Bank Said They Have No Coin. (Due To Covid-19)

My bank where I dump always needs coins, they told me with garage sales opening they are going through a lot of coins. They also said the local ice cream place has been using a lot of coins, he place is always packed. They only have a outside window and a drive through.

Time to issue COVID-19 tokens? Tokens were prevalent during the Civil War so there is precedent.

One of my banks has no problem giving me rolls of pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters. But for the last 3 months, the haven't had any dollars or halfs.

Another possibility is that with so many businesses shut down they don't have as much commercial demand and have reduced their on hand stock. Remember banks don't actually keep that much cash on hand. Surplus coin on hand is money that is not out earning money for them, and coin costs them more to ship in or out. So they try to keep their on hand stocks low, just a small amount more than what they typically need for their commercial accounts.



Yes but issuing such tokens was made illegal in 1863 It is illegal to issue any token with a face value less than $1.

Title 18 Chapter 17 Section 336

§336. Issuance of circulating obligations of less than $1
Whoever makes, issues, circulates, or pays out any note, check, memorandum, token, or other obligation for a less sum than $1, intended to circulate as money or to be received or used in lieu of lawful money of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.

This is why when Casino started making their own tokens when dollar coins dried up in the mid 1960's they made chips in $1 amd multiples of that but continued to use half dollars. Also at first they allowed an informal acceptance of the chips from one casino at another and then would settle up between themselves. The government cracked down on that. They could use then internally but using then from one casino to another was forbidden.

So can you make tokens of higher values and circulate those? No, that is made illegal by a different law.

I had the same feeling, but I guess there is a class of collectors that uses them regularly.

I work at a bank in Ohio. Yes there is a shortage of coin from the Federal Reserve. This is an email I received from the Fed Reserve,

"The Federal Reserve has notified financial institutions, armored couriers and vault providers that due to low coin inventories resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, they would be limiting the amount of coin that can be ordered by each financial institution. Unfortunately, this directly impacts our ability to fulfill our customers' coin needs. To address the shortage, the U.S. Mint has restarted coin production, but it will take some time for these efforts to be realized. While we will do our best to fulfill coin orders, we cannot guarantee any requests at this time. Please work with your relationship manager or treasury management advisor to re-evaluate your current coin needs to reduce your order or recycle coins collected from your daily operations. We apologize for this inconvenience."

Also more information can be found at https://www.frbservices.org/news/co...ntories.html

At the branch level we started with about three thousand in quarters and we only have a little more than $1,000 in quarters with no idea when we will be able to order more. We have been instructed to limit coin transactions so we can service our customers and business that need the change.
At the moment I have a lot of dimes, nickels, and pennies. But that can change quickly...

But if someone came in with a bunch of quarters and wanted an even swap, I wouldn't have an issue with that.
I was even lucky that my local coin store said they have a bunch of quarters and that he would sell them for face value. So that is what I am going to do today or tomorrow.

Its definitely an odd time...

I have been calling some of my business customers that run laundry services to request them to deposit quarters. I also had a local roll hunter come in and asked if he could deposit as much coin as he has. He of course said he had $1,000+ in dollar coins, $2,000+ in halves, and about 200 quarters. So by next week I should be up $1,200 in quarters.
I cant even order dollar coins or halves... So I need some quarters...

I work in a mom and pop retail store.
No problem with change because we rarely need to use it.

I am also a consumer who uses self-checkout in grocery stores, occasionally feeding a bill and getting change.
There, too, no problems.

Anecdotal evidence that this is a tempest in a teapot.