In the capitalist economic system, consumers, investors, and entrepreneurs align their actions with the future. This future presents both opportunities and risks, but above all, it is uncertain. How do the actors deal with this uncertainty? Economists answer this question with various theories that rely on the predictability of the market. This often leads to an underestimation of the unpredictability of the future. Jens Beckert takes the temporal order of modern economic life seriously and develops a new perspective on the dynamics of capitalism. At the center of his investigation are the fictional expectations of the actors—imaginations and narratives about what the future holds. Using tools from sociology and literary theory, he provides a comprehensive typology of these expectations and examines their functions in areas such as money, innovation, and consumption.