Currency is term designating all the circulating media of
exchange of a country. In this sense, a currency includes coins
and paper money. The term sometimes includes credit instruments.
Coins are generally designated as metallic currency, and paper
money and credit instruments, as paper currency. Further
distinctions are made in the latter classification: Government
notes are called government currency; bank notes are designated
as bank currency; and checks drawn on bank deposits are called
deposit currency. This use of the term currency is of
comparatively recent origin, dating from the period following
World War I. Earlier uses of the term were more restricted. In
countries in which the governments did not issue paper money,
the term paper currency was applied exclusively to bank notes.
In the United States and a number of other countries, on the
contrary, the application of the term currency was limited to
government-issued, legal-tender paper money. The change from the
earlier, restricted meanings of the