From: craig@passport.ca (Craig Hubley)
Date: Sun, 22 Jan 95 15:28:40 PST
To: carolb@barton.spring.com (Censored Girls Anonymous)
Subject: Re: Why emoney? Why not a web of debt?
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9501220904.B11359-0100000@barton.spring.com>
Message-ID: <m0rWBhy-0002GdC@forged.passport.ca>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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> Many companies are already founded on "a web of debt".
> "Sallie Mae (Student Loans), Ginnie Mae (General Loans), and Freddie Mac
> (Real Estate Loans)," all come to mind at the moment. They're nicely
> formatted, processed and make even more money for investors as the
> interest rates change.

You are talking about trading mortgage-backed (and other debt-backed)
securities, and what you say can be generalized to bonds and certain
FX contracts as well.  Certainly derivatives often use debt instruments
in their formulation.
 
> So maybe the remailer IOU's, could be traded for the data haven IOU's,
> and so forth. I think someone does have a credit card IOU situation.
> The systems, and precedence for debt trading are there (and interest
> rates are going up again soon, indicated the Fed last week!).

This could work, but you are talking about securities markets, which
do this already.  Selling securities over remailers would be sure to
bring down the wrath of moneyed establishment types... :-)
 
> I just wonder who wants to play "collection agency"?

This is the problem.  Government always ends up playing this role,
and so it reserves the right to decide what it is willing to enforce...
classifying the rest as 'gambling' or some other unenforceable debt...

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