Abstract: A wire comprising a silver-based wire core having a double-layer coating comprised of an inner layer of palladium or nickel and an adjacent outer layer of gold, wherein the wire exhibits at least one of the intrinsic properties A1) to A3): A1) the average grain size of the crystal grains in the wire core, measured in longitudinal direction, is in the range of from 0.7 to 1.1 ?m; A2) the fraction of twin boundaries, measured in longitudinal direction of the wire, is in the range of from 5 to 40%; and, A3) 20 to 70% of the crystal grains of the wire core are oriented in <100> direction, and 3 to 40% of the crystal grains of the wire core are oriented in <111> direction, each % with respect to the total number of crystal grains with orientation parallel to the drawing direction of the wire.