(a) credit/debt (where there is an obligation to repay/perform) - I think of this as enabling value exchanges/ "dynamic" Value (Value in motion = "Money" IMHO) and I describe it as "deficit-based" finance; and

(b) investment (where there is no obligation to "repay") - which I think of as "static" value (ie "Capital") and I describe this as "asset-based" finance.

The reason for any confusion is that both secured and unsecured credit are conflated and the vast bulk of so-called "investment" currently comes about from money issued by banks as secured loans: ie deficit-based, but asset-backed.

Now this secured bank credit COULD (using asset-based techniques such as trusts or partnerships) be replaced by "investment", but because it is created as loans within a deficit-based monetary system it is actually debt.

The vast bulk of our "Money as Debt" supply actually isn't circulating: it is static, being tied up in fixed assets such as property.

I agree with Jerome that credit creation is necessary but not that banks are any longer necessary as credit intermediaries.

A Guarantee Society/Clearing Union achieves the same result, but with the added benefit that it will also permit value to be created and kept locally without leakage to Wall Street and the City.

"Banks" in this disintermediated model are service providers who manage the bilateral creation of "trade" credit (and any necessary default fund) and no longer put capital at risk as intermediaries.

"Any economic unit can emit money. The serious problem is to get it accepted" Hyman Minsky