Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, September 19, 1995 TAG: 9509190028
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
American currency is about to get a face lift, a high-tech overhaul to thwart counterfeiters that will have holders of greenbacks seeing double.
Two portraits of an American historical figure will be on each bill, but you'll have to hold the bill up to the light to see one of them.
It will be the first distinct new look for U.S. paper money in 66 years, a redesign that some experts consider long overdue, given the troublemaking possibilities from foreign counterfeiters.
The changeover will begin early next year with the $100 bill, a favorite of forgers. Existing bills will remain in circulation.
``We have an interest in protecting the integrity of our currency,'' said Treasury Under Secretary John Hawke Jr. ``As technology develops the potential for more sophisticated counterfeiting, it gives us increasing cause for concern.''
The most visible change will be to shift portraits off center.
An enlarged portrait of Benjamin Franklin will be moved to the left on the $100 bill, making room for a new watermark engraving. The watermark portrait, visible when the bill is held up to the light, is one of several new security features.
Officials said the watermark is extremely difficult to duplicate.
Eventually, there will be similar redesigns for the portraits on nearly all denominations - Ulysses S. Grant on the $50 bill, Andrew Jackson on the $20, Alexander Hamilton on the $10, Abraham Lincoln on the $5, and, of course, George Washington on the $1.
The exception could be the $2 bill, which bears the likeness of Thomas Jefferson. No decision has been made on whether to alter that largely commemorative bill.
Treasurer Mary Ellen Withrow has said borders on the new bills will be simplified, with geometric designs replaced by an assortment of lines and dots intended to foil counterfeiters.
Also, color-shifting ink will be used so that the greenback will take on a different hue when viewed from an angle. And government printers may use computer-designed patterns that are made to turn wavy when copied improperly.
The redesign presents an opportunity for modernizing the currency. The $10 bill, for example, has on its reverse side a 1920s-era car in front of the Treasury building. But no one has said whether it will be replaced by a newer model.
About $390 billion in U.S. paper currency is in circulation, some two-thirds of that in foreign countries.
The Secret Service has said there may be three times as much counterfeiting conducted abroad as in the United States. There have been reports, questioned by the Clinton administration, that Iran is distributing counterfeit bills through Lebanon.
Robert Leuver, a former director of the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing, doubts anti-counterfeiting measures will work as long as old-style bills remain in circulation.
``If they exist as legal tender, people can counterfeit them,'' he said. ``You copy whatever is easy to counterfeit.''
U.S. officials decided not to recall the old bills because a recall could disrupt foreign economies. Foreigners tend to be reluctant to turn in old bills, fearing tax consequences and currency devaluation.
A leading example is Russia, thought to have the largest supply of dollars anywhere outside the United States. Despite assurances from U.S. officials, Russians fear redesigned bills will mean a recall of greenbacks.
Last month, the newspaper Izvestia warned that criminal gangs might try to dump their counterfeits of existing bank notes in anticipation of the new ones. Dollars are the main financial refuge for inflation-weary Russians.
The last major change in U.S. currency was in 1929, when bills were reduced in size and given a uniform look. Congress added the words ``In God We Trust'' in 1957.
by CNB