#thirdseat
Retire the line.
Cancel a debt with a surplus that has already been named. This is not a new way to print money.
Floor → Mint → Issue → Tape → Charge → Agent → Thin → Desert → Retire
The missing line
Desert is what remains after the floor and the listed prices are paid. It can be zero. Naming zero stops a book from looking closed when it is not. If a surplus is left unnamed, the next shortfall can swallow it. The debt falls only when that surplus is locked to cancellation before anyone spends it.
The order
Retire sits last. A positive desert, and the listed fee for new units, may be used only to cancel an old promise. They may not be used to make new units.
How a line dies
A line is written only when it is accepted, and only with three numbers: the face amount, the live discount, and the date it must be retired. The face amount is not cash. On that date the issuer pays the live value from surplus already titled to Retire, or the line fails and cannot be rolled over at par.
- A rollover is a new issue: a new acceptance, a new charge, and the old face still open.
- Lines inside the same book can cancel each other with no cash.
- A foreign or private line is cancelled only when it is paid.
Cash, without a silent print.
Three sources. No quiet extra issue.
01
Name the surplus first
Post desert ahead of time and title the share to Retire. Zero adds nothing.
02
Use the listed fee on an old promise
Seigniorage retires a line already written. It is not a new pot of money.
03
A failed line stays failed
Keep the charge. Do not write the face again. Never spend the basket to make the debt look smaller.
The federal sheet.
The −$41.7T net position stays until cash actually cancels a line. A $1.8T deficit skipped the floor. It did not retire anything. A new issue needs a date and a live discount.
Only a posted surplus, or listed seigniorage, moves the net position. Household wealth is not the Treasury’s. The third seat can refuse a rollover that skipped Retire.
Pace.
A room or a firm can bind retire-on-accept in a quarter. Binding new federal issue takes a law. Clearing the stock takes a generation of real surplus paid to holders. The rule can force the surplus to be used this way. It cannot create the surplus.
Same rails. Anyone may issue. No one may hide the print. Third Seat.