r/stocks
What happens if you adjust the stock market for ALL the money printed by the Top 10 economies?
Analysis adjusting global stock market returns against the massive expansion of M2 money supply in top 10 economies since 2006 to determine real vs. nominal growth.
- Significant portion of nominal market gains may be attributed to currency debasement and liquidity injection rather than fundamental productivity growth.
- Global money supply has expanded multiplicatively across major economies, suggesting that asset price inflation is a systemic monetary phenomenon.
We all know the stock market has been on an absolute tear over the last two decades. But how much of that is actual, productive company growth, and how much is just central banks firing up the money printers worldwide?
If we treat the total expansion of the global money supply as our baseline for "zero percent growth," the real returns of our portfolios look entirely different.
Instead of just looking at the US and Europe, let's look at the top 10 economies. Because the stock market is a global sponge, capital crosses borders constantly to find a home in equities. Here is the raw, step-by-step conversion of native currencies into USD using the historical exchange rates from 2006 vs. 2026.
STEP 1: BROAD MONEY SUPPLY CONVERTED TO USD (2006 vs 2026)
1) United States (USD)
2006: $6.85 Trillion
2026: $22.80 Trillion
2) China (CNY)
2006: 34.0T CNY at 8.00 USD/CNY = $4.25 Trillion
2026: 353.0T CNY at 7.25 USD/CNY = $48.69 Trillion
3) Eurozone (EUR)
2006: 6.63T EUR at 1.25 EUR/USD = $8.29 Trillion
2026: 16.29T EUR at 1.08 EUR/USD = $17.59 Trillion
4) Japan (JPY)
2006: 715.0T JPY at 115 USD/JPY = $6.22 Trillion
2026: 1250.0T JPY at 150 USD/JPY = $8.33 Trillion
5) United Kingdom (GBP)
2006: 1.30T GBP at 1.85 GBP/USD = $2.41 Trillion
2026: 3.00T GBP at 1.27 GBP/USD = $3.81 Trillion
6) South Korea (KRW)
2006: 1100.0T KRW at 950 USD/KRW = $1.16 Trillion
2026: 3900.0T KRW at 1350 USD/KRW = $2.89 Trillion
7) India (INR)
2006: 23.0T INR at 45.0 USD/INR = $0.51 Trillion
2026: 233.0T INR at 83.0 USD/INR = $2.81 Trillion
8) Canada (CAD)
2006: 0.75T CAD at 1.11 USD/CAD = $0.68 Trillion
2026: 2.50T CAD at 1.36 USD/CAD = $1.84 Trillion
9) Australia (AUD)
2006: 0.80T AUD at 0.74 AUD/USD = $0.59 Trillion
2026: 2.90T AUD at 0.66 AUD/USD = $1.91 Trillion
10) Brazil (BRL)
2006: 0.70T BRL at 2.20 USD/BRL = $0.32 Trillion
2026: 6.00T BRL at 5.00 USD/BRL = $1.20 Trillion
STEP 2: THE COMBINED GLOBAL MONEY MULTIPLIER
When you add everything up:
Total Top 10 Money Supply (2006): $31.28 Trillion
Total Top 10 Money Supply (2026): $111.87 Trillion
The total fiat currency supply of the world's major economies expanded by 3.58x over the last 20 years.
STEP 3: ADJUSTING THE STOCK MARKETS
Let's assume this 3.58x expansion represents a 0% baseline growth rate (meaning assets must increase 3.58x just to keep up with the dilution of paper money).
The US Market (S&P 500)
Nominal Growth: Went from 1,270 to 7,384 points (A 5.81x nominal increase, or +481%).
Adjusted Growth: 5.81x divided by 3.58x = 1.62x.
Real 20-Year Return: +62.3%
Real Annualized Growth Rate: \~2.46% per year
The Whole World Market (MSCI ACWI / VWRA)
If we look at a globally diversified basket of thousands of companies across developed and emerging markets, the trend is even clearer.
Nominal Growth: A 5.46x nominal increase (+446%).
Adjusted Growth: 5.46x divided by 3.58x = 1.52x.
Real 20-Year Return: +52.5%
Real Annualized Growth Rate: \~2.13% per year
THE CAVEAT
To be entirely fair, this isn't a scientifically perfect economic model. Treating global money printing as immediate asset inflation skips over the fact that inflation has a heavy time delay. Money velocity matters, and capital doesn't flow smoothly or evenly into every single asset class at the exact same moment.
However, as a perspective shift, it is eye-opening. While corporate innovation did create real, productive value over the last two decades (yielding us a modest \~2% true annualized return), the vast majority of your portfolio's massive growth wasn't an economic miracle. It was simply the global financial system flooding the world with currency, and that currency using equities as a safe haven to protect its purchasing power from being eroded.
Already knew that, but it’s nice to get actual confirmation of it from independent research.
My numbers are very rough estimate and Dont even take account for dividends. So stocks have better returns. Also read caveats as I sinplified inflation
For simplicity sake you could say they were ether reinvested or if used as income / support that the funds went to another business within the stock market. Ether directly for example a purchase at Walmart or indirectly to a small business that then later bought from a major supply source.
I'd actually be really interested in seeing these numbers seperated into a per capita change over time to roughly see if an individual has more value or if the value has stayed constant.
Its both, they cause inflation to justfiy money expansion, then the economy and companies "grow" into the new money if that makes sense.
Why would we pretend that all expansion of the money supply represents zero real growth...? I care what things I can buy with a dollar, not what percent of all dollars I have.
I don’t pretent. Is just the numbers out there. Before and after and the difference. Of course real estate is not included and private businesses etc
Interesting framing, but I think it mixes up currency supply growth with investable dilution a bit too cleanly. A lot of that money never lands in public equities in any direct way, and exchange rates, velocity, productivity, margins, and buybacks all muddy the comparison. I still agree with the broader point that nominal returns flatter reality, but I would treat the exact “true return” number as more thought experiment than hard measure.
Yes, that’s part of the caveats. Problem is I can’t find a real inflation figure. The official ones can’t be right. So the only way I can get an absolute worse case scenario is m2 money inflation. And tbh I like it as if you think of the game monopoly, if every player gets 10% more cash on every cycle it inflates everything eventually
Agreed completely. Actually interestingly enough, I calculated a very similar thing recently: if you approximate the money in the S&P 500 using a weighted money growth of China, Japan, the USA und the eurozone (I didn't think of GB at the time) and divide the s&p 500 by it, we are almost exactly (literally you can almost draw a horizontal line) at the same level from the 2000 highs. If you simplify it using only the US money growth, the latest SPX highs are LITERALLY a straight line to the highest point in 2000.
Another interesting thing: during your time frame (Jan 2006 to Jan 2026) the gold price (the thing that indicates the decay/ the fear of the decay of the money unit) rose from 517$ to 4333$. That's 8.38x or 738%.