Talk:Zimbabwean dollar/Archive 1

Redenomination plans

Anyone got any details on that? —Nightstallion (?) 20:31, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

No news from the Reserve Bank yet. However, the new Z$50,000 bearer cheques have an expiry date of 31 December 2006. (I thought that the validity of the other bearer cheques had only been extended to 30 June 2006.) Does this mean that the new currency will only take effect in 2007? By the way, Dr. Gono has said that it will be a "new currency", with a more Zimbabwean look, and not just a redenomination of the Zimbabwean Dollar. Blair 2006-02-14

The Reserve Bank issued a Z$100,000 bearer cheque on 01 June 2006 and announced a Z$1 Million bearer cheque to appear in September 2006. I have heard that they don't have enough foreign exchange to purchase banknote paper or ink for the "new currency". Blair 2006-07-05

In July, the RBZ announced that validity of all bearer cheques had been extended to 31 Dec 2006. They also announced that the "new currency" would not be introduced until inflation dropped to double digits. This does not sound like the near future to me. Blair 2006-07-20

Zimbabwe coins

For fun, I did some very rough calculations about the value of Zimbabwe coins. If we assume that a Zimbabwe 1 cent coin is the same mass as a 1 Euro cent coin, and is composed fully of steel, then its value as a legal tender coin is approximately one ten-thousandth of its value as raw steel. No wonder people prefer to use them as game tokens instead of real money... JIP | Talk 15:03, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

There are now over 400,000 Zimbabwe cents to one US cent (500,000 per one Euro cent) . Blair 2006-07-05

Here is an interesting comparison as of mid July 2006. Three friends could go out in Harare and each order a beer. The total bill would be Zim $450 thousand (about one US dollar at the parallel rate). They decide to pay the tab with 45 million Zimbabwe cents.

The weight of the coins would be 135 tons. Based on current London metal prices, the metal value of these coins would be US $351,000 . Not bad for three beers. Blair 2006-07-10

Updating this story, the number of Zimbabwe cents needed at the current parallel rate would be 3.172 million million (3.172 billion in the European notation, 3.172 trillion in the American notation). The total weight of the coins would be 9.516 million tons. Going by the rate used above (I don't know the current rate), the metal value of the coins would be US $24.74 thousand million ($24.74 milliard in the European notation, $24.74 billion in the American notation). You could buy several cruise ships for that much money. And it's all for three beers. JIP | Talk 06:38, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Great idea. No I'll just have to figure out a way to fit the 9.5 million tons of coins into my suitcase and get past that lady at the airport check-in and her obsession with luggage weight limits. :) Passportguy (talk) 07:12, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

In June 2005, the RBZ anounced plans for new Z$5,000 and Z$10,000 coins. Has anyone heard or seen anything more of these coins? click for story Blair 2006-07-10

$5,000 coins, $10,000 coins?? First I've heard of it. I say like most of the RBZ proclaimations, this one got axed (perhaps because the currency decided to start the current steep downward trend on October 28th 2005. Zimbabwean 2006-7-15

Revaluation

Well, as of August 2008, one Zimbabwe dollar is worth a tiny bit more than one Euro cent, which should be about 2.4 US cents. Therefore, if the total bill is one US dollar, the total number of Zimbabwe cents is about 4200, which should weigh only about ten kilograms, at the most. JIP | Talk 18:43, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I've worked out the weight would (roughly) be around 6 kg. However some sites claim 1¢ and 5¢ coins are not even theoreticly legal tender. If so the weight would be 60,000,000,000,000 kg (60 trillion) or 60,000,000,000 tons (60 billion). $1000000000ten0one1 (talk) 05:53, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Banknote images

The banknote images linked at www.banknotes.com don't seem to be there anymore.. AnonMoos 20:23, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

They renamed their files for Zimbabwe. The pointers have been amended to the new file name. Blair

Clean up with Banknotes of Zimbabwe?

