Currency bill tracking is the process (usually facilitated by any one of a number of websites set up for the purpose) of tracking the movements of banknotes, similar to how ornithologists track migrations of birds by ringing them. Currency bill tracking sites can track currency among the users of that website. A user may register a bill by entering its serial number, and if someone else has already registered the bill, then the "route" of the bill can be displayed.
Some bill tracking sites encourage marking before spending, whereas others do not. This usually depends on the laws of the country issuing the currency.
The most popular currencies for currencies tracking are the Euro, the United States Dollar (USD), and the Canadian Dollar (CND).
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Originally beginning in the United States in the mid-1990's, the phenomenon or hobby of currency tracking quickly spread first to Canada and then beyond. Especially with the Euro bill tracking, trackers have taken on a much more competetive nature and have form communities within their respective sites. Many successful sites incorperate some sort of social media, either through site specific unique techniques, or through outside popular social media sites. In the Eurozone because multiple countries having adopted the Euro, this easily leads to competetion between trackers in different countries; in the United States cometetion plays out at the state or county level; and in Canada, at the provincial level.
Canada, once a thriving bill tracking country, has been hit hard by the introduction of cotton bills and later polymer bills, making currency tracking through marking bills nearly impossible. This trend is causing growing concern throughout currency tracking sites around the world, already having desimated New Zealand and Vietnam. In Australia, the country with the longest exposure to polymer, attempts were made in 2006 to form The Money Tracker which tracks Australian Dollars without marking of any kind. If successful, it could be huge breakthrough to the polymer problem, meaning adjustment could be made to existing tracking sites to allow the tracking of polymer banknotes. If a breakthrough is not made, it could mean the collapse of currency tracking as a result of the polymer problem.
Marking bills in Canada with ink or rubber stamp is legal. In the United States, marking is illegal if intended to deface the bill; however, this is rarely enforced and only a fine is faced, if convicted. Marking is widespread in both countries. In the Eurozone marking is not universal, and varies by region.
Some of the most popular websites for bill tracking include the following:
The act of tracking a $20 bill was the binding theme between various stories in the film Twenty Bucks.
A similar scheme to currency bill tracking – and said to be inspired by it – is BookCrossing, which tracks the movement of secondhand books which are marked and then "released into the wild".