Over the past 18 months the firm has bought nine companies including an online self-publishing site, a financial-data firm and one with a technology that newspapers can license for an online-payment system.

ECONOMIST: An industry that puts ink to paper is fighting for survival

Last spring it won permission to inspect the records of customers of PayPal, eBay's online payment system, who have bank or payment-card accounts in tax havens.

ECONOMIST: How to defeat tax cheats

Founded in 2007, Rixty is currently the leading cash-based payment system for online entertainment in the United States.

FORBES: Connect

Political pressure has already led credit-card firms and PayPal, an online payment system, to stop customers transferring cash for online wagers.

ECONOMIST: Texas hold-em

An online payment system not unlike PayPal, the company says the plain-sounding-but-ominous-in-a-sci-fi-way Credits will streamline commerce on Facebook (games first), and, with Zuckerberg and Co. taking a 30% cut of every transaction, perhaps fatten the bottom line one day.

FORBES: Gold Bugs Take Note: Facebook Credits Now "Universal Currency"