The bank card was inspired by a novel by René Barjavel

Roland Moreno filed a patent on March 25, 1974, directly inspired by The Ice People by René Barjavel. The novelist indeed described in 1968 a ring equipped with a code connected to a central computer to make purchases. Another science fiction author, Robert A. Heinlein, had also imagined a similar system as early as 1957 in his book The Door into Summer.