Currency | featured news

The dollar has risen above 100 yen for the first time in more than four years as currency traders persist in selling the Japanese currency in reaction to Tokyo's aggressive credit-easing moves.

The Federal Reserve announced Wednesday that it will begin circulating a redesigned $100 bill this fall, more than two years after its initial target. The Fed has set a new target date of Oct. 8. The redesigned note incorporates added security features, such as a blue, 3-D security ribbon and a disappearing Liberty Bell in an inkwell. The features are designed to thwart counterfeiters.

The Obama administration has declined to label China a currency manipulator, although it says China's currency remains significantly undervalued.

The Canadian penny is withdrawn from circulation as production costs exceed its monetary value.

Iranian authorities used aggressive measures Wednesday in an attempt to halt the nosedive of the country's currency, making arrests, vowing to stamp out sidewalk money changers and warning merchants against fueling the mounting public anger over the economy.

The Obama campaign has attacked Republican Mitt Romney this week for having investments in China, saying it is inappropriate for a presidential nominee to be investing so much money there. Former Ohio governor Ted Strickland (D), a campaign co-chairman, said it “defies logic.” “It may not be illegal, it may not be unethical, but it is unseemly,” he said in an interview. “It just leaves a bad taste in your mouth.”

Markets and the euro rose after Mario Draghi reportedly told a conference in London that the central bank would “do whatever it takes to preserve” the currency.

China loosens its currency controls in a move that may spur gains in the value of the yuan. From Monday, the yuan can fluctuate up to 1% in trading against the US dollar from a fixed price set by the central bank, the People's Bank of China said.

Police say a North Carolina man insisted his million-dollar note was real when he was buying $476 worth of items at a Walmart.

Just three years ago, the euro was being praised as the can-do currency that had delivered unprecedented prosperity in Europe. Now, it's widely derided as a hugely flawed experiment in the wake of a debt crisis that's threatening its very existence — an uncomfortable backdrop as the currency's notes and coins hit their first decade in circulation on Jan. 1.