Willemstad/Philipsburg – The Centrale Bank van Curaçao en Sint Maarten (CBCS) announces that the Caribbean guilder has once again received international recognition. The International Bank Note Society (IBNS) has named the 200-guilder banknote “Bank Note of the Year 2025.” This latest honor follows earlier recognition in June 2025, when the CBCS received an award for the Cg banknote series as a whole. In March this year, it was also announced that the CBCS had won the Central Banking Currency Manager Award for the successful introduction of the Caribbean guilder.
The award is presented annually to the most distinctive banknote worldwide, based on design, innovation, and security features. In 2025, almost 100 new banknotes were released worldwide, of which only 17 designs were deemed sufficiently innovative to be nominated. From the onset of voting, the 200-guilder banknote of Curaçao and Sint Maarten was the overwhelming favorite making this recognition even more remarkable.
According to the IBNS, the award highlights the high quality and innovative character of the banknote design of the monetary union. For the CBCS, this recognition confirms its approach to building a modern, secure, and internationally respected currency.
The IBNS competition is internationally recognized as an important benchmark for banknote design. Recent winners demonstrate that both artistic value and technological innovation play a decisive role in the evaluation process.
The first runner-up in this competition was Fiji’s 5-dollar banknote, featuring a kulawai bird and a sea turtle. The second runner-up was Zambia’s 100-kwacha banknote, depicting an eagle and giraffes.
