2018-08-14 Tue

It was officially announced on 24th July that Hong Kong is going to issue a new series of banknotes. The redesign is taking place after eight years. Hong Kong has three banks namely, Standard Chartered Bank, Bank of China, and the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corp. Each bank would be issuing five denominations.

New $1,000 and $500 banknotes would be circulated later this year and early in 2019. The $100, $50, and $20 notes will be released in 2019 and 2020. Notes from the earlier series will circulate with the new banknotes. The older notes would be slowly withdrawn from circulation.

Each note will have a different colour. For the first time in history, Hong Kong would be issuing a note with a vertical obverse design. The reverse themes will be standardised. Various aspects of Hong Kong will be depicted in the new designs.

The design for $1,000 notes would represent Hong Kong as an international financial centre. $500 notes will feature Hong Kong UNESCO Global Geopark. Cantonese opera will be celebrated on $100 notes. $50 notes will feature beautiful butterflies from Hong Kong. $20 notes will highlight dim sum and tea culture.

The Bank of China’s version $100 note has been in the spotlight for the wrong reasons. Some think that the painting of a female Cantonese opera singer looks similar to “hell money” used in some East Asian burial ceremonies.

Advanced security features like a dynamic shimmering pattern, windowed metallic thread, improved watermark, fluorescent see-through denomination, concealed denomination and raised printing are used on the new notes.

Image Courtesy: Hong Kong Monetary Authority