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The Bank of England, which is now the central bank of the United Kingdom, British Crown Dependencies and British Overseas Territories, has issued banknotes since 1694. In 1921 the Bank of England gained a legal monopoly on the issue of banknotes in England and Wales, a process that started with the Bank Charter Act 1844, when the ability of other banks to issue notes was restricted.
Main articles: Banknotes of the pound sterling and Bank of England note issues. Note: The description of banknotes given here relates to notes issued by the Bank of England. Three banks in Scotland and three banks in Northern Ireland also issue notes, in some or all of the denominations: £1, £5, £10, £20, £50, £100.
A third note surfaced recently on the collector market, dated 8 September 2003, serial number R016492, and it is signed by Andrew Turnbull, Secretary to the Treasury, and cancelled. Until 2006, these Treasury notes were issued by the Bank of England, in the City of London.
The combined size of these banknote issues is well over a billion pounds. To make it possible for the note-issuing banks to hold equivalent values in Bank of England notes, the Bank of England issues special notes with denominations of one million pounds ("Giants") and one hundred million pounds ("Titans") for internal use by the other banks.
Fox, Fowler, and Company was the last commercial note-issuing bank in England and Wales, until it was bought out by Lloyds Bank in 1921. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] Under the terms of the 1844 act, the bank lost the legal right to issue banknotes upon its merger with Lloyds, and the Bank of England became the sole note-issuing bank in England and Wales.
As provincial banking companies merged to form larger banks, they lost their right to issue notes, and the English private banknote eventually disappeared, leaving the bank with a monopoly of note issues in England and Wales. The last private bank to issue its own banknotes in England and Wales was Fox, Fowler and Company in 1921. [117]
A bank of issue, also referred to as a note-issuing bank or issuing authority, is a financial institution that issues banknotes. [ 1 ] : 10 The short-lived Stockholms Banco (1657-1667) printed notes from 1661 onwards and is generally viewed as the first-ever bank of issue.
B. File:Bank of England £1 obverse.jpg; File:Bank of England £1 reverse.jpg; File:Bank of England £5 obverse.jpg; File:Bank of England £5 reverse.jpg