Euro banknotes will have to be replaced, because they wear out but also because counterfeiters are always finding ways to counterfeit them. This means finding new techniques to prevent counterfeiting. The European Central Bank (ECB) has decided to launch a consultation to replace these banknotes because it believes that the citizens of the euro zone must be able to have more evocative banknotes, as its president, Christine Lagarde, says.
3 mins
With our correspondent in Brussels,
Christine Lagarde appears in a short video on the bank’s website where she shows her signature. It is present under the European flag on the front of all banknotes that have been printed since 2020. It’s my signature, she says. But it’s your money, so you should have a say in how it looks. »
There European Central Bank (ECB) opens this week and until August 31 a great consultation where everyone will be able to express their desires and their tastes, but not freely. The process has been launched for 18 months, we already have pre-selected themes: the culture of nature, identity, rivers, birds, and even hands.
If the ECB wants more evocative notes, it is because the current notes are not enough. Euro banknotes have been in circulation since 2002, and they have never aroused the same enthusiasm as the American dollar, the green banknote with its unique, very characteristic format and colour. Supported by the world’s most powerful currency, Europeans have been dreaming aloud since the introduction of the euro of seeing it on par with the dollar. But the strength of their common currency does not go hand in hand with the prestige of their note.
impersonal cuts
It has been said a lot that euro denominations were quite impersonal, that they did not allow real identification with the currency, unlike the coins and especially the national banknotes of the past. There are even a number of Europeans who qualify them as “ugly” with their somewhat indefinable color or not very practical with their variable format, four different heights and six different widths.
30 years ago, the European Monetary Institute appointed 15 experts from central banks, including two architects, to produce banknotes without national references, apart from the first letter of the serial number. They quickly realized from the reactions to their drawings that they had to remove all references. All resemblances with the Pont du Gard or with the Rialto in Venice have been quickly erased to avoid recriminations or accusations of favoritism. Drawing inspiration from the style of each era is the current limit.
The future banknotes that the ECB promises us will not appear tomorrow. The first denominations should appear in 2029 at the earliest. What is certain is that they will be very different from the current Europe series, launched ten years ago on the same model as the first series. Either way, it will take years to replace the approximately 29 billion euro banknotes currently in circulation.
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