Zimbabwe introduces new $50 billion note

[daveza]

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/africa/01/10/zimbawe.currency/index.html

Zimbabwe's central bank will introduce a $50 billion note -- enough to buy just two loaves of bread -- as a way of fighting cash shortages amid spiraling inflation.


Zimbabwe's dollar is virtually worthless with foreign currency now being used to purchase basic items.

The country's acting finance minister, Patrick Chinamasa, made the announcement in a government gazette released Saturday.

While Chinamasa did not give the date on which the $50 billion and new $20 billion notes would come into circulation, an official at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe said the notes would be distributed to all banks by the end of Monday.

Zimbabwe is grappling with hyperinflation now officially estimated at 231 million percent and its currency is fast losing its value. As of Friday, one U.S. dollar was trading at around ZW$25 billion.

When the government issued a $10 billion note just three weeks ago, it bought 20 loaves of bread. That note now can purchase less than half of one loaf.

Does anyone know if they have coin-operated vending machines in Zim ?

 

[Hosehead]

A trillion dollar note can't be too far off then.

 

[Hosehead]

Does anyone know if they have coin-operated vending machines in Zim ?

What is there to put in them ? Zanu PF T-shirts?

 

[zesto]

I am a billionaire..

I have a $100 billion and $50 billion note, currency traders sell them at the kazungula border post as souvenirs
The notes have expiry dates on them

 

[proximiti99]

lol, this is very weired, but expected i suppose.

 

[Jarrod]

I have a $100 billion and $50 billion note, currency traders sell them at the kazungula border post as souvenirs
The notes have expiry dates on them

Those were the old currency notes. Zim dropped 10 zeros and then introduced the new currency notes about 5 months ago. The way one can see if its old or new currency notes are that the old currency has expire dates on it. If i can recall correctly they all expired on the 31/12/08. So if you disregard the dropping of 10 zeros then the 50 billion note now have an extra 10 zeros so all in all its 50 000 000 000 000 000 0000.00

I have been working in Ngezi area about 160km north of Harare since August, came home for the break period and am flying back on Monday.

 

[daveza]

This pig and his wife need to be locked up.

He won't even go to his own hospitals for a checkup.

What a great president.

http://www.news24.com/News24/Africa/Zimbabwe/0,,2-11-1662_2451284,00.html

Mugabe living it up on holiday
10/01/2009 14:32 - (SA)


Johannesburg - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is vacationing in Malaysia, to where he has also transferred funds, according to the Saturday Star newspaper.

It said Mugabe's wife, Grace - who went with their four children to Malaysia before Christmas - had organised a transfer of $92 000 dollars from Zimbabwe's central bank.

Mugabe, who followed on Monday, was using the vacation for routine health checks, while his personal doctor had also helped organise transfer of personal funds to Malaysia and also Singapore.

 

[Jarrod]

The $92 000 seems a bit of a suspect amount. I am sure that the exchange rate zar to usd were above 10 to 1 before xmas. So that amount seems to have been R1 mill that was transferred. Makes one thinks that he is using SA's banks to hoard his money.

 

[Balstrome]

I came across an old "racist" text file from wayback in 1998, let me paste it here
--------------------------------------------------
A WHITE RHODESIAN'S APOLOGIES

We white Rhodesians wish to make a confession. We confess our sins
against the black people of Zimbabwe (and those of our forefathers),
which are outlined in detail below:-

1. We apologise for giving them doctors, new hospitals, medical
services that enabled them to survive plagues, disasters and
to multiply into uncountable numbers.
2. We apologise for teaching them to read and write the English
language and even for putting their own languages down in
writing for them. We even taught them mathematics and built
hundreds (if not thousands) of schools for them even rebuilding
and repairing same when they were burnt down.
3. We apologise for building factories and shops, which gave them
work. We apologise for taking them into our houses to work,
giving them food and even paying them.
4. We apologise for building farms out of barren bush and gardens
from which we fed them (and virtually the rest of Africa)
5. We apologise for giving them clothes and shoes instead of
leaving them in the animal skins they wore before we found
them wandering aimlessly around the plains, mountains and valleys.
6. We apologise for extracting minerals from below the earth,
minerals which had always been there but were unknown to the
local inhabitants. We apologise for paying them to work in these mines.
7. We apologise for those among us who established charity
organisations to feed and clothe them, while they themselves
never knew the meaning of charity.
8. We apologise for building a network of roads all over the
Country which they now use to give Africa one of the highest
road accident rate in the world.
9. We apologise for building huge dams which keep them supplied
with fresh water, even in times of drought.
10.We apologise for paying the lion's share of the countries tax
burden while spending the least upon ourselves.

For all these evil sins we most humble beg forgiveness, and if
they will only accept our apologies, we will gladly take back
all of the above mentioned evil deeds and leave them where we
found them.
--------------------------------------------

 

[lion_fish]

we will gladly take back
all of the above mentioned evil deeds and leave them where we
found them.

They seem to be doing well enough by themselves...