Short presentation to WE-CAN's Climate Action Provincial Assembly, September 2023

1. Vancity’s Leadership

9. There are three kinds of money:
1: Coins and bank-notes
3% of money
2: Money created by banks as debt
3: Money created by central banks
For every $1 million in reserves, a bank is allowed to create
(say) $20 million, and charge interest on it.
Printed out of “thin air”, out of trust in the financial system

10. “There is no
magic money
tree.”
Theresa May, past Prime Minister of UK

12. Source: Positive Money

13. British
example

15. If a Canadian bank had financed
a German tank factory in 1942
it would have been called treason

17. Why do we allow Canadian banks
to finance increased fossil fuel production,
pouring fuel onto the climate crisis?

18. “One-for-One”

20. We – the climate movement - should
have been lobbying hard to end all
financing for fossil fuel expansion
projects.

21. Campaign to end international fossil finance

24. Campaigns to stop central bank fossil fuel financing

26. ECB = European Central Bank

28. Central Banks: Europe

33. 127 members, 20 observers

36. “One-for-One”

37. It’s okay to finance
a German tank factory in 1942
as long as it’s “one for one”

38. Central banks create money out of thin air
• When a government orders its central bank to print money the result can be disastrous,
causing hyperinflation. Germany 1922, Hungary 1945, Argentina, many others.
• This is a bad thing.
• This is why central bankers insist on independence from governments.
• In 2009, the Bank of Canada created $25 billion to tackle the financial crisis.
• In 2020, to confront Covid, it created $420 billion by buying bonds and other debt from
governments and businesses
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/2020/05/our-policy-actions-in-the-time-of-covid-19/

39. “Increasing the credit supply”
“Injecting liquidity”
“Monetizing the deficit”
“Buying securities”
“Expanding the balance sheet”
“Quantitative easing”
How does a central bank
inject money into the economy?
They buy bonds or securities off banks or corporations, putting
that much extra money into their accounts.

40. Money printing to stop
the 2008 financial
crisis
Money printing to assist
recovery following the
2008 financial
crisis

45. ECB = European Central Bank
solutions
Building retrofits – heat pumps - renewable energy –
bike lanes – transit –electric vehicles