[deadbabe]

What people miss from these things is that there is economic value being created.

For example, if you gift someone a $100 Amazon gift card, but they also gift you a $100 Amazon gift card. Has any gift actually been exchanged? Yes, the sentiment of giving.

Or if someone pays you $100 to eat a pile of shit, and then you use the same $100 to pay them to eat a pile of shit, you both have eaten, but the money is in the same place it started.

In the end, if you paint a big enough picture, all money flow in an economy is circular anyway.

[apsurd]

The moving of money across time is 100% central to money's value. Passing digital money around to cook the books is moving money... fraudulently. So yeah, they're not the same unless you're goaling on the semantic purity of the word "move".

[weego]

I'm confused how circulating legal tender between 2 parties could be cooking books or fraud. Each party can absolutely claim they made money from the transaction. The fact they lost money in a different transaction is a separate concern.

[Spooky23]

Rather than claim that they passed money around to make money, a nice income statement demonstrates that they made money.

Cooking up fake transactions to make an investor think there is business happening is the definition of fraud.

[thewileyone]

Gross Revenue is sometimes passed off as Revenue in reports, until you examine the fine print.

[antonvs]

Neither of your examples shows “economic value being created”.

[SkipperCat]

But they did increase the GDP by $200.

[deadbabe]

The state change is the value.

[didntknowyou]

well the point is value is not being created. the stock market is at an ATH, by all metrics productibity has increased, but ask anyone on the ground- the mood is not as optimisitic as the financial instruments say