But the reality is more complex. As we will see in a moment, while the real world of value exists, financial instruments are never perfect or unproblematic representations of that value. The prices at which financial assets are exchanged are not direct representations of the underlying value of the “real stuff” to which they allegedly refer. For instance, in 2007 the price of a sub-prime mortgage had almost nothing to do with the value of the house in question, nor was it an accurate reflection of the mortgagee’s ability to repay the loan (see McNally 2011, 97–112; Wyly 2012). Rather, the price of a sub-prime mortgage was a function of its circulation in a broader speculative financial economy (see Chapter 2). Its price represented its relationality to a vast array of interconnected speculative gambits.

Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, loc. 80