Last fall the Bureau of Engraving and Printing announced they encountered a problem with their printing of the new, more secure $100 currency. Somehow, the paper was creasing as it flowed through the printing processes, and at least for a portion of the bills already printed, part of the new design was missing. Prior to the issue, the new currency was to be available in February 2011.
In looking for an update of the availability of the new $100 bills, information is not readily available on the various money sites.
If you search the press releases on the Bureau’s web site, they have not yet announced the availability of the new bills. If you search their New Money web site that provides more information including a virtual tour of the new $100 bill, the delay announcement from October 2010 is the last availability information they offer.
But, if you look at their productivity numbers for the past few months, they are still making $100 currency. Other than the series number, their data do not identify old versus new design in the production.
The virtual tour of the new Ben Franklins shows a 2009 series number on the bill, but it’s unclear if all series 2009 $100 currency is the new design.
The numbers below show the $100 bill productivity for January 2010 through April 2011 and include quantities of regular notes. For this exercise, star notes were not included. The quantities were aggregated from the Bureau of Engraving and Printing’s productivity announcements on their web site.
| Month | Printing Location |
Series | Quantity of Regular Notes |
| Jan2010 | East | 2006N | 89,600,000 |
| Feb2010 | East | 2006N | 76,800,000 |
| West | 2009G | 3,200,000 | |
| Mar2010 | East | 2009G | 44,800,000 |
| 2006N | 64,000,000 | ||
| West | 2009G | 51,200,000 | |
| Apr2010 | East | 2009G | 41,600,000 |
| 2006N | 38,400,000 | ||
| West | 2009G | 96,000,000 | |
| May2010 | East | 2009G | 60,800,000 |
| 2006N | 12,800,000 | ||
| West | 2009G | 131,200,000 | |
| Jun2010 | East | 2009G | 60,800,000 |
| West | 2009G | 118,400,000 | |
| Jul2010 | East | 2009G | 64,000,000 |
| West | 2009G | 105,600,000 | |
| Aug2010 | East | 2009G | 64,000,000 |
| West | 2009G | 118,400,000 | |
| Sep2010 | East | 2009G | 80,000,000 |
| West | 2009G | 160,000,000 | |
| Oct2010 | East | 2009G | 0 |
| West | 2009G | 19,200,000 | |
| Nov2010 | East | 0 | |
| West | 0 | ||
| Dec2010 | East | 2009G | 3,200,000 |
| West | 0 | ||
| Jan2011 | East | 2006NA | 12,800,000 |
| 2009G | 3,200,000 | ||
| West | 0 | ||
| Feb2011 | East | 2006NA | 41,600,000 |
| West | 2009G | 54,400,000 | |
| Mar2011 | East | 2006NA | 99,200,000 |
| 2009G | 9,600,000 | ||
| West | 0 | ||
| Apr2011 | East | 2006NA | 64,000,000 |
| 2009G | 19,200,000 | ||
| West | 0 |
As they work through the problems, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing must continue production for replacing worn and damaged currency and to build an inventory of “good” currency with the new, more secure design.
The New Money web site provides a wealth (pun intended) of information about the design and security features of the new $100 bill, but they do not provide that much detail about the actual printing process.
Take a look this technology site’s information about the printing of the new currency. Their information was collected during the summer of 2010, but the gist of the process should still be true – even with the issues that were found.
Making the next-gen Benjamin (photos) (Be patient, this takes some time to load.)
Behind the scenes with the next-gen $100 bill
Both of those resources are provided by cnet News and were developed by one of their people who took a road trip to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to see the new $100 bills being made.
We still don’t know when they will be available, but learning about the productivity and about the processes in the meantime is interesting.