Euro banknotes will get a new look. With the participation of EU citizens

Will euro banknotes become more emotional? – We want to develop banknotes with which the citizens of EU countries will be able to identify and use them with pride – said Fabio Panetta, member of the board of the European Central Bank.

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“So that Europeans can identify with them more”

In the multi-stage process of introducing new banknotes into circulation, the guardians of the single European currency want to create a new image of it. The ECB wants to involve EU citizens in this process. In 2024, the Governing Council of the ECB intends to decide on the release of new banknotes and how they will be put into circulation.

– After 20 years, the time has come to take a closer look at our banknotes and shape them so that Europeans, regardless of age and other factors, can identify with them more – said ECB President Christine Lagarde.

The European Central Bank has thus made it clear that paper notes will still remain in circulation, despite the increasing use of electronic money. For 11 of the then 15 EU members, the euro became legal tender on 1 January 1999; first, only in electronic form, and from 1 January 2002 – also in the form of banknotes and coins. Today, the euro is the official tender of payment for almost 340 million people in 19 European Union countries.

Concrete instead of abstraction

The security features of euro banknotes against counterfeiting have been refined and expanded in recent years. The second, complete generation of euro banknotes has been in circulation since 2019.

First-generation banknotes are still valid but are being gradually withdrawn from circulation. Relatively modest and neutral motifs remain on them, mainly buildings that do not exist in reality. The old German brands were completely different, with portraits of such personalities as Bettina von Arnim, Carl Friedrich Gauß, Annette von Droste-Huelshoff, Clara Schumann and the Grimm brothers, as well as famous buildings and specific objects instead of fancy architectural motifs.

“There was not much room for national wishes and emotions when establishing the design of the first series of euro banknotes,” explained then-ECB chief economist Otmar Issing. – At that time, when we were discussing in the Bundesbank about what the new euro banknotes should look like, I was fully aware from the very beginning that only symbols are involved here, without any national character. Imagine what would happen if the French insisted on having a portrait of Napoleon. Countries that suffered as a result of the Napoleonic Wars would have immediately protested against it. Many more such examples could be given. That is why we decided to use symbols of a completely neutral character, namely – bridges. It had a symbolic dimension: the euro creates bridges in Europe.

Working with EU citizens

In preparation for the release of the new series of banknotes, the guardians of the single European currency want to build new bridges between themselves and consumers. The European Central Bank has announced “working together with EU citizens in this process, ahead of its final decision in 2024”.

In the first step of this process, focus groups will be selected, whose members will gather views from people across the euro area on anything related in some way to the new euro banknotes. A thematic group will then be formed, composed of one expert or expert from each euro area country, and this group will submit an opinion to the ECB General Council on what topics should be reflected in the design of the new euro banknotes. The ECB Council will then inform the public in EU countries of how it relates to them.

Once the image-shaping process of the new banknotes is completed, the European Central Bank will make a final decision on the start of printing of the new banknotes and the deadline for their introduction into circulation.

Euro area candidate countries also have the right to vote

The process is to involve the citizens of Bulgaria and Croatia – two countries that have been applying for years to meet the criteria enabling them to join the club of euro countries. The last country to join the euro area so far was Lithuania. It entered January 1, 2019 as the 19th EU country to adopt the single European currency.

What the new euro banknotes will look like is currently an open question. Everything is possible and depends on what ideas in this matter will be submitted by the citizens of the EU countries. The final decision will be made by the Management Board of the European Central Bank; also whether the current denominations will remain in circulation, i.e. 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 and 200 euro banknotes. This also applies to their protection against counterfeiting.

For now, only one thing is certain. It will be a long time before we get new banknotes. Even if the ECB decides to release them as early as 2024, the new banknotes will not come into circulation until a few years later, after the end of the meticulous testing phase. Such a project is also a large and complicated logistics undertaking. In October 2021, according to OBC data, over 27.6 billion euro banknotes were in circulation, with a total value of almost 1.5 trillion euro.

(DPA / like)