Banking on a Promise

Frank Brun

The illusive story of money, debt and the banks that create it

In Banking on a Promise, Frank Michael Brun traces the hidden mechanics of modern finance: how private banks generate money “out of nothing” through accounting, and why this system sits at the heart of capitalism’s recurring crises. From the Great Depression to the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, Brun explores how excessive credit creation and debt expansion drive economic instability, inequality, and political upheaval.

Drawing on the ideas of Henry Simons, Irving Fisher, and Frank Knight, he revisits the Chicago Plan of the 1930s and the modern Sovereign Money movement—two reform efforts separated by nearly a century yet united by a common goal: to reclaim money creation as a public, sovereign function.

Accessible, rigorous, and deeply relevant, Banking on a Promise challenges the reader to reconsider who really controls the lifeblood of the economy—and whether it’s time to bring money back under democratic control.

 

BOOK RELEASE: 7th FEBRUARY 2026

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About the Author

Frank Brun is a former international banker and financial markets practitioner with a career spanning four decades. Beginning in foreign exchange trading in the early 1970s, he worked across global banking institutions during a period of profound change in monetary systems, financial regulation, and risk-taking culture.

After retiring from active markets, Brun returned to academia, completing a Bachelor of Political, Economic and Social Sciences and later a Master’s by Research in Political Economy at the University of Sydney. His research focused on credit creation banking, monetary reform, and the historical roots of financial instability.

Banking on a Promise draws on both professional experience and academic research to examine how modern banking came to create money through debt—and the social, economic, and political consequences of leaving this power in private hands.