500 Euro Bill Story

 After a long discussion in 2018 by EU authorities and various state governments in Europe.....the 500 Euro bill was withdrawn from production (2019). 

Chief reason?  There is an enormous 'gut-feeling' by the authorities that the 500 Euro bill is used for criminal efforts (hint: terrorism).  

So they felt....by ceasing production and stopping the handling via banks....it'd come to a closure.  As the 500's came in....they'd be cornered off....sent to burn facilities and just ended.

How many 500's still exist?  400-million individual bills....amounting to 200-billion Euro.....in private hands.

The fact that the 100 Euro and the 200 Euro bills have gone into higher production cycles?  Well, that's part of the background of this entire story.  If you need 10,000 Euro for some transaction (lets NOT talk about the legality of this)....you can walk into a German bank and draw off fifty of these 200 Euro bills, or one-hundred of the 100 Euro bills.

All this chatter of the ceasing the 500 Euro bill to halt criminal activities?  Maybe in their minds, they believe this....but their action hasn't done much to change things.

As for who is holding the 400-million individual 500 Euro bills?  

I would make a guess that various middle-men are holding the bills as collateral and walk secretive real estate or shipping deals through....getting something for their use of their collection of 500 Euro bills.  

In forty years....these bills still being around?  More than likely.  Criminals using the 100 and 200 Euro bills now?  More than likely.  

The only way to fix things?  Dump bills entirely and go either to digital transactions only....or start using coins (like a 50 Euro or 100 Euro giant coin that you'd lug around).