When a currency drops, the nominal price of hard assets in that currency generally rises.

FORBES: Gold's Allure Tied to Interest Rates

By pegging nominal interest rates at artificially low levels, the Fed is penalizing millions of people who have their assets in saving accounts or money market funds and are getting near zero nominal returns.

FORBES: The Federal Reserve's Crony Capitalism

It steals from taxpayers through higher nominal taxes while depreciating the value of their financial assets.

FORBES: Ben Bernanke's Secret Inflation Plan

Unlike the goods and services prices index, the GDP deflator measures change In compensation of employees, operating surplus (including mixed income), and consumption of fixed assets arisen from changes in prices and nominal net taxes.

UNESCO: Belarus: Report: Part I: Descriptive Section

In economic textbooks currency movements counter the differences in nominal interest rates between countries so that investors get the same returns on similarly safe assets whatever the currency.

ECONOMIST: Currencies

The risk in America now is that slower nominal growth will force firms and individuals to improve their balance sheets by spending less or by selling assets, exacerbating deflationary pressures.

ECONOMIST: Economics focus: Sinking like a soufflé | The

While Mr. Tepper may be correct in assuming that the major averages could rally in nominal terms if the Fed undertakes another round of quantitative easing, investors would still need to own the right assets to gain a real return on their portfolios.

FORBES: Why David Tepper Is Only Half Right

Deflation pushes up the real burden of debt, while the value of assets linked to that debt, such as house prices, may have to fall even more sharply in nominal terms to return to a fair level.

ECONOMIST: The world economy