Eric Schmidt: Google Once Thought About Creating ‘Google Currency’

Google Chairman Eric Schmidt spoke in Barcelona at the 2012 Mobile World Congress on Tuesday where he revealed that at one point Google was prepared to create it’s own currency known as “Google Bucks.”

According to Schmidt:

“We’ve had various proposals to have our own currency we were going to call Google Bucks.”

No Google wasn’t attempting to replace US Currency, instead the system would be a “peer-to-peer money” platform that allowed users to shuffle money around in cyberspace.

While the idea sounds interesting the Google Chairman says his team learned pretty quickly that the practice of exchange money in such a way was illegal in many areas. It turns out Government officials are wary of the potential for money launder.

Here’s Eric Schmidt’s full disclosure about the peer-to-peer money system Google thought about implementing:

“There’s an issue with peer to peer money, that being that it’s illegal. Other than that it’s a great idea. There are some issues with peer to peer money. In most places it’s illegal. Governments don’t trust it because of issues with money laundering. There were various proposals for our own Google currency – Google Bucks. But we didn’t want to get into it due to these issues.”

Google isn’t a complete stranger to the online money market as its own Google Checkout platform powers millions of transactions across the internet in an attempt to compete with the likes of other online payment systems including Paypal and even Amazon checkout.

Would you be willing to use a “peer-to-peer” payment system for online money transfers if such a program was made available to the public?