> So I suppose I put it to you that there is something special about the IOUs created by banks - they are legally allowed to used.

IANAL, but the IOUs created by Full Tilt Poker were also legal to use. When the government eventually pressed charges in the debacle, no charges were pressed against regular players of the poker site, including those who used these IOUs for small economic activity. If using these IOUs would have been illegal, then surely the government would have pressed at least some charges after spending years investigating the case?

But anyway, even if _using_ the IOUs was not illegal, creating them like a fractional reserve bank surely was illegal. So you definitely have a point that the regulatory environment creates a special status for the legal tender of the country.