Now that there are different values of the euro, which ones should you avoid?

Cyprus is now in effect not in the core Euro zone, does that mean that Cyprus Euros are worth less than other Euros? For quite a while I have heard that many Germans have been demanding just German Euros. So how do you know what Euro is from where?

Euro coins have a national side indicating which country issued them but it's the notes that interest me more now. Euro notes do not have a national side but don't worry you can tell their origin from the first character of each note's serial number. The first character of the serial number is a letter and that letter uniquely identifies the country that issued the note. 

Here's the list that you need (thanks to Wikipedia)

So I'll obviously be avoiding Euro bank notes starting with a G, but I think that I'll also be avoiding M, S, T, V and Y.

In fact let's be frank, I'll be insisting upon X when I change my money for my next European holiday.

It seems that X does indeed mark the spot.


As a matter of interest the remaining 11 characters on Euro bank notes are numbers which, when their digital root is calculated, give a checksum also particular to their country of manufacture. Interestingly, because of the arithmetic of the checksum, consecutively issued banknotes are not numbered sequentially, but rather, 'consecutive' banknotes are 9 apart.