Virtual currencies are a contemporary form of private money. Thanks to their technological properties, their global transaction networks are relatively safe, transparent, and fast. This gives them good prospects for further development. However, they remain unlikely to challenge the dominant...

This paper studies the impact of credit rating agency (CRA) announcements on the value of the Euro and the yields of French, Italian, German and Spanish long-term sovereign bonds during the culmination of the Eurozone debt crisis in 2011-2012. The employed GARCH models show that CRA downgrade...

This paper shows that currency arrangements impact on credit available through default incentives. To this end we build a symmetric two-country model with money and imperfect credit market integration. With the Euro Area context in mind, we capture differences in credit market integration by...

The euro crisis remains unresolved even as financial markets may seem calm for now. The current euro regime is inherently flawed, and recent reforms have failed to turn this dysfunctional regime into a viable one. Our investigation is informed by the "cartalist" critique of traditional "optimum...

The paper identifies how a usage fee parallel digital currency is more attractive than Bitcoins, either to provide liquidity in a crisis or for stimulating businesses on a sustainable basis. User fee "Stamp Scrip" successfully stimulated businesses and distressed communities during the Great...

Currently numerous market-driven cryptocurrencies challenge to dethrone the state-controlled supply of fiat money. The outcome hinges on the old question of whether privately produced money with or without government is possible. This paper revisits the issue by looking for insights in the...

Selgin's Theorem -- that a free banking system operating on a fixed supply of commodity reserves acts to stabilize total nominal spending per year -- provides an analytical bridge between this alternative regime and conventional monetary theory. For a system of competing banks subject to...