Banknotes do of course cost something to produce - around 30 centimes per note, whether it is a ten or a thousand franc note. The production process comprises the initial design stage, manufacture of the paper, printing and incorporation of the security features. Each year the National Bank spends between 20 and 30 million Swiss francs on replacing worn notes.

The 100-franc note. There are over 70 million notes of this denomination in circulation. The circulation of the 200-franc note, which was only introduced in 1997, runs to a good 30 million.

When designing new banknotes priority is given to security and to ensuring that the note has an up-to-date appearance and that individual denominations can be easily distinguished from one another. Since the 1950s, the National Bank has issued a new series of banknotes roughly every twenty years. Frequently it has played a pioneering role in the development of security and design features.

The Chinese are considered to be the inventors of paper money. The first forms of paper money emerged in China in the 7th century. In Europe paper money was at first used only as a temporary makeshift - when there were not enough official coins in a besieged city. The first proper banknotes in Europe emerged in the 17th century.

The legendary "banknote press" that one comes across so often is not located at the National Bank itself. Unlike other central banks, the Swiss National Bank does not have its own note printing facility. Up until the 1970s, Swiss banknotes were printed in England. Since then they have been printed by the Zurich company Orell Füssli Sicherheitsdruck AG under contract to the National Bank.

While the National Bank has the sole right to issue banknotes, the right of coinage is vested in the Confederation. swissmint (formerly "Eidgenössische Münzstätte", the Federal Mint) is part of the Federal Department of Finance and mints Swiss coins, which the National Bank puts into circulation.

Nowadays, most goods and services can be paid for without cash. But for small purchases coins and notes are still important because they are practical. In a number of business transactions it is usual to pay in cash, e.g. for second-hand cars or on the livestock market.

The Swiss franc is the statutorily prescribed means of payment in Switzerland. This means that banknotes issued by the National Bank must be accepted in Switzerland whenever they are offered in payment. They may only be refused if there is reason to suspect that they might be forged. Of course, it is also permitted to pay with credit cards or in a currency other than the Swiss franc, provided that the seller agrees.

In the kind of free market economy that we have in Switzerland the prices of goods and services are determined by supply and demand. If demand is high, prices usually rise. It then becomes more advantageous for suppliers to bring more goods or services onto the market. If the supply is increased while demand remains the same, prices may fall again. Price changes help to ensure that supply and demand remain in balance.

Very high face values on banknotes are usually the result of a prolonged period of inflation. Such notes become inconvenient for daily use. Payments have to be made in denominations of hundreds of thousands or millions. Some countries faced with such a situation delete several noughts on their notes in order to make them simpler to use again as a means of payment. The problem of inflation itself is a harder nut to crack.

In common speech not having much money means that you are poor and having lots of money means you are rich. But economists use the term "money" more narrowly to refer to means of payment only, i.e. coins, banknotes and deposit money. However, wealth can also include securities, physical assets and property. It is quite possible for a wealthy person to have only a little money, although he is certainly not poor.