Why does currency have serial numbers?

I'm not a currency guy, and I did try to find the answer via the magic of google, but to no avail.

So why does currency have serial numbers? It's not like it'll stop counterfeiters, and nobody checks them to ensure authenticity. Only reason (I can think of) that anyone even cares about them is to find cool numbers.

Must be a legitimate reason...

 

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To my best knowledgeable opinion:
So that they can track how may bills are produced for public's use.

For each bill to be unique in terms of serial numbers PLUS series year and banks of where the bills are printed.

My other fun fact opinion:
So i can hunt for those US currencies with neat serials LOL like this:

 

Seems like a few different answers when I googled..
Serial Numbers are used as a control mechanism for governments or monetary authorities to know the exact number of banknotes being printed.

Here are some interesting web info I found to share with you -
https://www.moneyfactory.gov/resources/serialnumbers.html

http://www.uspapermoney.info/general/number.html

 

Also, to trace bills used for illegal purchases

 

To track your currency, of course..why else??

 

I always thought currency had serial numbers for Where’s George members.....

 

I did it once.. The George I had was up and down the East coast. I put my location then put it back into circulation

 

I did that once, but only once. I found out a particular fiver was following me around.

 

You know another reasons the bank will count bills back to you? So the camera above you will have a snapshot of every bill

 

So why does currency have serial numbers?

It's for the pea/bean counters. What is made, is what goes out=accounting Got it?

 

Based on the logic mentioned here we should expect that one ounce AGEs have serial numbers. After all, they are a lot more valuable and so should be tracked. Come to think of it, any PM coin should be.

 

That's kind of what I was thinking. If serial numbers serve as sort of an inventory tracking, why wouldn't coins (any of them) have serial numbers?

And why do they know the exact number of coins minted without serial numbers, if one of the reasons they use SN's on currency is to know how many were printed? Seems that even in the early days of currency, which were the adolescent years of coin minting, they'd be able to keep track of how many were made.

Now I realize we're dealing with the government, but I still haven't heard or read a 'logical' purpose of serial numbers on currency.

 

IDK if you are kidding, but I don't believe that at all.
I thought silver and gold bars all had serial numbers. You mean coins too?