How a commercial bank creates money when it makes a loan.

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I don’t get it. I don’t get it. I don’t get it. I don’t get it.

When a bank makes a $1,000 loan, that creates $1,000 in the recipient’s account, but I don’t get how the loan, the absence of money, is an asset on the lending bank’s books. If it’s because the money will be paid back, then isn’t it’s value based on a corresponding debit of the recipients account thus nullifying the created money?

Edit: I am not asking how banks make a profit. I get that. I am asking how NEW DOLLARS are created. There are more dollars in existence now than there were say 100 years ago. I want to understand how they came to be. The answer I’ve found so far is that NEW DOLLARS are created when a commercial bank makes a loan.

Second Edit: For those saying commercial loans don’t create new dollars, apparently they do, but I don’t get it. For reference:

https://positivemoney.org/how-money-works/proof-that-banks-create-money/

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34 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

They double count the money that they lend out.

Suppose you deposit $1,000 in a bank. They then decide they want to loan $100 of that money to someone else.

Now that person has $100 of cash (and $100 of debt..) but your bank account still shows $1,000 despite the fact that $100 of your money money is somewhere else.

This only works because you don’t really withdraw all of your money very frequently.

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