Though great privacy when used offline, which is also pretty sick and the adoption levels defies reason, it's virtually usable globally both online and offline.
That also assumes every bill you use will be immediately returned to a bank. You'd have no way of knowing where money comes from and belongs to after one hop. Just make a purchase at the supermarket to exchange a 50 for 45 and you've got anonymous cash.
What if the government pays the supermarket to do it? They'd have a financial incentive, then. I could imagine this scenario in a high-security authoritarian paradigm.
That said, they do broadly track movements of physical currency. It's one of, or was one of, their primary tools against counterfeiting, tracking large cash robberies, money laundering, etc.
They might not know "This bill was held by Person X and they spent it at Y which spent it at Z" but they do know "Person X had this bill, and it showed up again in region A. If more with associated numbers also show up in the area Person X is most likely there."
This must be some zoomer blind spot because this is just common knowledge to anyone that grew up in a cash economy and had a proper taste in fine art (aka heist movies and pulp fiction)
Yeah so cashiers still handle the cash in US with drawers and having to even out and everything. this is likely why you are getting so many u r crazy replies. I imagine the us will get like that eventually. Myself I almost exclusively use cc so im like an open book.
American in Spain here. Everybody declines USD. Literally got coffee for free this morning because it was the only shop I've seen out of like 100 in the week I've been here that wouldn't take card.
For a charge of €2.50, when I offered $5 he opted to take nothing instead.
Why not have local currency while you're in a foreign country where why would you assume they would accept your money they would have to go to the bank to exchange?
You'd be hard pressed to not find an exchange shop in any major city which is were most people reside these days. And I've yet to encounter a currency exchange that doesn't take USD cash.
I'm just saying you can bring a duffel bag of USD with you and in just about any large city world wide you'll be fine. Some you can transact directly but most you'll need to locate an exchange first. Still the most versatile currency there is, and more universally accepted than anything else. Sure your VISA card works just about everywhere too but it's traceable to the max and there are places where USD works far better than a card.