I was just over on eBay buying way too many coins from my favorite Dave Enders and then went to look at the world banknotes--I'm generally looking for Austro-Hungarian Empire notes. I saw a large number of "crisp uncirculated banknotes" from 50 or whatever countries, being shipped from China. Is there a hope that they're genuine? I was also intrigued by the lots of U.S. currency with a Chinese red stamp in the corner "used by bank tellers for training" that looked like replicas of our banknotes. I wonder if any have been passed here. So far I've only bought banknotes at my local coin show. Has anyone bought them from eBay?
Hope is something nice to have. But ask yourself how many items does China produce that are both genuine and are of good quality ... I could name ... none. So that would be the number of notes and coins I would buy from China.
I would say that small cheap uncirculated banknotes are genuine; it would be waaaaaaaaaaaay too expensive and time-consuming to print them for the few cents they're worth in bulk. Unless they have superb photocopiers and carloads of suitable paper (a possibility). Please cite a couple of eBay item numbers, I'd like to look at them.
Ed, in the past 25 years, we've collectively bought MOUNTAINS of stuff from China -- furniture, slippers, jackets, umbrellas, dishes, tools, the list is endless. Most of it, I'm guessing, proved reasonably satisfactory. Satisfactory or not, WE kept buying it, hand over fist. There are two items I buy from China (via Walmart, I mean) repeatedly, and they are OK. It's the counterfeits (and food) that give them a bad name, and that tend to have the highest public visibility, and generate the most outrage. If they'd round up about a hundred counterfeiters and hang them upside down in Tianamen Square for 3 weeks, this baloney would stop. But they never will, it generates too much foreign exchange, plus all those juicy bribes.
You just have to know who the good sellers are. I have bought paper money on Ebay from sellers in China for several years and have never had a problem. I've been in the hobby for almost 30 years and can recognize most fakes.
I've purchased foreign notes from China dealers without issue. Have not yet pulled the trigger on U.S. currency offered by them. Just cautious I reckon.