There's too much redundancy with Banknotes of Zimbabwe. I suggest we merge the section into Banknotes of Zimbabwe and keep the most essential summary in Zimbabwean dollar. --Chochopk 06:02, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

This has been done. Blair

Update to this article needed NOW

It claims, currently, that the ZWN has been used since 1980; of course, what's meant is that ZWD was used from 80 till 06, and since 06 we've had ZWN. —Nightstallion (?) 12:27, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The ISO officially announced ZWN as the new code and then withdrew it.
The RBZ could not handle a new currency, so the revalued dollar will have the same ISO code (ie ZWD).
The RBZ uses the term "revalued dollar" and not "new dollar".
The first part of the article has been rewritten to reflect these points.

Blair (10 SEP 2006)

They couldn't handle a currency code change? Fucking incompetent, I'd call that. —Nightstallion (?) 14:10, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

And you couldn't tell that from their worthless currency? Ramorum (talk) 07:22, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Detail on change over

It says

Also on 1 August 2006 the Government of Zimbabwe revalued the Zimbabwean dollar vs. the US dollar at a rate of 2.5 to 1. The net effect of both actions was a revaluation of the Zimbabwean dollar vs. the US dollar at a rate of 400 to 1.

I thought just before the redenom, 1 USD = 100,000 ZWD, and after the redenom, 1 USD = 250 ZWN = 250,000 ZWD. What does the so called "net effect" mean? --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 05:13, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

You are partly correct. The ISO declared then withdrew the ZWN code. It reverted to ZWD again. So, 1 USD = 250 ZWD (REVALUED) = 250,000 ZWD (OLD).

Please Note: These are the OFFICIAL exchange rates. Only the Government can buy USD from the RBZ at this price.
For most people and businesses, the parallel market still offers the USD for about revalued ZWD $650. On large volume purchases, the parallel rate is revalued ZWD $700 to $800 per USD.

Blair (10 Sept 2006)

Edit of section New currency (2005-6) and revaluation (2006)

This section was rewritten. Grammar and spelling was corrected. Blair (10 Sept 2006)

New table

The new table is much better! Thanks to User:Nik42. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 18:54, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks.  :-) The old one had been bugging me for a while, so I finally decided to do something about it. Nik42 19:55, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Template:ZWD Inflation

I created the template "Template:ZWD inflation", because it was being used in other areas such as hyperinflation and it wasn't being updated frequently enough. 159753 16:44, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Good job! Copying and pasting large bulk of data (as well as code) is a bad practice. They ought to be reused as much as possible. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 07:46, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Inflation

I don't know anything about these things, but the 2007 inflation is stated as 9000% in the template and 4500% in the inflation-table. Which is correct?Twerbrou 10:13, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I think 4500% is the official figure and 9000% is the estimate by non-government analysts. We should probably be using the official figure. --Tango 14:18, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Independent press is reporting the inflation rate to be about 15 000 % now. The inflation rate is changing on a daily basis. 76.211.6.150 16:57, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

You are correct. The last RBZ official rate (leaked out) was 4530% for May 2007. However, the RBZ has stopped publishing the inflation figures. (We can easily guess the reasons why.) Unofficial inflation figures of 9000% to 15000% (year-over-year) come from non-government economic analysts. In the absence of any official RBZ numbers we should be using the unofficial figure, but make a note that the figures are UNOFFICIAL. --Stannard 20:58 (UTC), 10 July 2007

Split?

I think a great deal of this article refers to the current inflation in Zimbabwe, which has already enough to make a new article Hyperinflation in Zimbabwe. But I wonder if that's proper, since I'm merely a passerby. --Samuel di Curtisi di Salvadori 14:25, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure there is actually enough content to warrant a split. We should probably make the current article more concise - the tables are a little excessive. How about we reduce the exchange rate table to one rate (or a range) per month? --Tango 21:24, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I haven't checked on the status of this article for a while. But I'd be against removing such data. If the inflation is hyper, then it's important to illustrate these weekly, if not daily, change. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 08:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Banknote question

Is anyone aware what the numbers 02022909 at the bottom of the banknote are for (there is already a printed serial number.) I've had a look arounf the net and all the latest bearer cheques appear to have the same number. Tarcus (talk) 09:01, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Since these are notes are "bearer cheques" and not true banknotes, this is the number of the account at the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe that these bearer cheques are charged to. (Just like your account number is on your personal cheques.) Stannard (talk) 16:07, 03 January 2008 (UTC)

Anything look familiar?

