Bond
 Bond  (money)   | |
|---|---|
| A type of security under which the issuer (debtor) owes the holder (creditor) a debt, and is obliged to repay over a specified amount of time. |
Not to be confused with James Bond.
In finance, a bond is a type of security under which the issuer (debtor) owes the holder (creditor) a debt, and is obliged – depending on the terms – to provide cash flow to the creditor (e.g. repay the principal (i.e. amount borrowed) of the bond at the maturity date as well as interest (called the coupon) over a specified amount of time). The interest is usually payable at fixed intervals: semiannual, annual, and less often at other periods. [1]
Bearer bonds
Bearer bonds are promises to pay the bearer. They are popular tools for smuggling because of their high face value.[2][3]
2009 Chiasso smuggling case
In June 2009, two middle-aged men with Japanese passports were caught in Italy trying to smuggle in a false-bottom suitcase a purported $134.5 billion in United States government bearer into Switzerland. The bonds made out in stratospheric denominations. In all, the Italian financial police and customs guards confiscated 249 paper bonds, each supposedly worth $500 million, and 10 bonds with a face value of $1 billion each, in total $134.5 billion, dated from 1934. A spokesman for the US Treasury Department, said "The whole thing is a total fraud.They don’t look anything like real securities, which in any case were never issued in any of those denominations." A spokesman for the United States Secret Service, which was contacted by the Italian financial police and the prosecutor's office to determine the "legitimacy of the seized financial instruments," said that his agency had verified the bonds were "fictitious instruments and were never issued by the United States government."[4]
In a strange coincidence, on March 30, 2009, the US Treasury Department announced that USD $134.5 billion remained in its Troubled Asset Relief Program [TARP]. The stated amount of seized bearer bonds was $134.5 billion.</ref>[5]
An example
| Page name | Description |
|---|---|
| Israel Bond |
References
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20230426204521/https://books.google.com/books?id=Cxm9r7215gwC
- ↑ https://www.aic.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-05/tandi402.pdf
- ↑ https://www.newsweek.com/2014/09/26/why-europes-super-rich-are-resorting-smuggling-cash-271540.html
- ↑ https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/26/business/global/26fake.html
- ↑ https://seekingalpha.com/article/143462-strange-inconsistencies-in-the-134_5-billion-bearer-bond-mystery
