Australian cash hoarding and counterfeiting up, says RBA

Forget Bitcoin, Block Chain and all those other new-fangled internet platforms like Apple Pay – when it comes to holding a fat stash of cash, Australians still demand the green folding stuff: those crisp $100 bills.

But our national love affair with holding some hard currency on the side has produced a nasty side effect for people and businesses that prefer cash over cards: despite Australia having the best banknotes in the world, forged notes are now the increase.

“Counterfeiting rates of the current series of banknotes remain low by international standards but have been rising,” the Reserve Bank of Australia’s Head of Payments Policy, Tony Richards, told thePayments Innovation 2016 Conference in Sydney on Tuesday.

“And there are some signs that the counterfeiters are getting a bit better with new and cheaper scanning, printing and image manipulation technology.” Read more. 

This story first appeared in Government News.