Anything look familiar on http://www.zimbabwesituation.com/jan10_2008.html#Z2 ? --Tango (talk) 19:12, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I think that we should charge them a $15 million license fee. Then we could buy one hamburger and share it between us. 8*)
--Stannard (talk) 01:00, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

And here we are, 6 months later, and $15m is worth only fractions of a cent. You'd now need $15 BILLION to be able to afford a hamburger. I'd known this was a bad situation but somehow putting it in terms like this just makes it that much more salient. 159.153.138.98 (talk) 16:48, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Neutrality

The neutrality issues mainly consist of unsourced claims of problems. I don't doubt that there were many problems, but they need to be cited and fairly represented. For example, the "other problems included" list has 6 problems listed, without any inline citations. Then it says, "Most economists have blasted the move as merely political.", which is weasel wording because no economists are named. Later, it says point-blank, "The implements and cattle are to be used to buy votes in the 2008 election." Surely, some other sources would dispute that, and the source it's from attributes it to "unconfirmed information". In other places, it has negative tone like "started badly" or "problem-ridden", which aren't necessary; we can present the facts (with citations) and let the reader decide. Superm401 - Talk 21:19, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree, so they should be cited of deleted. Its the other editers ball now. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 07:55, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Portions mentioning the "other problems included" , "Most economists have blasted the move as merely political.", and "The implements and cattle are to be used to buy votes in the 2008 election." have been deleted. [[User:Stannard|Stannard] (talk) 09:00, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Banknotes used

So can we remove the issue under 1 million dollars? Given the exchange rate is 200 million to U.S.$1. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 03:31, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no idea. I wouldn't be surprised if they're not still in use, in big bricks. Like this picture: http://www.thezimbabwean.co.uk/images/stories/bread.jpg from less than a month ago, when it was somewhere around Z$50 million to the US$, so each of the bills individually were less than a US cent. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that such bundles were still found Nik42 (talk) 04:32, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

That kid was having fun, but those bundles might still be around. Enlil Ninlil (talk) 05:09, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Is there any reason why we keep getting edits replacing banknotes right down to 1 cent when those are no longer valid by the expiry date printed thereon?
I know a few notes earlier on were /officially/ permitted to extend beyond their expiry date and if someone can provide a history of those, fair enough, but repeatedly listing every expired note down to 1 cent reads more as deliberate mockery of the country than a list of actual, current, valid banknotes. (If this exercise was repeated on other country's pages, could be fairly sure of a negative response, I'd've thought). Cheers, David. Harami2000 (talk) 00:43, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree. It seems to be mostly one or two users who keep restoring those older denominations. Nik42 (talk) 04:27, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Well; given that it's June 30 2008 very soon; another good batch of bearer cheques up to 50 million would be expiring. It looks like we're gonna only be having 3 denominations (100, 250 and 500 million) of bearer cheques in circulation in July. Unless the RBZ decides to extend their expiration within 48 hours... Ruby Cored (talk) 12:48, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

It's unlikely they will extend them, given their current value of around 0.00077 dollars (for the 50 Million note). Passportguy (talk) 13:21, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

I wonder if they're gonna be making new denominations in the coming months? Since given the exchange rate / inflation rate it would be necessary to carry bricks of $500M notes (instead of $200k depicted in the "bread" image just above) just to buy --- a sandwich. Ruby Cored (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 20:21, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Official exchange rates

