[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >On 13 May 2002 at 18:27, R. A. Hettinga wrote: > > > Right, though I'm sure you're wishing it wasn't. Again, crime, > > illegal markets if you will are piddly bits of pocket fluff in the > > global economy. $4 trillion worth of foreign exchange alone happened > > today. > >How could this possibly be true? :ast I checked, GDP for the US >was about 10 trillion bucks a year, the combined GDP of >every nation on earth per year can't be more than 100 trillion, >most of which doesn't involve anything crosiing a border, >so how can there possibly be trillions of dollars worth of >foreign exchange a day? > >George
The $4 trillion doesn't actually go anywhere. It's mostly put up as risk-management and exchange tweaking. Like pork bellies, dig? You buy the options but no truck actually comes and unloads a mound of pork on your front lawn. Keep in mind that US currency is US Government debt. The more stashed under mattresses, the less debt has to ever be "repaid." As the article mentions, if non-interest bearing currency becomes less popular, then the debt will have to be financed at higher cost through interest-bearing bonds.
