I guess if they were going to get excited about something, it’d be this.

At a ceremony on 1 September, Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso pushed the button to officially begin printing the country’s newly redesigned 10,000 yen bills. Most noticeable in this new design is that writer Fukuzawa Yukichi has been replaced by economist Shibusawa Eiichi, also known as the “father of Japanese capitalism.”

In addition to the aesthetic changes, several functional adjustments have been added. The bills were given a unique texture to help visually impaired people distinguish them and the numbers are also more prominently printed to help those from outside Japan understand its value at a glance.

Not only that, but the bills carry a “state-of-the-art” hologram that appears to move in 3-D when looked at from different angles. Not sure what makes it so cutting-edge, but if that’s the case then my old Visionaries and Super Naturals figures I had when I was eight were light years ahead of their time.

Either way, revamping physical currency is always a good thing from a security and public service point of view, but perhaps no one was happier about it than The Bank of Japan who announced it in an uncharacteristically chipper tweet:

▼ “Ta-daaaa! The new 10,000 yen bill!”

Sure, it’s far from the zaniest tweet anyone’s posted before, but considering the central bank of Japan’s entire timeline is just a series of links to reports on economic policy and guidelines alone with the title of said report, the sudden appearance of “ta-daaaaa” can be quite jarring.

Most replies to the tweet certainly had a hard time getting over the bank’s unexpected candor.

“‘Ta-daaa’ it ain’t, but okay.”
“The Bank of Japan is getting all giddy.”
“It looks like toy money.”
“Lol, that’s too happy.”
“The font on the ‘10000’ makes it look cheap.”
“Hmm. I’m interested in this design and would like to try it out. Please send me 1,000 of them.”
“Since you have time to Tweet like a teenager, can you get on the whole deflation problem?”
“That font though…”
“How much longer until the Yukichi ones disappear?”

Even the social-media-dwelling otter mascot Chi-tan chimed in to comment on the new look of Japanese currency.

▼ “The new money is cool. I’m looking for the old money now because we have to cherish it.”

Luckily, Chi-tan and everyone else will still have plenty of time to enjoy the current bills. Once the first run of printing is complete, the bills will be used to aid the designers of machines such as ATMS and vending machines so they can properly identify them.

The redesigned 1,000 and 5,000 yen bills will follow a similar roll-out and are scheduled to begin first-printing later this autumn. All banknotes are expected to enter circulation in the first half of 2024, and their magical hologram power will shake the earth!

Source: NHK, My Game News Flash
Top image: Twitter/@Bank_of_Japan_j
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