Bernard Lietaer facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Bernard Lietaer
Bernard Lietaer in 2011
Born	(1942-02-07)7 February 1942 Lauwe, Belgium
Died	4 February 2019(2019-02-04) (aged 76)
Occupation	Civil engineer, economist, author and professor

Bernard Lietaer (born February 7, 1942 – died February 4, 2019) was a smart Belgian engineer, economist, and author. He spent his life studying how money systems work. He believed that communities could create their own local money, called complementary currencies. These local currencies would work alongside regular national money to help people and businesses in the community.

Bernard Lietaer's Early Life and Education

Bernard Lietaer was born in Lauwe, Belgium, on February 7, 1942. He went to College of St Paul from 1955 to 1961. He studied engineering at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium. Later, he taught international finance there. He was also part of a debating club called Olivaint Conference of Belgium. After getting his master's degree in 1967, he continued his studies at the MIT until 1969.

Bernard Lietaer's Career in Finance

In 1971, Bernard Lietaer published his post-graduate paper. It described "floating exchanges" for currencies. This means that the value of one country's money could change freely against another's. That same year, the Nixon Shock happened. The US dollar was no longer tied to gold. This led to "universal floating exchanges" for all major currencies. Lietaer's research became very important because it was one of the only ways to understand these new money systems. A US bank even bought the exclusive rights to his ideas.

Managing Money and Currencies

In 1987, Lietaer helped start a company called GaiaCorp. This company managed different currencies. He managed a special fund called "Gaia Hedge II." Between 1987 and 1991, this fund was the best-performing currency fund in the world. Lietaer said they almost tripled the money in three years. In 1992, Business Week magazine called him "the world’s top currency trader."

Teaching and New Ideas

From 2003 to 2006, he was a visiting scholar at Naropa University in the United States. There, he created a center for business and economics. While working at the Central Bank in Belgium, he helped set up the system for the ECU. This was a step towards the single European currency (the Euro). He also led Belgium's Electronic Payment System.

In 2007, Lietaer said that having different types of money, including international ones, could help with specific problems. He thought they could help fight global warming, create jobs, and improve education and health care. In 2012, he co-authored a book called Money & Sustainability: the missing link. In this book, he predicted that the years 2007 to 2020 would be a time of financial trouble and money problems.

Personal Life and Death

At the time of his death, Bernard Lietaer lived in Hoyerhagen, in northern Germany. He passed away on February 4, 2019.

See also