5 Cents - Canadian Tire 'Money'

Canadian Tire "money" occupies a legal grey area that has fascinated notaphilists for decades — it is not currency in any statutory sense, but Canadian Tire Corporation has consistently designed and produced it as though it were, commissioning the Canadian Bank Note Company, the same firm responsible for genuine Dominion and Bank of Canada issues. That choice was deliberate: the security printing pedigree made counterfeiting the coupons economically irrational relative to their face value.

The 1987–1989 series introduced machine-readable features and tightened the redemption terms, partly in response to a secondary market that had grown well beyond the company's original intent — by the 1980s, some small independent retailers were accepting the coupons as de facto tender.