Many observers of financial technology have offered interpretations and discussion of potential use cases of programmable money.2 While such references to programmable money typically describe it as being enabled by distributed ledger technology (DLT) or blockchain systems, this is not universally the case, and the term remains ill-defined.3 Two natural components of the definition are a digital form of money and a mechanism for specifying the automated behavior of that money through a computer program (this mechanism is termed "programmability" in this note). However, it is not clear whether these components alone are sufficient for a definition, given that various combinations of similar technology for payments automation have existed for decades. It was only after the advent of public blockchain cryptocurrencies that the term "programmable money" became common parlance.4 So what is it about these new systems that has prompted the recent spate of references to the term, and does the answer somehow imply that DLT has to be a part of any "programmable money" system?