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by randbox 1547 days ago
The quantity of money in the system doesn't stay the same. Speculators buy financial assets such as stock and real estate on credit. This increases valuations and causes more speculators to buy financial assets on credit, or at least stop paying back their other debts as fast so they can hold more assets, to capture asset price gains. When the process slows down eventually the expected asset price gains will be lower than the interest owed on the debt, causing a sell off.

That's the basics of how a credit bubble works.

1 comments

I do not see that reflected in the money supply. No wild swings there:

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M2

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MABMM301USM189S

Depreciation of assets like stocks and real estate will lead to a reduction in value in our portfolios, but not necessarily a reduction in the money supply. Money supply is only one factor here.