ABSTRACT
Money carries an expectation value to be realised in the future and enables a delayed barter in form of at least two sales. In addition, banks have the privilege to create res that function as money because of the belief in the function by the market participants. Adam Smith considered barter the result of a decision of rational human beings, and money a facilitator of that barter. There is a ‘propensity to truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another’, he said. The Chartalist theory of money is too narrow for a description of the modern system of money. In the Middle Ages, money was imbued with Christian thinking and symbolism. Money as such was neither good nor bad, only its abuse was. Spending money for religious purposes was obviously encouraged. In the nineteenth century, Americans found it difficult to accept paper money in the shape of the ‘greenbacks’.
