In Other News…

• Jamaica’s Finance and Public Service Minister, Dr Nigel Clarke, has said that the country’s new series of banknotes will be ready to be released to the general public by mid-June, with a publicity campaign to prepare the public ready to roll out imminently.

The new all-polymer series is being printed on SAFEGUARD® by De La Rue, and will feature more modern designs, new portraits and a holographic stripe on each denomination, viewable from either side of the note.

• The US Mint has commenced its 2023 American Women Quarters (AWQ) programme with the release of the first two coins in this year’s series.

Launched in January, the first coin of the year features Bessie Coleman, the first African American and first Native American woman pilot as well as the first African American to earn an international pilot’s licence.

The second coin, also now issued, features Edith Kanaka‘ole, an Indigenous Hawaiian composer and custodian of native culture, traditions, and the natural land.

The other three honorees in the 2023 series are Eleanor Roosevelt, first lady, author and civil liberties advocate; Jovita Idar, a Mexican-American journalist, activist, teacher, and suffragist; and Maria Tallchief, America’s first Native American prima ballerina.

Separately, according to an estimate revealed in the Federal Reserve’s 2022 annual report to Congress about Presidential dollars, it has enough inventory of $1 coins to match circulation needs for nearly 16 years.

The Presidential dollar programme ran from 2007 through to 2016, with four coins issued per year honouring each US President in turn. However, public preference for paper $1 bills over the clad coins resulted in large inventories building up, peaking in 2012 at $1.44 billion. A year earlier, the then Treasury Secretary halted their production for circulation, with subsequent versions offered as collectible products only.

The stocks of Presidential dollars held in Federal Reserve vaults stood at $880 million at the end of 2022.

• A new campaign is calling for Canada’s $20 bills to be reimagined in order to put the spotlight on Indigenous women and their contributions to the country.

The Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC) has launched the ‘Change The Bill’ campaign, which seeks to promote reconciliation through art by commissioning Indigenous artists to reimagine the $20 bill with Indigenous women at the focus.

‘Canada has been printing money for over 150 years. In that time, an Indigenous woman has never been featured on a Canadian banknote,’ the campaign’s website reads. ‘Placing an Indigenous woman on the bill would go far in recognizing the important but often overlooked contributions they have made to this country. Change is long overdue.’ 

• The National Bank of Tajikistan has released into circulation new banknotes in denominations from 10 through to 500 somoni, bearing the year 2022. The designs are the same as those of 2021. However, the 5 somoni has not been included in the update, implying that it is being replaced by the coin of the same denomination, which has been in circulation since 2018.

• The Central Bank of Jordan has issued a new 20 Jordanian dinar (JD) banknote, the third in its new series (the fifth). The new note features a portrait of the late King Hussein on the front, whilst the reverse features images of Wadi Mujib foothills, stone-age spearheads and a Nabataean coin from the ancient city of Petra.

The main security features is a 4.5mm MOTION® Switch thread and a hologram.

The new JD 1 was issued, and the JD 50 in February. The remaining notes yet to be issued in the new series are the JD 5 and the JD 50.