The Macau Judiciary Police (PJ) seized 18 more bogus HK$1,000 banknotes from last Friday to Sunday bringing to 121 the total number of fake bills in Macau.
According to the PJ 105 bore Bank of China designs and 16 featured HSBC designs. Both types of pirated currency are dated from 2003, and were issued during January 2008.
The police haven’t ruled out the possibility that more bogus notes will reach the market. Tips for users to tell the difference between fake and genuine notes are available on PJ’s website.
Three casinos had received 13 counterfeit HK$1,000 notes issued by HSBC last Thursday.
All of them have the same date of ‘1 January 2008’ printed on them, but with different serial numbers.
According to PJ, the copied banknotes are thinner and less responsive to UV light. PJ suspects that these HSBC counterfeit notes came from the same criminal organization that produced the Bank of China counterfeit notes found some days ago.
According to HK police Sunday, 39 counterfeit HK$1,000 bills were seized in HK on and after the December 23. Among these, 22 bore the Bank of China design and 17 bore HSBC designs.
In Macau some shops are refusing to accept the HK$1,000 banknotes.
According to the South China Morning Post, some 2,646 counterfeit HK$1,000 banknotes have been seized since 2010.
The HK Monetary Authority said it would ask banks to speed up the process of withdrawing the 2003 series from circulation.(macaunews)