Now the Z$ is floating, there are meaningful exchange rates posted on www.rbz.co.zw, they do seem to be slightly lower than the black market rates (which makes sense - things always sell at a premium on black markets), but they're not far off. Should we switch to reporting those rather than the black market, or a combination of the two? I'm not sure why the black market still exists... is it not possible to actually get currency on the official market? --Tango (talk) 16:16, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

As I understand it, there are restrictions on who can get foreign currency and how much you can get at any one time. Nik42 (talk) 18:57, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Actual exchange rates vs. need for newspaper sources

I've been keeping tabs on http://www.siyabonga-tatenda.com/zimmoney.html to sanity-check newspaper-sourced figures, albeit the pound vs. US dollar to Zimbabwe dollar exchange rates are usually distorted in favor of the pound sterling owing to the location of the company. Unfortunately this site's page is still not archived on http://www.archive.org.
While awaiting a better (permanent) weblink I've utilised this quoted rate for the first time here, just now, as the other rate posted for today is clearly out-of-date already.
In the last few weeks, this site has provided interim steps where there are large breaks in the sequence on wikipedia, but I neglected to add those in "temporarily", albeit in retrospect those might have been useful for historical reference purposes.
Trust that makes some sense, anyhow. Regards, David. Harami2000 (talk) 23:07, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Just a footnote to the above for future reference to clarify exchange rates from http://www.siyabonga-tatenda.com/zimmoney.html (probably just as well started using these as a matter of habit) as being derived from a UK-based company and thus slightly disadvantageous to money transfers sent in US$.

e.g. Tomorrow morning's (7th June 2008) rate is 2.601 billion ZWD per US$ vs. 5.3 billion ZWD per UK£. Applying xe.com's current "live rate" of 1.00 USD = 0.507814 GBP would yield 2.691 billion ZWD extrapolated per US$. (The "gap" has been larger than this over the past couple of weeks).

Also, aside, for future ref., the http://www.siyabonga-tatenda.com/zimmoney.html quotes are for mid-range (£50 to £1,500) transactions. d. Harami2000 (talk) 16:54, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Interesting quote, aside, albeit using the single source above for daily comparative exchange rates may have advantages at present, giving the market turbulance.
"http://www.zimbabwesituation.com/jun6b_2008.html "Zim Independent, Business. Thursday, 05 June 2008 21:59
"THE fragile Zimbabwe dollar this week crashed to a record $1 billion against the US dollar as it become apparent that the new foreign currency liberalisation regime had failed to stabilise the local currency.
Six weeks have passed since the Reserve Bank floated the exchange rate under the willing buyer, willing seller twinning arrangement.
This week all four foreign exchange markets were trading at above $1 billion dollars for one US dollar, as demand far outstripped supply in the foreign exchange-starved market.
The four markets are the Old Mutual Implied Rate (OMIR), the official interbank, the cash parallel market and Real Time Gross Settlement System (RTGS).
The OMIR rate closed Tuesday at $1 746 899 809 after having opened trading at Monday's rate of $967 480 942. The OMIR rate is used by some companies to do business transactions and track the true value of the Zimbabwean dollar.
The rate surged even further on Wednesday when it rose to an unprecedented high of $3,9 billion before registering a slight decline to close at $3 047 030 834 last night. It is expected to surge next week.
The official interbank rate surpassed a billion dollars yesterday with most banks trading slightly above the mark. ABC Bank was trading at $1,1 billion for the US dollar while ZABG and Standard Chartered were just over $1 billion.
A handful of banks were trading at slightly below the $1 billion mark by midday yesterday but were poised to exceed the barrier by close of day.
Kingdom Bank was buying the greenback at $995 million and selling at $1 099 000 000 while Stanbic was buying at $990 million and selling at $992 million.
The two thriving parallel markets could not be matched by the interbank system and still held its lead throughout the week. On the cash parallel market, dealers were buying the US dollar at rates between $1,1 billion and $1,2 billion yesterday. Parallel market dealers on the RTGS market were buying the US dollar at $1,8 billion yesterday.
The RTGS rate for Tuesday was $1,2 billion before rising to Wednesday's rate of $1,6 billion."

