「Goal, eyes on」with「emissions」…WEALTH, MONEY is used for purchasing goods 品 and services 士, and received when selling goods and services: CURRENCY literally means the 'flow of wealth from one to another' as a medium of exchange that formerly was bartering services for food. In the world economy, what were the first goods and services offered in exchange for food? What was the first profession? Buyers and sellers were the ones「eyeing the goal of emissions」and trading.
　While there are a variety of mollusc eye morphologies extant, it is a stretch to suggest that the eyes of headless bivalves are remarkable, or even noticeable, yet the element for「eye」comprises most of this glyph…but what exactly do shells have to do with eyeballs? not much—yet as filter feeders, and most often as bottom feeders, sea creatures equipped with a shell indeed have the「goal of emissions」as their primary purpose and support for continued existence by pumping fluids through internal meat organs, straining morsels in order to eat. Some scallop species have primitive 'eyes' that allow sensing of light variations, enabling them to flee from predators using jets of fluid squirted from between their shells, the 'emissions' as it were.「…the plesiomorphic feeding state for bivalves is probably deposit feeding utilizing long labial palps…」
　　[　https://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/taxa/inverts/mollusca/bivalvia.php 2017-02-12　]　 not unlike service providers in that regard. And while no-longer-integrated feet individually resemble a clamshell both in form and the function of surrounding some meat, placing two no-longer-integrated feet together by juxtaposing the soles strongly resembled both the hinged portion of a clamshell, and, a human buttocks complete with an anus:「…predators using jets of fluid squirted from between their shells」[quote admittedly taken out of context]. Nevertheless, when digging clams or other bivalves from the sandy bottom of a seashore, a good policy is to「look, watch, use eyes for goal of emissions」since the filter-feeding action of the animal causes small jets of fluid and chunks of sand to be squirted up, revealing their position buried under the sand (the analogy with no-longer-integrated feet in use again is obvious).
　FLESHPOTS of course are heated from below (see 火). Interestingly, a pair of these glyphs refer to large breasts, 賏 eyes on the goal of emissions, and「emission in eye」will in fact result in temporary blindness, a hazard associated with emissions spurting from between two breasts, or other close-up viewing (see 糢). See the following glyphs, all of which equate money and wealth with sex, not seashells: 金, person downward thrusting with spurts. 円 and 腺 glans within spread legs. 泉, open-mouthed tonguing white streams. 蚨, orifice loose and dripping with adult male, and see all the similar glyphs as well having to do with buying and selling sex. Perhaps a misunderstanding (deliberate or otherwise) of the elements used in a glyph that refers to the seashore (濵) has resulted in the mistaken notion that 貝 can only mean 'seashell,' and cannot possibly refer to the VALUABLE OUTER appearance of a concubine, and in particular her vagina, in the imperial palace that resembled raw scallop meat, juicy freshwater clams, or raw oysters…
　Somewhat surprisingly, we still receive a comment now and then that insists this glyph primarily refers to shells, with the reasoning given being that the 'other dictionaries say so'…there are well over 500 glyphs using 貝 as an element, and if they can all be explained using this glyph to exclusively mean「seashell」please compile that list and submit it.
　When appearing as an element in other glyphs, most often represents the simplified version of a CAULDRON (鼎) or FLESHPOT that contained 'meat in a casing' and other ingredients with real VALUE for sustaining human life. In some instances this glyph substitutes for「look, see」(見 for example, as in 蜆, 蛽) as the things people want to look at, what is attractive, what they value: what was more beautiful in ancient China than the emperor's own harem, what more ostentatious display of WEALTH could there be than an array of the most gorgeous females in the land whom the emperor had purchased with money (貴)? that glyph's elements (見) are「goal of, eyeing copulation.」
　Modern sources describe this glyph as only one of its very limited meanings, but one that also refers to「casing full of meat」the exoskeleton of an animal, also known as a SHELL. Shells are simply「containers full of meat」just as are fleshpots, readily available and easily obtainable. Sources describe that shells for a while were used by early societies as a medium of exchange and as a store of value (MONEY), at least until everyone else figured out you could just take a walk on the beach at low tide and pick up a fortune without working too hard while picking up a free lunch to boot (now, really, how much time did that require?), and then shells seemed to lose their monetary value in a manner similar to the value of Dutch tulip bulbs back in 1639-1640. Shells have no undiscovered intrinsic value, nor do coins and currencies of today. Shells don't last forever and can chip easily.
　Paper currency, digitally-stored debits and credits in one's bank account, and stock shares at a brokerage firm as wealth have value only if everyone else believes so sufficiently as an utter act of faith…you cannot eat shells or coins or paper money (nor digital bits and bytes), and although gnawing on an oyster shell now and again may help with osteoporosis or benefit a pregnant or nursing mother, sucking on a penny is not recommended. Nevertheless, paper money is an acceptable substitute for abstergent in a pinch. Real wealth in the old days was PLENTIFUL MEAT, symbolized by the FLESHPOT, CAULDRON, and measured by the size, skill, and stature of a lord's harem.
　Is it merely coincidence that the English word「wealth」relates to many weals and welts from whacking (one's slaves?).

Modern definitions (that generally disregard history) …excluding politically incorrect concepts and other meanings deemed offensive today; may list only pigeonholed definitions, euphemisms, or meaningless mnemonics)
Chinese: cowrie; shellfish; currency (archaic)
Japanese: shell, shellfish, Japanese babylon, Japanese ivory shell, spinning top, work
Unihan extended: sea shell; money, currency
EDRDG: shellfish