Denmark to phase out 1000-krona banknote by May 2025

Copenhagen, Dec 1 (IANS) Denmark will phase out its 1,000-krona ($146 U.S. dollars) banknote to battle financial crimes, the country's national bank announced.

Danmarks Nationalbank, in collaboration with the Ministry of Industry, Business and Financial Affairs, will discontinue the banknote by May 31, 2025, reports Xinhua news agency.

A new banknote series devised by Danmarks Nationalbank is expected to launch between 2028 and 2029.

As a result, all banknotes that were issued before 2009 must also be discontinued, and will become invalid after May 31, 2025, said the bank.

The removal of the 1,000-krone note is seen as a critical step in enhancing anti-money laundering efforts and complicating financial crimes.

"By phasing out the 1,000-krone banknote, large cash transactions will ... become more difficult for criminals to carry out, and it will also become more difficult for them to store and transport cash," said Lasse Boje, director of Police at the National Unit for Special Crime.

The Danish government has also proposed lowering the maximum amount of cash that can be paid at once from the current 20,000 to 15,000 Danish krone, starting on March 1, 2024.

"The 1,000 crone note makes up avery small part of the payments in shops and is largely used for financial crime. Therefore, we are also lowering the payment limit in the shops to further strengthen efforts against financial crime," Morten Bodskov, minister for industry, business and financial affairs, told Danish news agency Ritzau.