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1945? Bank robbery is still incredibly easy. Literally all forensics is during this time period is just fingerprinting. People are also malnourished and incredibly weak compared to the average person in 2026. So beat up some GI that illegally kept a gun from the war, use that to perform a series of bank robberies along the west coast of the US and the American South (where Gold stores were concentrated during the gold standard period we find ourselves in).
After that invent corporate trusts and the concept of multi-layer corporate holdings. This would be having a corporation per property owned, which is owned by a corporation and uses services from another corporation, all of which eventually ends in a labyrinthine ownership path that few, if any, forensic accountants in the 1940s could possibly follow to find out it's all just me.
By understanding, even just vaguely, which cities and areas get built up over time in history and buying surrounding properties cheaply and simply holding them until areas are built up enough to sell them for massive profit I would be able to generate essentially infinite money from basic seed money. Add onto this a series of bank and hedge fund holdings that are informed roughly when to invest in specific companies as they come up through the ages the infinite money glitch becomes an exponential money glitch.
Again layers and layers of holdings on holdings on holdings creates obscurity and complexity that would take well into the age of computers to ever unravel. A kingdom easily rivaling the Rothschilds, while being even more hidden as I'd be copying their modern techniques a half century before they perfect them.
With infinite exponential money during the golden age of capitalism I can wait until the present day when I'd no longer be effecting the timeline and then start funding communist revolutions globally, allowing for myself to become a martyr in the revolution.
You realize that in 1945 it was before most gun regulations, right? You could buy a gun for cash at a hardware store.
Yeah but without cash as a freshly time traveled person to 1945 there's only so many ways to get a gun.
Would you bring some period specific cash with you on your trip?
That would be ridiculously expensive and time consuming. The question does not present a lead up scenario but one would assume whatever deal this is doesn't allow for a lot of prep time or extra money.
Additionally any money that would exist in that time period that survived to today... would still be present in that time period. In a pre-computer world it'd be easier to get away with what is essentially counterfeiting or what would be explained as counterfeiting to those that caught you; but that's still a massive risk for saving at best a few years building up that wealth yourself.
And that's all assuming you didn't create a paradox by allowing those two versions of the same item to exist simultaneously. Like you traveling back is fine, as you wouldn't exist in 1945, but bringing items that did exist would either displace the money to avoid the paradox, changing the future possibly significantly which breaks the rules, creates a paradox which would cause you to no longer exist.
Why would we assume that? We assume that you become immortal, and are sent back in time, and the part that seems unrealistic to you is that you'd prepare for the trip before you go? :P
Any money that existed then would exist today, so you avoid anything serialized. Stick to things that are non-serialized and fungible- precious metals for example, or gemstones (without laser serial #s of course). Pre-serial cash would work too (probably the easiest to counterfeit in modern times).
But as for existence paradox-- the mere action of going back would create such an issue if it is an issue. All the molecules in your body and clothes existed in 1945, if perhaps in different arrangements-- IE anything plastic might have been in the ground as crude oil, the molecules of your body would be things like plants, dirt, trees, etc, anything metal you have would be ore in the ground, etc. And per butterfly effect paradox, from the instant you arrive you've changed things, just by breathing and walking around you've affected air flows and converted a little more oxygen to CO2. If you arrive in the middle of nowhere, hold still for 30 seconds, then depart again, that might have no real effect. Or it might create a butterfly effect that changes a weather pattern or something and has a huge effect.
By that measure, the whole thing becomes a not fun exercise in paranoia- knowing that even saying hello to someone (or not saying hello) might alter the future and erase your existence.
This just sounds like what the rich are doing already. Maybe they're the time travelers after all.