BSP to issue peso bills with new designs by December

By December of this year, we could be having new designs on our peso bills. The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) would begin circulating by December the new peso bills, while coins will follow suit after two years.

According to the BSP, aside from having new designs, the new bills and coins will also have new security features which would make it easier to detect counterfeit money.

BSP in its primer said, “As a matter of practice, central banks regularly change the designs of their money – whether coins or banknotes – to guard against counterfeiter. By making it very difficult and costly for counterfeiters to produce exact copies of our money, we protect the integrity of our currency against criminals.”

The peso bills, from the 20-peso to the 1,000-peso, and coins from the one-centavo to the 10-peso, are all up for a facelift. Once the new designs have begun circulating, BSP said the existing peso bills would remain valid and legal tender in the next three years, after which they will be phased out.

“Based on previous currency retirement or demonization program of the BSP, this will give enough time for the public to make a full transition to our new generation currency,” BSP said, adding that there would be a separate schedule for the coins.