because the money printer is now a money vacuum

The printing of unprecedented amounts of money from 2008 to now created those low yields the banks are seeing. And now there was a tiny increase in yields the banks go under.

This would not have happened with a stable supply of the base currency.

We spent millennia with examples of stable, metal currencies and bank failures. Then, like now, bankers chased risks. First Republic financed long-term Treasuries. Romans financed eastern fineries [1]. Many others blew capital on kings’ failed wars.

Booms and busts are inherent to money and credit, this is a foundational learning every industrialised non-Malthusian society learned fast and, in many cases, including our own, the hard way.

[1] https://epicenter.wcfia.harvard.edu/blog/financial-crisis-th...

https://www.officialdata.org/us/inflation/1800?amount=1#:~:t....

or even in the 18th century:

https://www.in2013dollars.com/UK-inflation

The counter-swings just created an illusion of longterm stability. But it definitely didn't feel that way for people living on the ground (of course a lot of that is down to unstable food supply and not just the monetary system. Not that it was avoidable, you can't really have a fiat currency without a stable and somewhat reliable government anyway).

You wouldn't have had a stable fractional banking system prior to the 1930s anyway. So yeah, in a way you're right.

Generally financial systems are much more stable nowadays than they were under the gold standard.