The Four Nations group was founded in 1978 and consists of five central bank members – the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Bank of Canada, Reserve Bank of Australia, Bank of England and Banco de México. The group is a forum in which its members share information and experiences on banknote development, issuance and distribution, counterfeit deterrence, and relevant technical studies.

Portals, the second largest commercial banknote and security paper manufacturer, has entered into an agreement with Fedrigoni, one of the leading European producers of specialty papers and self-adhesive labels, to buy its security business based in Bollate in Italy, which specialises in security threads and foils.

The last year has been dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which continues to surprise and to wreak huge damage. But perhaps there is another global issue that is just as urgent – namely, climate change and, as part of that, environmental sustainability.

G4S shareholders have accepted a £3.8 billion from Allied Universal, bringing to a close a months-long battle between two firms to take control of the security services company.

One increasingly common counterfeit technique is harvesting – the act of taking a security feature from a lower value object and incorporating it into a counterfeit banknote of higher value. There are several ways to minimise harvesting, including making each security feature bespoke.

According to Jura, COVID-19 has required a lot of strategic rethinking. The company’s core way of conducting business has always been in-person, building rapport with current and future clientele via personal contact.

Ergonomics and automation are well-known terms these days. But where does the banknote industry stand in these areas? Do printworks have to address both areas, which benefit employees and companies alike?

This is now the fifth Industry Watch where COVID-19 has been the main influence on company performance and market trends, and this situation is unlikely to change any time soon.

Three years ago, the family-owned security ink business Luminescence was acquired by Sun Chemical, the world’s largest manufacturer of inks and pigments to create, in its words, a new global player and an enormous growth platform for the company in the $2.7 billion security ink market. Since then, whilst the company is now called Luminescence Sun Chemical Security, it seems to be very much business as usual in the highly specialised security ink market, where technical requirements are exceptionally demanding and competition relatively limited.

In 2014, Spectra Systems (Spectra) launched Aeris™, a unique new banknote disinfection system which uses carbon dioxide in a supercritical phase to penetrate banknotes and remove oxidised oils and other contaminants, effectively ‘washing’ the notes with gas.

Revenue for 2020 of €1.03 billion exceeded Koenig & Bauer’s guidance of €900-950 million, but was €217.2 million (17 .4%) lower than that achieved in 2019, according to its recently announced results.

The state-run Korean Minting, Security Printing and ID card Operating Corp (KOMSCO) has announced the implementation of an emergency management system in the face of losses sustained last year.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a prime factor in companies’ financial results for the last year, and for most its impact has been negative. Orell Füssli’s results are no exception. In an opening statement it said the company ‘held its own in a difficult market environment in 2020. Although sales and profitability were lower than in the previous year and cash flow was negative due to high capital expenditure, our balance sheet allows us to pay a dividend to our shareholders’.

The National Bank of Ukraine, the ECB and Federal Reserve, Crane Currency and CCL Secure are among the winners in the Central Banking Awards 2021, presented annually by the Central Banking Journal and which this year have nearly doubled in number to 29.

The Board of the Central Bank of Russia has issued its ‘Guidelines for Cash Circulation Development in 2021-2026’. Its over-arching goals are to ensure the stability of cash circulation, optimise costs based on the development of technical infrastructure, as well as the formation of partnerships with banks for holding stocks of banknotes.

Russian banknote printer and papermaker Goznak is the latest in a series of currency suppliers to move into digital payments, having signed an agreement to acquire a stake of 50% plus one share in fintech company Preprocessing Settlement Center JSC (JSC PRT), which operates under the Uniteller trademark.

The Bank of England has unveiled the design for the new £50 which, when it goes into circulation in June, will compete the transition to a new all-polymer series.

At Intergraf's just-concluded Currency+Identity online conference, Bernadette O’Brien presented the work done by the European Central Bank (ECB) on improving the environmental sustainability of euro banknotes. From its first life cycle assessment (LCA) of the first euro series in 2004 through to its 2020 Product Environmental Footprint project, the ECB has steadily worked to ensure the euro banknotes are ‘good citizens’.

The technology platforms used for banknotes continues to rise ever higher, for all security levels – 1, 2 and 3. Challenging and beating the counterfeiter is central to the design, functionality and security of banknotes. And we note that with a well-defined security feature matrix to raise the bar, there can be success.

Despite Sweden being in the vanguard of the cashless movement, its central bank – Sveriges Riksbank – is opening new offices to handle notes and coins.