HN Books @HNBooksMonth

I'll go a different route and recommend that you read The Ascent of Money[1]. It's much more engaging to read vs an econ textbook and it will give you a much better understanding of money, currency, and finance by starting way back at the beginning of modern civilization. It effectively explains all of the major concepts of international finance (bonds, insurance, stocks, currency, loans, etc) through the real-world examples which created them.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Ascent-Money-Financial-History-World/...

More popular history:

https://www.amazon.com/Ascent-Money-Financial-History-World/...

https://www.amazon.com/Splendid-Exchange-Trade-Shaped-World/...

https://www.amazon.com/Cash-Nexus-Money-Modern-1700-2000/dp/...

https://www.amazon.com/Devil-Take-Hindmost-Financial-Specula...

Academic but readable:

https://www.amazon.com/Manias-Panics-Crashes-History-Financi...

https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Financial-Capitalism-Internation...

I have been reading a lot about the history of money, finance and economics. It is a topic I find interesting. All of the biographies about money mention Fibonacci.

I would recommend the following (you can get most of these books in kindle edition and most of the documentaries are online in one form or another:

Web:

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci

* Liber Abaci, his most famous book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liber_Abaci

* History of money: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money

* More on Liber Abaci: http://liberabaci.blogspot.com/

* More again on Liber Abaci: http://www.math.utah.edu/~beebe/software/java/fibonacci/libe...

* This American Life episode on the invention of money: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/423/t...

Books:

* The Ascent of Money: http://www.amazon.com/Ascent-Money-Financial-History-World/d...

* The Origins of Value (hard to find): http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Value-Financial-Innovations-Cr...

* History of Money (I haven't read this yet, but plan to): http://www.amazon.com/History-Money-Ancient-Times-Present/dp...

Documentaries:

* NOVA's 'The History of Money': http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/history-money.html

* BBC's 'The Ascent of Money' series: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ascent_of_Money

* The Secret History of the Credit Card: this was PBS again, can't find it online but if you Google around I am sure you could find it somewhere.

There is a lot more out there - if you follow links, wikipedia, amazon recommendations and reviews etc. you will find a lot of good sources. A fascinating topic and fascinating characters involved in the creation of money (like the Rothschilds and their involvement in toppling governments and funding conflict).

Every financial instrument we use today - from bonds, stocks, notes, interest, credit, debit, trade finance instruments etc. have an interesting story around their origin.

Fibonacci bought over the Arabic number system, base 10 notation (which makes interest easier to calculate), and set formulas for conversion, standard units of weight etc. It was a bit like an early draft standard for merchant traders.

With the history, you soon realize that money is just a promissory note or a debt, and that all money is borrowed. With a wallet full of notes what you have is a promise from the US Government that the notes can be readily exchanged.

The more recent fascination with gold-backed currency seems a bit ridiculous if you understand the history and why we went into gold and then back out of it.

The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World by Niall Ferguson.

http://www.amazon.com/Ascent-Money-Financial-History-World/d...