> The money given to banks didn't result in increased lending but instead went into financial markets buying up assets. This statement is precisely what I mean

> The money given to banks didn't result in increased lending but instead went into financial markets buying up assets. This statement is precisely what I meant by 'put a lot of credit in to the economy, which shows up as economic growth.' The trick is that QE took the bad mortgage loans (which are created as you say, loan first, not deposit first) off of the banks hands, and put real Fed-created money in the place of the loans (around 1.5-2T of QE went to mortgage-backed-securities.) That converted the bad loans into good credit, then used in the way you describe.