Which U.S. currency bill is there the most of?
I heard on TV that the U.S. currency bill that there is the most of and is most used is the twenty dollar bill.
This defies credibility because mist of the time, when you pay with a twenty you get back at least one–and usually more–one dollar bills.
Does anyone know whether the one or the twenty is the bill there is most of?
I heard it was the $100 bill as they are stashed all over the world…
Printed each year - $1>$20>$100>$5>$10>$50>$2
Most found worldwide - $1/$100, depending. Lots of countries use the US dollar as their official currency. Others have adopted it officially, and more have it alongside other currency(ies). And those bills stick around a long time.
It’s a close race for the top three: $1 are most common, then $100, then $20. The $5 bill is in a very distant fourth-place, closely followed by $10 and $50.
By value, the share of $100’s was 75% in 2010, having risen dramatically since the 1970’s.
That’s two supplementary questions: How much of what is printed due to high demand, and how much of what is printed due to fast deterioration. It seems the 100 is in demand the most, but the smaller denominations would depreciate fastest.
You have to wonder how many are not genuine?
I wonder if $50 frequency will increase with inflation. I’m seeing ATMs that will dispense them.
The ATM I frequent, I have to withdraw $80 at a time instead of $100 like I’d prefer, because if I get $100 it comes in a pair of fifties, which I can’t spend in a lot of places.
I read something that suggested a significant number of overseas dollars are counterfeit. The first Jack Reacher book has an in depth discussion of overseas currency.
If you go to a third world country where the dollar is used in parallel with the local currency, most people won’t take anything printed before 2003 - the older ones are too easy to counterfeit.
Yep, when I worked in the bank, people who were visiting the old country (Philippines most commonly IIRC) would ask for crisp $100 bills from a specific series.
there is a story that a decent number of $100s have traces of cocaine on them due to use by drug smugglers. Probably an urban legend.
I think it was Rolling Stone in the 90’s that reported that something like 80% of $100 bills tested in Florida had cocaine residue. During the height of the cocaine epidemic, snorting coke through a tightly rolled $100 bill was a “cool” thing to do…
How are there so many $2 bills in circulation? According to the chart there’s not even twice the number of $10 bills as there are $2 bills, and yet I’ve never come across a $2 “in the wild.” Are they popular in other countries?
It doesn’t need to be that every bill has been used itself - the drugs come off the bill when it’s rubbed against surfaces that sort and count it, and this passes drugs on to the bills that come after it.
“In circulation” just means they’ve been issued and not redeemed. It includes $2 bills in collections, bank vaults, etc. They’re used so infrequently that they rarely wear out, so they stay in circulation for a long time.