Adam Smith actually wrote about just such a system, which later came to be called Real Bills. http://www.safehaven.com/article/17603/real-bills-revisited http:

Adam Smith actually wrote about just such a system, which later came to be called Real Bills. http://www.safehaven.com/article/17603/real-bills-revisited http://www.safehaven.com/article/17603/real-bills-revisited TLDR: When a merchant buys, say, a dress, from a producer, the merchant pays the producer with a note that gives the note's recipient the right to x% of the eventual sale price of the dress. The producer can then use notes like that as a form of collateral for their own notes, which they can use like cash to pay upstream suppliers with it (fabric, thread, dye, sewing machines, etc). Items tend to sell, or clear, within 91 days, so that is the term of the note. Eg, the note is 'self-clearing' within 91 days. Eventually the dress will sell, and the cash/gold proceeds will remit up the chain, from merchant -> producer -> upstream suppliers, until all the notes and their derivatives are redeemed. It's basically an alternative to bank credit that's backed by sales of real goods.