Hello all of you that have commented,

Thank you for your comments - they are as always, insightful.

Above, Utpal Choudhury wrote, "If the market behaves rationally, as I understand, there is no need to have a fixed-money-supply standard." In response I would write...

For the market to be able to re-price a currency it relies upon several important things: liquidity, and more importantly, a currency that is not being distorted by a monetary authority. On the first issue, liquidity, there are very few truly global currencies: US dollar, Euro, Yen, and to a lesser extent the yuan/renminbi. It is not a small matter to re-denominate all of your assets in a preferred currency. Further, look at those four 'reserve-type' currencies and in all four cases there is massive monetary stimulus in those economies. So the 'rational' market folks who would re-price a currency can only do so on a relative basis. There is no ability to re-price a currency on an absolute basis...and that is the problem which is why folks advocate for a gold standard.

I am not necessarily advocating for a gold standard so much as I am advocating that the discussion actually focus on actual merits and not on the 'intrinsic value' debate which is, in my opinion, the wrong argument to have.

With smiles to all!

Jason