Thirty years ago a movement began referred to as the “Community and Complementary Currencies” sector which advocates the use of private currencies, i.e. money not issued by countries’ governments.

As the movement evolved, its scope expanded to include microfinance, regional monetary systems, timebanking, social and commercial currencies, etc. Systems developed in the Americas, Asia, Africa and Europe in a total of 50 countries, effecting economic development, education, manufacturing, hospitality, construction, retail, services, media/advertising and real estate.

Our company joined the movement several years ago. We created the American Trade System (ATS) with the objective of developing a U.S.-based commercial operation using, as a model, the highly successful Swiss operation, the WIRBank Trade System.

To assist in the educational process to help understand Complementary Currencies and their function in the economy click into "About CCs" - Complementary Currencies 101.