Facebook's David Marcus leaves Coinbase Board to avoid conflict of interest

David Marcus has resigned from the board of cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, CoinDesk reported.

Marcus has been serving as vice president at Facebook since 2014. He joined Coinbase’s board in late 2017 saying that the company has the potential to materially change the lives of people around the world.

In May 2018, Marcus announced that he was leaving his role as the head of Messenger to set up a group “to explore how to best leverage Blockchain across Facebook, starting from scratch.”

Marcus told CoinDesk that he resigned from Coinbase’s board "because of the new group I'm setting up at Facebook around blockchain." A Coinbase spokesperson, on the other hand, said that Marcus' decision to resign was to avoid a conflict of interest.

Marcus’ departure from Coinbase comes amid blockchain push at Facebook. According to a recent report from Business Insider, Facebook has held talks with a number of crypto projects, including Stellar, on how it can use the technology.

Earlier this year, Facebook banned all cryptocurrency ads on its platform. However, within months, the social media giant said that it would revise its policy "to allow ads that promote cryptocurrency and related content from pre-approved advertisers."

Update: A Facebook spokesperson told Cheddar that the company is not engaged in any talks with Stellar and is not considering building on its technology.