The original idea behind the Trustlines Network came up as the current financial system is unable or unwilling to serve about 1.7 billion unbanked and underbanked people.
There have been many attempts to solve this problem, but all have failed to create a truly inclusive financial system.
Everyone around the globe, including 1.7 billion unbanked people, can be part of a financial system, make digital payments and have access to credit.
Empower people to create their own money and access digital payments by building a truly inclusive complementary financial system.
Our current financial system is mainly debt-based which means that digital payments are simply transfers of claims between financial institutions.
Such transfers have shown to be efficient and practical payment methods. Nonetheless, unbanked and underbanked people can’t join this system as many of them do not have a government-issued ID and/or money.
Cryptocurrencies also tried to solve this problem by making use of a decentralised infrastructure which does not rely on the actions of banks or a monetary authority.
However, after more than 10 years of existence, we see that cryptocurrencies rely heavily on the very system they were originally intended to provide an alternative to.
To combat this issue, why not combine the technological innovation of cryptocurrencies with the benefits of a debt-based financial system?
This way we reworked the idea to create a fully decentralised, debt-based money creation system using trustless infrastructure. We’ve called it People Powered Money as it is truly inclusive and allows anyone to create their own money, as well as access digital payments and credit.
Among the Trustlines Network contributors are individuals, entities and other projects from all over the world, aligned towards a shared mission to foster economic inclusion.