Things You Probably Never Knew About Money

Money — it's something we all use every day, but rarely think about, except to lament that we don't have enough of it.

So let's go on a journey of The Benjamins read some important facts about it.
* Gambling generates more revenue each year than movies, spectator sports, theme parks, cruise ships and recorded music COMBINED.

* There is more Monopoly money printed every year than actual cash.

* 90% of all US bills have at least a trace of cocaine on them.

* Only 8% of the world’s currency is actual physical money.

* North Korea is the largest counterfeiter of US currency, why? Let's ask them.

* Early humans used blood and bat poo as money. Before the invention of bills, ancient civilizations utilized numerous other commodities as currency. The list includes animals, shells, blood and bat guano (poo). Imagine sticking that stuff in your wallet. Hehe

* Cash is not paper. It's cotton. Forget about the "old money doesn't grow on tree" saying. Cash is really made from cotton and linen fibers. And original money, around the time of Ben Franklin, had to be repaired with a needle and thread since it was cloth, unless those made from polymer

* The idea for the first ATM was conceived in a bathtub. Inventor John Shepherd-Barron dreamed the concept for the first ATM while in the bathtub during the 1960s, and there were no ATM fees. Now, if only they can install ATMs in bathtubs.

* There's US$75 trillion in the entire world. If this is distributed amongst all people on Earth, each person will have less than $11,000.

* The blood you donate is sold on the open market and it's a US$4.5 billion per year industry.

* Bob Marley's final words were "Money can't buy life"

* At a spending rate of $1 million a day, it would take Bill Gates 218 years to spend all his money. Its really time to go make my money

* Sea shells were once commonly used in many parts of the world as money...and cowries

* The 100 richest people in the world earned enough money in 2012 to end global poverty 4 times. So what did they do with the money?

* The total amount of money owed by every single person and country in the world is US$199 trillion, but the world has only US$80.9 trillion in cash and bank deposits. How much do you owe the world?

* Cattle (which include sheep, camels, and other livestock) are the first and oldest form of money. Each head of cattle was called a caput, which is Latin for “head.” So, a person with a lot of cattle had lots of caput or “capital,” a word still used today to describe money.

* Throughout history, people have used many forms of money, such as soap, cocoa beans, elephant tail hairs, entire elephants, grain, animal skins, fishhooks, feathers, tea tobacco, bird claws, and bear teeth.

* The Romans made their coins in the temple of Juno Moneta, the goddess of marriage and women. From the name Moneta, derives the words “mint” and “money.”

* During the Middle Ages, knights did not want to carry cash around because of robbers. Instead, knights wore special rings. When a knight stayed at an inn, for example, he would stamp the bill with his ring. The innkeeper later took the stamped bill to the knight’s castle to be paid.

* In Old English pygg was a type of clay that was used to make jars and dishes that held money. The word eventually morphed into “piggy bank.” Pygg was a type of clay used to make the chubby bank accounts. That's what we know as kolo

* The word “bankrupt” is from the Italian banca rotta, literally “broken bench.” In the years of early banking, people who exchanged, stored, and lent money did their business in the public marketplace at a bench. If the man at the bench, or the “banker,” ran out of money or was unfair, his bench would be broken. There are more than 1.6 million ATMs in the world. There is even one in Antarctica. Friday is the most popular day at the ATM. The average amount withdrawn from an ATM is $80.