The BINARY phrase is specified for binary data items. Such items have a decimal equivalent consisting of the decimal digits 0 through 9, plus a sign.
The amount of storage occupied by a binary item depends on the number of decimal digits defined in its PICTURE clause:
The leftmost bit of the storage area is the operational sign.
For better performance, avoid using 8-byte binary items. You can specify these items for convenience, but the compiler must make conversions in order to use them.
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