National Post

Alberta man may be first to sell house for bitcoin virtual currency
Like countless young men across North America, Taylor More likes sports and hanging out with friends. And if his latest project pans out he’ll be unique — the first person to sell a house for bitcoins.

Mr. More’s two-bedroom bungalow “with beautiful mountain views” is priced at the equivalent of $405,000 in bitcoins.

A so-called crypto-currency that exists only electronically, bitcoin was created in 2009 and has grown in popularity, the darling of digital enthusiasts and, increasingly, doubtful types who value the anonymity and ease of doing business it provides.

Graphic: Everything you ever wanted to know about the late, lamented (Canadian) penny
The National Post‘s Graphics department takes a look at what actually went into our soon-to-be-gone smallest denomination coin.

A penny-less Canada: Mint begins years-long process of collecting and melting down 82-million kg in coins
Canada’s iconic penny gets one step closer to extinction Monday as the Royal Canadian Mint officially stops distributing the coins to financial institutions.

Businesses are now beginning to round cash transactions to the nearest five-cent increment in a “fair and transparent manner” — but there are 35 billion of them still in circulation. There’s still a long way to go before they disappear from every day life. (Darren Calabrese/National Post)

Canada’s flawed bill: Our $20 bill depicts a non-native maple species. What else is wrong with it?
When it unveiled its new paperless, plasticized $20 bills in May 2012, the Bank of Canada touted its high-tech anti-counterfeiting technology. “This new $20 note fits the bill,” they said. Ha ha! Nice pun. Too bad they didn’t mention that little problem with them melting. There have been other complaints too. The Post‘s Steve Murray investigates.

With the penny on its way out, will Canada’s nickel be the next coin to go?
s the penny is set to begin retirement next month, there are already calls to put the nickel out to pasture as well.

The Royal Canadian Mint starts collecting one-cent coins on Feb. 4 for melting and recycling of the metal content, with some six billion pennies expected to be surrendered by Canadians over the next six years.

And a former Bank of Canada economist says the nickel is also becoming obsolete, and should be next in line for retirement.

“We see less and less people now … digging in their wallets for nickels,” Jean-Pierre Aubry said in an interview. (ThinkStock)

The hunt for Canada’s $1,000 bills: There are nearly a million left, most in the hands of criminal elites
More than 10 years after the $1,000 bill disappeared from circulation 946,043 of them are still out there, somewhere.

The whereabouts of almost $1-billion worth of the banknotes is a mystery rekindled this month at Quebec’s corruption probe when a witness spoke of a safe over-stuffed with cash, including $1,000 notes, inside a political office.

Retired on May 12, 2000, for being mostly used in criminal transactions, any $1,000 note deposited at a bank is destroyed, although the bills — nicknamed “pinkies” by gangsters because of the pinkish-purple ink — remain legal tender. (Postmedia files)

Bank of Canada to release new $20 bill
On Wednesday, the Bank of Canada will begin circulating a new $20 bill made of polymer instead of paper.

The new bill pays tribute to the contributions and sacrifices of Canadian men and women in all military conflicts and is being released just before Remembrance Day. The note features a view of the Canadian National Vimy Memorial on its back. (Handout/Bank of Canada/The Canadian Press)

Bank of Canada bans image of Asian woman from $100 bill
The Bank of Canada has purged an image of an Asian-looking woman from its new $100 banknotes after focus groups raised questions about her ethnicity.

The original image intended for the reverse of the plastic polymer banknotes, which began circulating last November, showed an Asian-looking woman scientist peering into a microscope. The image, alongside a bottle of insulin, was meant to celebrate Canada’s medical innovations.

But eight focus groups consulted about the proposed images for the new $5, $10, $20, $50 and $100 banknote series were especially critical of the choice of an Asian for the largest denomination.

“Some have concerns that the researcher appears to be Asian,” says a 2009 report commissioned by the bank from The Strategic Counsel, obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act. (Peter J. Thompson/National Post)

See the answers

The End of Cash: Dropping the penny was just the beginning as the Canadian Mint seeks digital future With the penny gone and the triumph of plastic over paper bills only months away, the research and development department of the Royal Canadian Mint has proposed going one step further: the death of hard currency altogether.

Everything you ever wanted to know about the late, lamented penny
Last week, when the federal budget was released, the government announced it would be discontinuing the penny. The National Post‘s Graphics department takes a look at what actually went into our smallest denomination coin. 

Canadian penny fell victim to changing times
The lowly penny, once an important unit of currency but long since reduced to providing little more than irritating pocket ballast and use in nursery-school rhymes, was declared officially redundant in the 2012 budget.

Aside from giving opposition members ample opportunity to criticize the Tory budget as “penny-wise, dollar-foolish,” the decision to eliminate the coins meant that Finance Minister Jim Flaherty could make a bedroom reference in his budget speech: “Pennies take up too much space on our dressers at home.” (Photo: Getty Images / Thinkstock)