Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World

by Liaquat Ahamed

Wrote one observer: “In the whole course of history, no dog has run after its own tail with the speed of the Reichsbank. The discredit the Germans throw on their own notes increases even faster than the volumes of notes in circulation. The effect is greater than the cause. The tail goes faster than the dog.” The task of keeping Germany adequately supplied with currency notes became a major logistical operation involving “133 printing works with 1783 machines . . . and more than 30 paper mills.” By 1923, the inflation had acquired a momentum of its own, creating an ever-accelerating appetite for currency that the Reichsbank, even after conscripting private printers, could not meet. In a country already flooded with paper, there were even complaints of a shortage of money in municipalities, so towns and private companies began to print their own notes. Over the next few months, Germany experienced the single greatest destruction of monetary value in human history. By August 1923, a dollar was worth 620,000 marks and by early November 1923, 630 billion.17