Recently, I started thinking about an interesting question: how much money is there in the world actually? And it turns out that the answer depends on what exactly you count as money. Because the number can be quite different.

If you only count cash — banknotes and coins in wallets, cash registers, safes — it's about 40 trillion dollars. Sounds huge, but that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Then it gets more interesting. When you add bank accounts from which you can withdraw money at any time, the figure jumps to around 80 trillion. And if you include savings accounts and other liquid assets — it amounts to 100-130 trillion. Just like that.

But hold on, that's not all. When it comes to the real value of all financial assets — stocks, bonds, futures, and the like — the number becomes simply astronomical. We're already talking about 400-500 trillion dollars. And if you add derivatives and exotic financial instruments, the total could even surpass quadrillions.

How much money is there in the world — by the way, that's not a static question. All these figures are constantly changing due to market fluctuations, central banks printing money, inflation, and other factors. The market is alive, you could say.

And here's what's funny: cryptocurrency, which many recently considered some kind of toy, already accounts for about a third of the total money volume in certain categories. Not entirely virtual currency, it turns out, if you look at the scale. An interesting transformation is happening.