The Portrait Series of currency notes is the fourth and current set of notes to be issued for circulation in Singapore. It was first introduced on 9 September 1999 by the Board of Commissioners of Currency Singapore (BCCS), whose role was since taken over by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) post-merger. This series features the portrait of Yusof bin Ishak, the first president of Singapore. The design has been simplified and new security features were introduced. Polymer versions of this series were released for general circulation by MAS as of 4 May 2004. History The Portrait Series was first released by the Board of Commissioners of Currency Singapore (BCCS) on 9 September 1999 to welcome the new millennium, designed by local artist Eng Siak Loy. The series has a total of seven denominations in general circulation; the denominations $1 and $500 were not carried forward from the previous Ship Series. The colour for denominations up to $50 have been retained, a tradition kept since the era of the Malaya and British Borneo dollar. A more standardised approach is adopted across all banknote denominations, with features noticeably differing from all previous series. For example, the watermark no longer features the lion head symbol. Due to design considerations, the dollar sign was considered redundant and is no longer included in this series. In addition, the note printing company no longer appears on any part of the portrait note. On 31 March 2003, the BCCS merged with the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), which took over the responsibility of banknote issuance. On 4 May 2004, the MAS started issuing polymer versions of the note for general circulation; polymer versions of the and notes were subsequently released. Higher denomination banknotes (, , & ) are still printed on paper. The paper version of the lower denomination banknotes remain in active circulation alongside the polymer version, though the number of and paper notes have dwindled significantly since the introduction of polymer notes. On 2 July 2014, the Monetary Authority of Singapore announced that it would stop printing notes starting from 1 October 2014, to reduce the risk of money laundering. MAS would also stop producing the banknote as well from 1 January 2021 onwards, which has the same reason of withdrawing notes and because the demand of these notes is low except for bank account maintenance (currently the notes that are in high demand