Who really benefits from a cashless society?

Many of us rarely use cash these days. And the reach of corporations into our lives via cards and apps has never been greater. But what we're told is inevitable is actually the work of powerful interests: the great battle of our time is for ownership of the digital footprints that make up our lives.

Cloudmoney tells a revelatory story about the fusion of big finance and tech, which requires physical cash to be replaced by digital money or 'cloudmoney'. Diving beneath the surface of the global financial system, Brett Scott uncovers a long-established lobbying infrastructure waging a covert war on cash under the banner of progress but at the cost of our privacy, politics and individual freedom.

'A wonderfully revolutionary text' YANIS VAROUFAKIS

'Scott has struck an important vein that is vital in a digital age' FINANCIAL TIMES

'Brilliant, fascinating and utterly accessible' KATE RAWORTH, author of Doughnut Economics

About the Author

Brett Scott is a campaigner, monetary anthropologist and former broker. He is the author of The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance: Hacking the Future of Money, and has appeared in a wide range of TV shows, radio broadcasts and documentaries, including BBC World News and Sky News.

He has written extensively on financial reform, digital finance, alternative currency, blockchain technology and the cashless society for publications like the Guardian, New Scientist, Huffington Post, Wired Magazine and CNN.com, and also publishes the Altered States of Monetary Consciousness newsletter.


His Twitter is @suitpossum

Reviews
If people could see clearly how their money is created, they would rebel - especially now that it is digitised. Brett Scott's highly readable and topical Cloudmoney is, in this sense, a wonderfully revolutionary text -- Yanis Varoufakis
Cloudmoney is a brilliant, fascinating and utterly accessible book - a pioneering and political guide to the fast-evolving web of global finance... If you want to understand what money is - and what it is in danger of becoming - start right here -- Kate Raworth, author of Doughnut Economics
A fascinating and readable guide to the future, and how we can reclaim that future from the clutches of Big Finance and Big Tech -- Grace Blakeley
The rush to a cashless society isn't about convenience. It is about power. Brett Scott cuts through the hype with this brilliant critique of digital money and the rise of fintech empires, while offering a compelling alternative vision. Don't miss this book -- Jason Hickel, author of Less Is More
Your head has been deliberately filled with falsehoods and confusion about money. This brilliant book helps you understand how that happened, who profits from our collective financial ignorance, and how we might best fight back. Filled with dazzling insight and admirable clarity, this is a book you'll soon be recommending far and wide -- Raj Patel, author of Stuffed and Starved
Cloudmoney does well to map out how the switch away from cash is being spun as natural progress... Scott has struck an important vein, that is vital in a digital age * Financial Times *
An important reflection on the new world of finance. Brett Scott writes with gusto about blockchain, crypto and the power nexus between Big Tech and the banks in a cashless society -- Lionel Barber, author of The Powerful and The Damned
With this wonderful, lucid and urgently important book, Brett Scott is hunting big game. Get a copy - and make sure you pay with cash -- Nicholas Shaxson, author of Treasure Islands
Quietly radical and unexpectedly beautiful, this is so much more than a book about money. Brett Scott propels the reader to a new understanding of today's capitalism through humour, first-hand reportage, patient explanation, deep political analysis and a lot of heart. Let him change the way you see the world - he has for me -- Sarah Jaffe, author of Work Won't Love You Back
Arise all data donors from your slumber - and read this book. You - we - have been sucked into the "tech-finance vortex" that is the new, dangerous alliance of Big Finance and Big Tech. Addicted to our apps, we are trapped in a dizzying whirlpool of surveillance, allowing the FinTech vortex to exercise power over, and profit from, every transaction undertaken. Scott, steeped in the sector, guides us through it, and helps readers understand what is happening. He invites us to revolt and jam the Big Fusion. His book is an urgent must-read -- Ann Pettifor
In a book that is simultaneously irreverent, hard-hitting and entertaining, Brett Scott blows apart conventional myths about cash, digital money, and crypto, and brilliantly shows us what's at stake in the coming battles for the soul of money -- Stephanie Kelton, Author of The Deficit Myth
A groundbreaking book * Morning Star *



Book Information
ISBN 9781529111484
Author Brett Scott
Format Paperback
Page Count 304
Imprint Vintage
Publisher Vintage Publishing
Weight(grams) 213g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 129mm * 18mm