Here's a new and interesting release. Now that Queen Elizabeth II is the longest-reigning British monarch of all time and possibly the world's longest-reigning female monarch ever, the Bank of Canada has released 40,000,000 commemorative $20 notes to mark the occasion.
Although Canada seems to have a poor reputation for its constant emission of coins and the lack of distinction between circulating and non-circulating issues, its banknotes have been relatively conservative - a new series is issued about every 10 to 15 years, incorporating all of the latest technologies with little fuss. The previous most recent Canadian commemorative banknote was issued in 1967, a $1 note to mark the nation's Centennial - these were widely hoarded, and today they sell for about $3 in UNC. (Considering that $1 in 1967 could buy you much more than $3 can in 2015, it was probably not a good idea to keep more than one of these.)
The only difference between this new note and a normal $20 note is that the clear holographic ribbon has been changed - Parliament has been replaced by a portrait of the young queen (dating from 1953) and her royal cypher. Because of their similarity, these notes will most likely be accepted by ATMs and other forms of high technology, and because these notes will be easily mistaken for normal $20s, it seems likely that they will continue to circulate for far longer than your average commemorative banknote. Will we soon see a flood of "circulating commemorative" banknotes? (I hope not!)
For a better view of this note's holographic strip, check out the Bank of Canada's website. (The holographic security feature is designed not to respond to flatbed scanners, so I can't really capture its design - which is probably a good thing.)
These notes were released only yesterday, so today I went on a little walk to the nearest ATB Financial and asked if they had any of the new $20 bills. I was the first person to ask at that branch! After about 5 minutes of backroom deliberation, I got my note at face value - the teller wasn't aware of the note's release and was interested to find out about it. Apparently, just this morning, the bank staff had been wondering why they had received a bunch of new $20 bills despite not having put in an order for any.
So, this is the latest news from Canada - if you have any recent banknote news of your own, be sure to share it!