HONG KONG, July 5 (Xinhuanet) -- The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) and the three note-issuing banks announced Monday the issue of the new series of Hong Kong banknotes and unveiled the designs of the remaining three denominations.

    The three denominations, 20 HK dollars ( 2.57 US dollars ), 50 HK dollars (6.43 US dollars) and 1,000 HK dollars (128.53 US dollars), will go into circulation in October 2004. The first two denominations, 100 HK dollars (12.85 US dollars) and 500 HK dollars (64.27 US dollars), of the new series have been in circulation since December 2003.

    A number of advanced security features have been added to the new series of banknotes to enhance their anti-counterfeiting capabilities. These new security features include denomination numeral in optical variable ink, fluorescent machine readable bar-code, holographic windowed thread, iridescent images.

    The new banknotes also retain security features used in the oldseries of banknotes.

    The color of the new 20 HK dollars' banknotes will be standardized in blue. The color scheme of 50 HK dollars' banknotes will be changed from violet to green. The new 1,000 HK dollars' will remain yellowish gold in color.

    The Bank of China (Hong Kong) Limited, Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong) Limited and the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited (HSBC) are the three note-issuing banks in Hong Kong. Enditem