Japan End-2025 Bank Notes Fall for 3rd Straight Year

Tokyo, Dec. 30 (Jiji Press)–The year-end balance of bank notes in circulation in Japan is estimated at 120,606 billion yen, falling for the third straight year amid the rise of cashless payments, according to Bank of Japan data released Tuesday. A stack of 10,000-yen bills equivalent to this amount would be 1,206 kilometers high, about 319 times the height of Mount Fuji, Japan’s tallest peak at 3,776 meters. The balance of bank notes in circulation is the total value of bank notes held at homes, in corporate vaults and elsewhere. Just over 7 billion of the new notes, which began to be issued in July last year, have been circulated, accounting for 42.8 pct of the total bank notes in use. However, the pace of penetration is slow compared to the previous series of new notes introduced in 2004, which accounted for nearly 70 pct in the same period. In Japan, there had been a strong preference for cash for many years, but the balance of bank notes in circulation declined for the first time in 14 years at the end of 2023. Meanwhile, the proportion of cashless payments, such as credit cards and electronic money, exceeded 50 pct of personal consumption in 2024, excluding imputed rent for owner-occupied houses, according to statistics from the industry ministry. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]