Think of the Enron collapse. When it collapsed, nothing was left for the little guy or the one with a pension invested in that stock.
I'm hypothesizing. It's clear that people are putting less money in banks. So either they don't have it or it's somewhere we can't see.
FWIW, the US mint had to stop selling silver eagles a month or so ago. I don't know if they started up again. Why? They couldn't keep up with demand.
Um, if I sell a stock, whether I lost money or not, I still have the cash value of the sale even if it is 30% less than what I paid. That's cash that has to go somewhere.
Got it now?