Switzerland has won the International Bank Note Society’s (IBNS) Bank Note of the Year Award 2017 for the second year in a row.

The IBNS selected Switzerland’s Ninth Series 10-franc banknote from more than 170 banknotes that were released globally throughout 2017. The Swiss 50, also from the Ninth Banknote Series, won the award for 2016.

According to the IBNS, it was the closest vote in the history of the award but the Swiss banknote narrowly beat runners up from:

• the Royal Bank of Scotland with their £10 note
• Canada’s commemorative $10 note
• Fiji’s commemorative $7 note, celebrating their first Olympic gold medal and their rugby “7’s” team
• Norway’s 100-Kroner note, and
• Djibouti’s commemorative 40-franc note.

Switzerland’s 10-franc banknote is printed by Orell Fussli Security Printing Ltd. on Landqart’s Durasafe® composite substrate, consisting of a core paper layer and two outer polymer layers to increase the note’s durability when in circulation. It is the fourth consecutive hybrid/ polymer banknote to win the Bank Note of the Year Award.

The design of each of the denominations of the Ninth Banknote series focuses on a typically Swiss characteristic, illustrated using a key motif. The motif of the 10-franc banknote is ‘Time’, focussing on Switzerland’s organisation prowess.

The banknote has a predominantly yellow colour scheme and contains a variety of modern security features to “maintain the high security standards of Switzerland’s banknotes and protect the public from counterfeits” says the Swiss National Bank. Key features include:

• SPARK® optically variable ink by SICPA, used to illustrate the globe on the front of the note. When the banknote is tilted, a golden arc moves across the globe.
• KINEGRAM® VOLUME foil stripe from KURZ, displayed on the front of the banknote revealing moving red and green numbers.
• Thrusafe™ window, revealing the Swiss cross when the note is held to a light source.
• Viewsafe™ window, revealing a section of the embedded security thread on the bank of the note.
• MICROPERF®, consisting of finely perforated holes which, when the note is held to the light, reveal an image of the Swiss cross.
• Tactile lines for the visually impaired, consisting of a block of short, raised lines located at the short edge of the note.

Other features include a watermark, latent image, see through register pattern, microtext and images visible with ultraviolet and infrared lights.

The Swiss 10-franc note began circulating in October 2017, replacing its predecessor that was introduced twenty years earlier.

Read the IBNS press release: Switzerland Repeat Winner of IBNS Bank Note of Year Award