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Re:China lets yuan break 7-per-dollar level for first time i... by kgwgk on Monday August 05, 2019 @09:02AM (#20613822)
The superpower of banks is to take the dollar from you and lend 90 cents to your friend while promising that when you need your dollar they will have enough money around to make you whole. (When the time comes, they may or may not be able to keep their promise.)
Re:China lets yuan break 7-per-dollar level for first time i... by RobertoG on Monday August 05, 2019 @12:39PM (#20615544)
Please, stop promoting this false conception of how banks operate. It makes really difficult to have serious discussions about the modern economy.

From the Bank of England, banks are not intermediaries of loanable funds:

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/working-paper/2015/banks-are...

Re:China lets yuan break 7-per-dollar level for first time i... by kgwgk on Monday August 05, 2019 @03:46PM (#20618045)
I'm sorry you didn't like that simplification. Anyway, it's better than "you have no money but you can make it appear from nowhere and lend it because you are a bank and have special powers".

The more details are given, the less interesting the special powers of commercial banks seem to be: not only is the amount of money that they can create limited to some multiple of the "real money" base, but they don't even lend that much out because it's not profitable.

Re:China lets yuan break 7-per-dollar level for first time i... by rags2riches on Monday August 05, 2019 @05:27PM (#20619185)
But the "real money base" will expand on demand if the banks need it. It's not a limiting factor! The loan happens first. The base money is created (if needed) after the fact. It's not as if base money is pushed out there and then the base money is used to create loans. Loans pull base money into being.
Re:China lets yuan break 7-per-dollar level for first time i... by kgwgk on Monday August 05, 2019 @06:07PM (#20619598)
It’s not a limiting factor anyway because US banks have 1.4 trillion dollars in excess reserves deposited at the Fed (down from 2.7 trillions five years ago!).

The monetary base (physical currency plus banks deposits at the Fed) is currently $3.3tn.

M1 (circulating cash plus on demand deposits) is $3.9tn (the money multiplier is slightly above 1, but it was below 1 for most of this decade!).

M2 (including also savings accounts) is $14.9tn. M2/MB is 4.5, it has ranged between 3 and 5 over the last 10 years. It was between 8 and 12 in the four decades before 2008.

Re:China lets yuan break 7-per-dollar level for first time i... by jobigoud on Tuesday August 06, 2019 @10:05AM (#20625249)
The superpower of banks is taking a dollar from you and lending 10 dollars to someone else. With interests.