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Cash and crises: No surprises by the virus

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  • Rösl, Gerhard
  • Seitz, Franz

Abstract

Despite the increasing use of cashless payment instruments, the notion that cash loses importance over time can be unambiguously refuted. In contrast, the authors show that cash demand increased steeply over the past 30 years. This is not only true on a global scale, but also for the most important currencies in advanced countries (USD, EUR, CHF, GBP and JPY). In this paper, they focus especially on the role of different crises (technological crises, financial market crises, natural disasters) and analyse the demand for small and large banknote denominations since the 1990s in an international perspective. It is evident that cash demand always increases in times of crises, independent of the nature of the crisis itself. However, largely unaffected from crises we observe a trend increase in global cash aligned with a shift from transaction balances towards more hoarding, especially in the form of large denomination banknotes.

Suggested Citation

  • Rösl, Gerhard & Seitz, Franz, 2021. "Cash and crises: No surprises by the virus," IMFS Working Paper Series 150, Goethe University Frankfurt, Institute for Monetary and Financial Stability (IMFS).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:imfswp:150
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Franz Seitz & Lucas Devigne & Raymond de Pastor, 2022. "Different Motives for Holding Cash in France: an Analysis of the Net Cash Issues of the Banque de France," Working papers 888, Banque de France.
    2. Nikolaus Bartzsch & Marco Brandi & Lucas Devigne & Raymond de Pastor & Gianluca Maddaloni & Diana Posada Restrepo & Gabriele Sene, 2023. "Forecasting banknote circulation during the COVID-19 pandemic using structural time series models," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 771, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    3. Muñoz, Manuel A. & Soons, Oscar, 2023. "Public money as a store of value, heterogeneous beliefs, and banks: implications of CBDC," Working Paper Series 2801, European Central Bank.
    4. Anna Iwańczuk-Kaliska & Mirosława Kaczmarek & Grzegorz Kotliński, 2023. "Non-cash retail payments in selected banks during the COVID-19 pandemic – the case of Poland," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 54(3), pages 309-334.
    5. Brian Micallef & Tiziana Gauci, "undated". "Excess demand for banknotes in Malta," CBM Policy Papers PP/02/2022, Central Bank of Malta.
    6. Jacek Pietrucha, 2021. "Drivers of the Cash Paradox," Risks, MDPI, vol. 9(12), pages 1-17, December.
    7. Tamele, Barbora & Zamora-Pérez, Alejandro & Litardi, Chiara & Howes, John & Steinmann, Eike & Todt, Daniel, 2021. "Catch me (if you can): assessing the risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission via euro cash," Occasional Paper Series 259, European Central Bank.
    8. Bartzsch, Nikolaus & Brandi, Marco & de Pastor, Raymond & Devigne, Lucas & Maddaloni, Gianluca & Posada Restrepo, Diana & Sene, Gabriele, 2023. "Forecasting banknote circulation during the COVID-19 pandemic using structural time series models," Discussion Papers 20/2023, Deutsche Bundesbank.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cash; banknotes; crises; Corona;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E41 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Demand for Money
    • E51 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Money Supply; Credit; Money Multipliers
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies

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