In the investment sense, the value of money is the purpose it serves in your portfolio.

For the investor, the value of money is determined by the tradeoff of

**commitment** versus **optionality**.

- If he wants more deferred choices then he needs **more cash**.

- If he wants **more income**, then he should get stocks or bonds.

The reason someone might want to defer his choices is because there

are limited periods of time in which investments go on sale.

Similarly, a business benefits from having cash because it is easy to make mistakes whose consequences are not evident until long after they are unavoidable. When that happens a business needs cash in order to survive long enough correct itself.

During such times, good businesses can be bought cheaply for limited periods of time - especially if they need to raise cash.

This is why an investor wants a cash balance ready to spend. You never know what is coming, but if you have cash you are prepared for whatever it is.

Holding a stock is a commitment to a particular enterprise, whereas cash keeps your options open.

-- an excerpt from It's Not About The Technology, It's About The Money (2016), its 2-minute version can be found here: https://2minutebitcoin.org/blog/bitcoin-is-about-the-money-not-the-blockchain-technology