The aim of this paper is to theoretically analyse the issues concerning the introduction of alternative moneys. A brief performance evaluation of the current monetary system, as well as two alternatives, namely gold and a private currency, i.e. the Swiss WIR, is followed by a historical look at...

To support the understanding that banks' debt issuance means money creation, while centralized nonbank financial institutions' and decentralized bond market intermediary lending does not, the paper aims to convey two related points: First, the notion of money creation as a result of banks' loan...

Cryptocurrency is private money and is costly to produce. In this paper, I ask whether cryptocurrency can serve as a medium of exchange, and whether it can coexist with fiat money as a widely accepted medium of exchange. To answer these questions, I develop two search-theoretic models: a model...

This paper documents nominal stability in Switzerland from 1805 to 2013 using a data set on annual price, wage and nominal GDP changes. The trends of these indicators are estimated by an unobserved-components stochastic-volatility model in order to control for short-term fluctuations and...