Bonds

Bonds 

(1) Short-term promissory notes issued by a treasury, municipal bodies, or private firms of capitalist countries and used by their holders as a means of purchase and payment. They fulfill the role of surrogate cash. They circulate and are in demand on the stock market. They are used for drawing up small money orders (postal bonds). In France the term “bond” is applied to various credit documents: short-term treasury obligations (“bons du trésor”), bank checks, and postal and other documents. In the USSR the term “bond” before the monetary reform of 1922–24 referred to two usages. The first usage included notes that were issued by various institutions and enterprises and that circulated sometimes as surrogate money when there was a shortage of small-denomination banknotes. The second included banknotes that were issued by local authorities during the Civil War when they were cut off from the center. After the monetary reform, the issue of bonds in the USSR was discontinued.

(2) The term “bond” is also used for paper money that has been taken out of use and has become a collector’s item.