I wonder how well a zero-balance money supply would work (having positive and negative money)? Positive and negative money is created simultaneously by a single transfer of wealth. The only problem I see is the possibility of reneging on negative money. Of course, when that happens nowadays, we call it bankruptcy. So I guess we deal one way or another. The banking system would have to constantly take a percentage of all transfers to pay its costs, one of which is bankruptcies. I *think* it would be impossible to inflate or deflate such a currency. Inflation might occur if people lost faith in it, but it would also have a negative feedback effect. Inflation increases people's ability to pay off their negative money, which puts a cap on the amount of inflation that could occur. As soon as the money inflated a little, people who could pay off their negative balances would do so at the newly inflated value. I also think it would be impossible to run such a currency anonymously, because a negative balance is essentially a loan, and how could you loan money to someone who could be anyone? Only if they had established a reputation with their public key... Hmmm... Interesting, then. You could only effectively work anonymously if you had created a reputation for your anonym. And that reputation would have to be established in some way *before* anyone would loan you money, otherwise such a loan would end up being a gift. One way to establish such a reputation would be to write some free software, or answer Usenet questions, or were otherwise seen to be knowledgable and responsible. I haven't seen anyone try it yet, though. Does anyone know of such an attempt? -russ <nelson@crynwr.com> ftp.msen.com:pub/vendor/crynwr/crynwr.wav Crynwr Software | Crynwr Software sells packet driver support | ask4 PGP key 11 Grant St. | +1 315 268 1925 (9201 FAX) | Quakers do it in the light Potsdam, NY 13676 | LPF member - ask me about the harm software patents do.