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Is Sweden going cash-free?

A country without physical money.

This is no thought experiment, according to a new study, Sweden is on track to become the World's first cashless nation.

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It isn't hard to see that a lot of people these days prefer to pay with card, if they get the chance.

NBC news reports, cash is on the way out, the world-over, having been overtaken in popularity by cards and mobile transactions.

But Sweden is seriously ahead of the curve.

A pair of researchers at the Copenhagen Business School and Royal Institute Of Technology estimate that by 2023, Swedish stores will no longer accept cash at all.

Only 18% of transactions in Sweden involve cash, though almost all retailers accept it right now.

But for plenty of venues, as baker Victoria Nilsson explained in an interview with the BBC cutting out cash speeds up business and reduces the risk of robbery.

One of the researchers, Niklas Arvidsson, summed up the Sweden's view on this trend.

"We are a small country that has had a very stable democracy for a long time."

"For us, it's no problem that the money is only visible on an internet site - we trust it."