ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, March 25, 1996 TAG: 9603250127
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
A new $100 bill with a bigger, off-center picture of Benjamin Franklin and several innovations to thwart counterfeiters goes into circulation around the world today.
So far, $80 billion worth has been printed, equal to about a third of all old $100 bills in use.
``They won't be everywhere right away - it will only be a trickle at first,'' said Bob Moore, a Federal Reserve spokesman. Some of the new bills should start showing up in financial capitals by this afternoon, he said.
The bills, expected to be widely available next month, represent the first significant change in the appearance of U.S. currency since 1929. Redesign of other denominations is to follow.
All orders from commercial banks for $100 bills will be filled by the new bills starting today, but old notes ``will not be recalled or devalued,'' according to the Treasury.
Packed in book-size ``bricks'' worth $400,000 each, the new notes are issued only to branches of the Federal Reserve system, the government's central bank. The branches pass them on to commercial banks, including three that distribute abroad: Union Bank of Switzerland, Bank of America and Republic New York Corp.
The new bills have the same green and black color as the old ones, but one of the new safety features is a large figure ``100'' in the lower right-hand corner. Color-shifting ink makes it appear green when viewed straight and black when seen from an angle. The paper also includes a watermark.
The words ``United States of America'' are printed in microscopic letters on Franklin's coat.
Fine lines, hard to reproduce even by the computerized technology used in state-of-the art counterfeiting, appear behind Franklin's head and above the picture of Independence Hall in Philadelphia that covers most of the reverse side.
The Treasury says there are other security devices it does not want to talk about, to avoid giving tips to the counterfeiters.
``The technology is expected to continue to improve into the next century,'' the Treasury said in explaining the need for new bills.
``As the price of personal computer technology continues to drop, the availability and use of this technology to counterfeit currency and other security documents will increase.''
The bills are expected to get more notice abroad than in the United States, where smaller denominations rule for all but the biggest cash transactions. Even U.S.-based counterfeiters tend to favor the $20 bill, while those abroad prefer the bigger bill.
The General Accounting Office, which makes reports to Congress, has warned about a new high-quality counterfeit operation, dubbed ``superdollar,'' reportedly based in Iran and Syria. It questioned whether the Treasury has deployed sufficient resources to detect the new fake version of the old $100 bill.
Russia has an especially big demand for the new bills, since dollar cash is popular as a hedge against the huge inflation of rubles. The Russian central bank estimates that $12 billion to $13 billion in American currency already circulates in the country, making it the biggest user of U.S. currency abroad.
There is widespread fear in Russia that the old bill will lose value, partly because it is easier to fake. But U.S. officials stress that, at least to the U.S. government, both bills will always have equal value and that there is no plan to call in the old bills.
Many countries issue new bills to replace old ones, which become worthless unless they are exchanged by a deadline, but there is no plan to do that with U.S. currency.
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP Newly designed $100 bills may thwart counterfeiters.by CNB