• DandomRude@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    I wonder how that can be. The Catholic Church owns real estate in almost every city in Europe, usually several buildings in larger cities, often in prime locations. Especially since these properties are only a fraction of the church’s financial assets, the rental income alone should be enough to finance the church for all eternity.

    • locuester@lemmy.zip
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      1 day ago

      Organizations that own that amount of stuff borrow against it to buy even more stuff and as it all goes up in value they borrow more and buy more stuff. In an endless loop. And people call crypto a scam 🤔

      Owning that much in assets typically means you also have a lot of debt. Particularly with generational, wealthy, corrupt organizations.

      Point being, they can be on the brink of bankruptcy even when owning half of Europe if they can’t service the debt they wound up.

      • jacksilver@lemmy.world
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        14 hours ago

        If there are physical assets to back up the loans, doesn’t that make it less of a scam than crypto.

        Maybe not a good business strategy, and maybe the loans outweigh the “true” value of the assets, but there is something backing it.

      • DandomRude@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Well, they can always get back to selling indulgences again or take out (another) mortgage on their state in the middle of Rome when the going gets tough.