response to Facebook unveiling its plan for users to be able to make payments through the platform.

Despite these recent pledges, official plans from governments could come too late. Apps and dark web currencies have already begun to define the shape of virtual currencies.

In China, users of Social Media app WeChat pay for goods and transfer money by scanning QR codes using money stored in a virtual bank account in the app.

such as Bitcoin have also been widely used as payment on the dark web for over a decade.

Comparatively, attempts to launch such a currency in Europe by the European Central Bank have been slow to take off despite several plans being in the pipeline for years.

This is an incredible trend ....

Indeed it is.

I use two such services all the time: