Index / Supply Chains / Dollar

A $100 bill, from cotton and flax to a saver in Buenos Aires

American cotton, European linen, a security ribbon from New Hampshire, paper from Massachusetts, Swiss-owned ink and Swiss presses meet at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. The note costs about 8.6 cents to make, becomes $100 when the Federal Reserve issues it, and flies to Argentina, where it is kept as savings.

Scroll to follow it. Figures are from public records, dated October 2026. An asterisk (*) marks a claim that still needs a source; a dagger (†) marks a calculated figure. Download as PDF

Summary

The whole chain

About 8.6 cents to make, $100 to spend

Cost: About 8.6 cents to print a $100 note: paper, ink, labour and overhead
Ratio: Face value about 1,160 times the print cost^†
Countries: 4: the US, France or Belgium for flax, Switzerland and Argentina
Single sources: 1 paper supplier, 1 colour-shifting ink supplier, 1 printer

Legs

How each piece reaches the next place

Every leg of the chain. Distances are straight lines between the points on the globe.

Leg	From	To	What	How	Packed	Distance or time	Cost
1	Cotton belt	Dalton	Cotton	Road^*	Bales	About 2,700 km^†	Not published
2	European flax belt	Dalton	Flax fibre	Sea and road^*	Bales	About 5,500 km^†	Not published
3	Nashua	Dalton	Security ribbon	Road	Reels	About 140 km^†	Not published
4	Dalton	Washington and Fort Worth	Currency paper	Secure truck^*	Sheets	About 510 and 2,400 km^†	Monthly orders, millions of dollars
5	Springfield	Washington and Fort Worth	Ink	Road	Drums^*	About 20 km to Washington^†	Not published
6	BEP	Federal Reserve	Finished notes	Secure transport^*	Straps of 100	About 330 km to New York^†	8.6 cents a note
7	New York	Ezeiza	Notes	Commercial flight	Sealed cash boxes	About 8,600 km^†	Not published
8	Ezeiza	Bank vault	Notes	Armoured truck^*	Sealed boxes	About 30 km^†	Not published

Chokepoints

Who controls each step

Step	Who	If it stops
Paper	Crane, Dalton	The sole supplier since 1964
Ink	SICPA, Springfield	Bought sole-source because only 1 company can supply it
Printing	The BEP	The only printer of US paper money, in 2 plants
Issuing	The Federal Reserve	Notes are not money until the Fed issues them

Paperwork

The rules along the way

Rule	Set by	Where	What it does
Print order	Federal Reserve Board	Each year	Tells the BEP how many notes of each kind to print
Cash orders	Federal Reserve Banks	Banks	Banks order and deposit notes through the Fed’s cash services
FinCEN Form 105	US Treasury	Border	Reports any shipment of more than $10,000 in or out of the US
Banknote import procedure	ARCA, Argentina	Ezeiza	Sets the customs steps for importing and exporting foreign notes, updated 2024
Exchange rules	BCRA	Banks	Govern how banks sell and hand over dollars to customers

Risk

What can go wrong, and where

Where	Risk	What happens
Everywhere	Counterfeits	The $100 is the most copied note; the ribbon and the bell are its main defences
In transit	Robbery	Cash moves in sealed boxes with armoured escorts
Argentina	Policy	Rules on buying dollars, and plans like Tax Innocence, change how many notes people want
Argentina	Condition	Banks have been strict about old or damaged notes, which go back to the Fed

Gaps

What the public record does not show

Where Crane’s cotton and flax come from.
How finished notes travel from the BEP to the Fed, and which Fed office serves Argentine imports.
Which flights carry the notes, and what a shipment costs.
How many $100 notes reach Argentina each year.

Sources