According to the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) each Australian holds about $4000 in cash, yet only 27% of all transactions were carried out using cash. Migrants and the elderly are the biggest users of cash.
Is this true in the UK, USA and other countries?
I believe so. I remember something about this many years ago on a documentary showing the difference between UK and USA. One guy in USA rarely use cash. I looked in in his pockets and found just one dollar note. I think it is now the same in UK. We do use some cash for a few things. The window cleaner, the dog groomer, the odd taxi but not a lot else. Now and again we have to go to the cash machine to get some of the folding kind.
Although paper currency transactions are down, a relatively few people have hoarded the paper currency in the pandemic.
Governments hate cash. They can’t trace transactions, there’s a high risk of laundering, counterfeit, etc. They would just love to get rid of it and control everyone using their transaction history. They already do this in China and some other countries. You can’t buy anything without a mobile phone, so if they want to hurt you they just block you from making those transactions. Alternative transactions rely on a complex array of high tech internet infrastructure.
At the end of the day nothing is safe. I keep seeing ads for gold bullion - do people really buy that as a backup?
New right to cash law in UK. Earlier there were attempts to ban cash transactions over 20k that failed.
We pensioners are well known as cash hoarders because our state pension is means tested and every $1000 over a certain value of assets means $3 a fortnight off our pension.
These are the maximum assets you can hold without your pension being affected - the value of your house doesn’t count but cars, motor homes, caravans, superannuation, shares, houses other than your dwelling etc do.
There is also an income test but they only apply the one which means they pay out less.
I have been receiving a state pension for over a decade but I am still not receiving a full pension because of my assets. Bastards!
Have never heard of a means-tested pension. Wonder what the rationale behind this is? What components does your pension system consist of?
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Actually I think means testing it is fair - we don’t contribute toward the pension and everybody gets the same. We do now have compulsory superannuation paid by the employer and employee now which in time will replace the pension and the latter will become a safety net.
It’s pretty much the same over here. Cash is predominantly used by low-income groups, pensioners, and migrants plus perhaps some people who are suspicious of being watched by the state but those are mostly older people, too.
I couldn’t believe, though, how little knowledge elder people sometimes have about the banking system and that has to do with their lack of the most basic knowledge of IT and the internet. My MIL (92 today) used to make a point of using cash exclusively following the old slogan of cash be king and would always be slightly irritated when she saw that people younger than herself would use their cards even for smaller purchases. On one occasion it turned out that there was another, more relevant reason why she’d kept using cash. Although she had a debit card of her own, it used to be her hubby only who used his for the odd payment while completely discouraging her to use hers. She also revealed that she still didn’t know how to use the card at the check-out. I showed her how to do it and she’s been using her card ever since saying it would spare her the hassle of going to the bank which is why she’d keep like 4k quid at home.
While visiting us over Christmas, she said she’d love to check her balances to see if the government fuel payout had arrived but would have to wait until she’s back home to do that. She was flabbergasted when I told her that she could get her balances not just from her local branch but also from a branch here at my place. “But how would they know here at your place what is on my bank account?”
So no bast**s then. 
I find it reassuring To keep a couple of dozen “Bit Coins” in a tin, under the bed, just incase of emergencies.
I’ve got chocolate bit coins, tinned sardines, pasta, rice and stollen cake for christmas.
I know an anti vaxxer covid denier who claims the main reason for the covid scare was to give us a cashless society. 
Would you consider selling these goods, I have cash?
hmmm will check the use by dates and get back to you.
Cash remains the most dominant form of payment on the African continent including South Africa, a survey has found.
Data from PwC Strategy’s 2022 Open Banking and Payments Survey shows debit cards come a close second.
The survey is a biannual study of consumers’ payment and open banking preferences.
Respondents were interviewed across three key African economies, South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria, which represent the largest economies in each market area.
Of the 1,357 respondents who participated in the survey in September and October, a third said cash was their preferred payment method.
In South Africa, the biggest cash users were youths aged 18 to 25.
Half the respondents said they pay with cash because there is no alternative payment option available, or because merchants ask for it.
Chantal Maritz of PwC Africa said this finding highlighted the lack of varied digital payment acceptance mediums and infrastructure in all three African countries.
“However, another key driver of cash prevalence is a lack of financial education. Consumers with low financial literacy often overlook indirect costs of cash, such as the cost of their transportation to cash access points, security risks, and loss of interest. This could result in respondents not finding digital payment alternatives intuitive, making them revert to what they know.”
In all three countries, debit cards were the second most common payment method, with high use in South Africa (32%) and Nigeria (41%).
In South Africa, the high use may be attributed to the country’s large banked population of about 84%, Maritz said.
In Nigeria, the banked population increased to 45.3% in 2021, but the high adoption of debit cards is likely due to its large number of point of sale (POS) devices.
Maritz said in South Africa and Kenya, the number of mobile phone subscriptions has exceeded the population at 1.7 and 1.08 times the population respectively. In Nigeria, mobile phone subscriptions are almost 90% of the total population.
The number of respondents already using mobile phones to make POS payments in Kenya (69%) is almost double that in South Africa (28%) and Nigeria (39%), and is expected to grow over the next few years as mobile phone penetration and mobile money increase.
While the concept of open banking remains new, the survey found respondents are willing to share their data with reputable companies, provided it benefits them.
The majority of respondents (29%) also cited the importance of a good mobile banking app.
However, in contrast with the importance of digital channels, the second and third-most important criteria were low-cost cash withdrawals (24%) and proximity of branches or ATMs (14%).
“This speaks to Africa’s underbanked individuals who have bank accounts but still choose to transact only in cash,” Maritz said.
“In South Africa alone, the majority of the population have bank accounts, though 25% (8.3-million individuals) prefer to withdraw all their money and transact in cash. This phenomenon is confirmed in the survey, where only South African respondents believed low-cost withdrawals to be more important than a good mobile banking app.”
While the majority of South African respondents are hesitant to open bank accounts with companies other than banks, Kenyan and Nigerian respondents are two times more willing to open bank accounts with non-banks.
South African respondents said they were more likely to open an account with a retailer (27%), compared to the other markets, which highlights the many South Africans who already hold clothing and loyalty accounts with some long-standing retailers.
Considering both data sharing and opening a bank account, the survey reflects that 25% of Africans placed higher trust in banks than any other company.
A summary of some of the survey’s insightful findings include:
You need a lot of faith these days, if you had said to a person as little as 30 years ago that folks will be going in and out of shops, with a card that is a direct extension of their bank account, tap a device for payment then, walk off without as much as a receipt, you would have thought they were crazy? 
And in the future, you’ll have a chip embedded linked to your phone/bank/family/work/home.
Scotty, beam me up?
I predict a Spreadsheet explosion!!!
I was accidently overcharged a fiver in the local shop yesterday, the spreadsheet was having none of it.
