Word: euros
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...indeed stretched thin. Banksys, the group that operates Belgium's ATMs, recorded about 600 cash withdrawals a minute in the first two hours of the new year. Some 200 Dutch post offices kept their doors closed on the morning of Jan. 2--the first business day of the euro era--because the postal bank, which handles the largest number of small bank accounts in the Netherlands, was not ready for the transition. In France, many motorways backed up as drivers eager to break francs into euro change skipped the credit-card and electronic E-Z pass lanes and jammed tollbooths...
...notes, legal tender from Lisbon to Helsinki and from Dublin to Athens, has given 300 million Europeans their first true experience of union. (Britain, the most significant holdout, is keeping the pound for now.) An Austrian who stood in a long bank queue to get her first walletful of euros could go home and see Spaniards doing the same thing on TV. The much photographed lines outside some banks were strictly voluntary displays of euro enthusiasm, since in most countries the old currencies are still good through February...
...their own countries, pondering price tags and trying to decide if that new sweater or pack of beer is a bargain or a rip-off. Most Italians will no longer be millionaires, and the French will have to cope with the fiddly exchange rate of 6.6 francs to 1[Euro]. ("It's easy," says another Paris greengrocer, displaying his mathematical prowess: "You just divide by 50% and add that to the original, then times...
Additionally, the euro is equipped with the most advanced anti-counterfeiting features of any currency. With a quick glance, you’ll notice holograms—with three different layers. Upon closer examination, there are numerous watermarks, raised print and in the correct light, the denomination on the bill changes color...
...seems that the United States is progressing to a currency with a more futuristic design, and there are some that support this shift. My avant-garde, immensely pro-euro German blockmate spares no effort in explaining the benefits of such a currency design: It’s harder to counterfeit, has a democratizing effect, and looks to the future, not the past. And I agree that this all makes perfect sense...