Zimbabwe introduces $100 billion banknotes
 

Official inflation rate: 2,200,000%. :)))))))))

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa...bwe.banknotes/
http://www.voanews.com/english/2008-07-20-voa3.cfm
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/af....inflation.ap/
http://www.economist.com/world/afric...ry_id=11751346
http://africa.reuters.com/business/n...BAN346498.html

"Once-prosperous Zimbabwe has seen an unprecedented economic meltdown since it gained independence in 1980, with the official inflation rate now at 2.2 million percent.

Gideon Gono, governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, said the new notes are for "the convenience of the banking public and corporate sector" in light of price hikes."

And people complain about 3-5% inflation :1orglaugh

He has the place destroyed.

the same's probably gonna happen to South Africa in a couple of years :(

botle of beer that cost a bilion ;) haqaha

Now that's nigga rich :thumbsup

Currently a 100 billion ZWD bank note is worth $5 usd

Count down begins for 1 trillion bill.

You have to wonder how a currency can survive at all with such inflation? Seems impossible. They should just switch to the US dollar (which is already heavily used there illegally) until they can stabilize the situation (awaits comment about USD falling).

Nothing much. There were 500,000,000,000 banknote in Serbia, back in nineties, though it only lasted for 2 days. :) No joke! Still got couple of them somewhere. If I manage to found one, I'll post a scan of it here. :)

I went to Serbia last year, you can buy them as a souvenir. Pretty cool.

they might as well give up and create some new currency...

its amazing that this mugabe guy is still around :(

Thats hyperinflation for you. Start printing money out of nowhere and this is what happens. Fiat money will always inflate its just a matter of managing it.

Hungry still holds the record.

Hungary
Hungary went through its worst inflation in modern history in 1945-46. Before 1945, the highest denomination was 1,000 pengő. By the end of 1945, it was 10,000,000 pengő. The highest denomination in mid-1946 was 100,000,000,000,000,000,000 pengő. The rate of inflation was 4.19 quintillion (4.19 x 1018) percent. A special currency the adópengő - or tax pengő - was created for tax and postal payments [2]. The value of the adópengő was adjusted each day, by radio announcement. On January 1, 1946 one adópengő equaled one pengő. By late July, one adópengő equaled 2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 2×1021pengő. When the pengo was replaced in August 1946 by the forint, the total value of all Hungarian banknotes in circulation amounted to one-thousandth of one US cent. [7] It is the most severe known incident of inflation recorded, peaking at 4.19 × 1016 percent per month (prices double every 15 hours). The overall impact of hyperinflation: On the 1st of August, 1946 400,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 4×1029 pengő became 1 forint.
One source [3] states that this hyperinflation was purposely started by trained Russian Marxists in order to destroy the Hungarian middle and upper classes. The 1946 currency reform changed the currency to forint. Previously, between 1922 and 1924 inflation in Hungary reached 98%.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperinflation

It doesn't matter even if you start all over and say

$100,000,000,000 old Zimbabwe dollrs = $1 New Zimbabwe dollars

You still are inflating at 2.2 million percent.

The only way out of it is to stop printing money and use another currency like the EURO or USA. I imagine most people over there have probably already done this since prices of goods are probably doubling everyday under their current inflation.

Nice read, thanks :thumbsup

Chavez did something similar here in december last year. They removed 3 zeros from the currency and gave it a new temporary name.

So instead of the dollar being Bs.2150/1$ it's now Bs.F 2.15/$1. And that's at the official exchange (we have an exchange control here). IN the black market its BsF.3.5 per dollar.

That, of course, didn't do squat to stop the inflation. That's what happens when you have a populist as president and $120 oil prices.

Its going to get higher than that in USD over the next couple years.

The only people who benifit from freshly printed money are the banks/government. The rest of us pay what is called an inflation tax. This is becuse it takes time for excess money to creep into the system.

Massive government debt, wallstreet bailouts, these are things that will be paid for by consumers through inflation.

This is also the problem in Zimbabwe at a much greater rate.

Mugabe benifits from having access to the newly printed money first. The people of Zimbabwe suffer when the effect of inflation takes effect.

The only people who benifit are the ones who have access to the excess money first.

haha... fucked up!