this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2026
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Today I Learned

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[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 21 points 5 hours ago (2 children)

another bonus fact! CDN money has an embedded hologram that will project the denomination when a laser pointer is shone through it. great party trick.

[–] MrShankles@reddthat.com 3 points 2 hours ago

Nifty! And apparently it's a security feature

[–] T00l_shed@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Annnnnd despite the mint saying there is no maple scent on the 100's$ was there lol

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

People kept licking them, it was (is) a problem.

[–] T00l_shed@lemmy.world 1 points 37 minutes ago

Bills are super dirty

[–] WoodScientist@lemmy.world 0 points 2 hours ago

But if they're the first of their kind, wouldn't that mean they're going into irregular circulation? 😁

[–] Etterra@discuss.online 5 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Is it the kind that need to be in the light for a few hours first? Because if so, I have some news about pockets.

[–] Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 4 points 4 hours ago (2 children)

Maybe it uses uranium to glow.

[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 3 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

replaces coin CMOS battery with nuclear coin

[–] NottaLottaOcelot@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 hours ago

That’s a resource we do have…we are planning to slowly mutate ourselves to superiority

[–] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 2 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

uh, before i lick this, how does it glow?

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 2 points 5 hours ago

strontium aluminate.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 2 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

Likely not radium, at least I think we learned that lesson.

[–] NottaLottaOcelot@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

If I’ve learned anything in my 45 years, it’s that humans have a remarkably short memory and repeat past mistakes at a staggering rate

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

Well that one was a kinda big lesson. But yeah maybe radiation "cures" will make a comeback.

[–] pedz@lemmy.ca 6 points 9 hours ago (3 children)

This reminds me that ths US Defense Department issued a warning about the painted quarters because they thought it was spying tech.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/alleged-canadian-spy-coin-deemed-harmless/

The odd-looking — but harmless — "poppy coin" was so unfamiliar to suspicious U.S. Army contractors traveling in Canada that they filed confidential espionage accounts about them. The worried contractors described the coins as "anomalous" and "filled with something man-made that looked like nano-technology," according to once-classified U.S. government reports and e-mails obtained by the AP.

[–] Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 2 points 3 hours ago

I wonder if this is indirectly admitting that they either considered or do spy via coins. Every accusation is an admission and all...

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 4 points 6 hours ago (4 children)

Americans are so wierdly ass backwards about currency tech.

Making bills out of not cotton? Fuck you

Making bills of different values different colours or sizes? Fuck you

Adding brail or addition security like hard to copy windows and holographic images? Fuck you

Coins coming in different styles? Fuck you

Coins above a 50 cent piece? Fuck you (unless it's a collectable).

[–] AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 1 points 37 minutes ago (1 children)

Two dollar bills? Obviously the work of the devil! Better burn them to be sure!

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 34 minutes ago

I still have one. They made sense when $2 CAD still meant something.

[–] Nautalax@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Funnily you very rarely see the Sacagawea dollar coins in circulation the US (albeit more than the $2 billion) but we ship a massive number of those dollar coins overseas to Ecuador which officially uses USD. Incredibly common since many expenses there are in the couple dollars sort of range and you barely see $1 bills at all since many people refuse to accept worn-out bills.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

Almost as if Ecuador knows how to money and the states is a wierd place.

[–] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Nah, I'm all for cotton for money bills. While they don't last very long, it's better than more plastic shit 100% of the time.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

As someone who had to fix the bank machines during both cotton and polymer, you are 100% crazy. Cotton notes are nasty and wasteful.

[–] yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

You could view cotton notes as providing job opportunities :P

But still: I'd rather waste five times as many cotton notes than have even more plastic going around and being lost. At least lost cotton decays, whereas lost plastic will just stay around forever.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

You ever have to clean anything that works with cotton bills? All that oil and dirt on your grubby hands is in those bills. Polymer bills don't absorb anything and unlike other plastics they do get collected and recycled (you know since they are money). And the dies and chemicals needed to make those cotton bills? Yeah not good.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 2 points 5 hours ago (2 children)

US money is counterfeit at such high levels, no one wants to bring in anti-counterfeit measures like other countries because an audit would bring bad news.

[–] AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world 1 points 35 minutes ago

But they can't be counterfeit, where would one find this elusive cotton?

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 5 hours ago

It looks fake when not. They make fun of our money but the us's looks and is from another time.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 2 points 5 hours ago

“filled with something man-made that looked like nano-technology

or, paint.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 1 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Bonus! the Canadian mint actually mints coins for other countries. All euro coins for example.

[–] Jiral@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

I couldn't find anything on that, do you have a source for the Canadian Mint making "all euro coins" and what that is intended to mean?

[–] Sylvartas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 hours ago

Idk but they're not making France's coins (casually being almost 10 times older than the Canadian mint). Germany even has more than one national mint I think, so I doubt they're making theirs either.

[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 1 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

when EU went to the Euro, coins were secretly minted in Canada for a few EU countries and shipped out on secret cargo ships.

Are you sure?

I couldn't find anything documented about that:

Royal Canadian Mint of Winnipeg: 0 results

Royal Canadian Mint of Ottawa: 0 results

That site is usually fairly accurate. For example, Greek Euro coins in 2002 were minted both in Greece and In Spain/France/Finland (depending on the value) because Greece didn't meete the criteria for a while and was accepted later than other countries, with less time to minr coins. The non-Greece minted coins have a small letter hidden in a star denoting the country they were minted in: E for Spain (España), F for France, S for Finland (Suomi). Take the 2 Euro coin for example: https://en.numista.com/120

75,400,000 were minted in Greece, 70,000,000 in Finland.

[–] anthony43@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

This list is the list of countries the Royal Canadian Mint has ever produced coins for. I was recently on a tour at the Mint in Ottawa and they're currently producing coins for a just handful of countries - four or five, if I remember right.

[–] 0ops@piefed.zip 58 points 20 hours ago (1 children)
[–] pedz@lemmy.ca 10 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

A---Aurora Borealis? At this time of year! At this time of day! In this part of the country! Localized entirely within your pockets?!?

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