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Considering that the central banks have conjured trillions of dollars and euros out of thin air, this story this seems sadly quaint...

• kennywinker 14y ago
  Penultimate counterfeiter doesn't sound as good.
• GigabyteCoin 14y ago
  ...seriously? On HN? Nobody is printing money out of thin air. When they print more money, they value of the $20 that is in your pocket decreases slightly, but the value of your house increases substantially. Everybody knows it's not wise to store 100% of your worth in cash.
• apendleton 14y ago
  All money is "conjured" to some extent. Cash has no intrinsic value (you can't eat it or use it to build a house); it only has value because we as a society accept that it does, and accept that governments have the power to print it. Counterfeiting as described in the article is a violation of that social contract. Perhaps you think that all money is counterfeit because banks print it, or something, and that we should instead operate on an economy built around trading shells or bison, but even if that's the case, societal expectations clearly differentiate between what banks do and what this guy did, so if "counterfeiting" is the wrong word to describe the latter and not the former, feel free to suggest a more precise term.