Following an adequate transitional period which will probably last until at least the end of 2018, the issuance of € notes will be discontinued as well. The time can then be used to produce other banknotes. This time will certainly be needed, as € notes account for as much as one-third of the currency circulating in the euro area (in terms of value).
At present, a large proportion of the loan assets of financial institutions are, in fact, unprofitable if default risk is taken into account. This is evidenced by the fact that NPL disposals by financial institutions have exceeded their ‘core’ profits, in other words interest rate margins obtained from  2  BIS Review 45/2002  lending, in each of the eight years since 1994.