(aside: the very next news article on that page quotes "There are no signs of the rate stabilising and economists contend that the rate could very well be above $2 billion by June 27". Missed by a bit... :/ ) d. Harami2000 (talk) 17:03, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Siyabonga Tatenda according to their website is a small money transfer company based in a rural part of the UK (Suffolk). The rates they quote for issue of Z$ cash notes seem to be much greater than rates available from other conventional foreign exchange information sources (Reuters, Bloomberg, Oanda, XE, OMIR, etc) which is surprising given banks are free to quote non-official rates. Can we get some sort of verification that the rates quoted are genuine and publish this source on wikipedia ? It seems like wikipedia is just quoting the highest available rate each day which may not necessarily be valid. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.137.1.99 (talk) 11:16, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I've asked for additional confirmation, but contrary to the observation that their quoted rates are "much greater" than all the others including the OMIR rate, you can see in the previous (17:03, 6 June 2008) newsclip I've added above that the OMIR rate was actually /greater/ for that timeframe. Unfortunately, there is no consistent feed on OMIR data and to swap back and forward between different rates and/or uncertain newspaper clippings might possibly do more damage to retention of a permanent record here. Siyabonga-Tatenda was the "best"/"closest tracking" option I could find for real-time rates when spending a good few hours looking around for a source to use as a "sanity checker" for any other rates cited.

02c only, anyhow, and if anyone /has/ a consistent feed to a *true* market value rate on a daily basis, I'd love to know about that. Harami2000 (talk) 19:46, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

I noticed the Economy of Zimbabwe article uses [1]. "The Old Mutual Implied Rate ('OMIR') is a broad unofficial proxy for the value of the Zimbabwe Dollar to the US$ based on the relative values of shares on the London and Zimbabwe Stock Exchanges." I don't have any idea which is a better figure, but there should be consistency between the two articles considering the numbers quoted for parallel rate can differ by 300% or more. Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 12:47, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Valuable work-- thank you!

I've found this article incredibly useful. The money supply explosion documented here must be the prime cause of the Zimbabwean hyperinflation, a point lost or obfuscated in all too many political discussions. WP articles on Zimbabwe would benefit from more links to this article and its references. Jeremy Tobacman (talk) 20:59, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Is the official rate really "floating" ?

On May 6th, when the offical rate was allowed to float, the official rate was roughly equal to the free market rate (190 Mil vs. 200 Mil).

But over the course of the last weeks the difference has widend again, to a point where it is again at less than 38 % as of June 23rd (8.26 Bil vs 21.89 Bil). So can we really say in the article that the official rate is (still) "floating" ? Or was theMay 6 float just a one-off adjustment of the official rate and the government has gone back to the two tier system ? If the gap continues to grow as it has, the official rate will be less than 10 % of the free-market rate by mid-July. Passportguy (talk) 19:47, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm a little confused by this as well. As I understand it, the rate is floating in that banks are allowed to match buyers and sellers at any price, but I don't understand why the official rate and the black market rate are so different. You do need to bear in mind that the rates we're reporting for the black market include commission, the official rates might not. You never get the official exchange rate for any currency when you visit a Bureau de change - there is either a percentage commission, or they change the exchange rates in their favour (they have to make a profit, after all). I'm not sure that can account for 38%, though! --Tango (talk) 20:24, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

From what I understand, there are restrictions on who can access foreign currency from the RBZ, and how much one can get, so that some people can *only* get foreign currency on the black market, which makes it profitable to sell foreign currency there at rates above the official rate. Nik42 (talk) 20:27, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that is correct. But that is a sure sign that the currency is not fully convertible, and rates thus not floating but rather state controlled. Passportguy (talk) 20:52, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Reliablity of http://www.siyabonga-tatenda.com/zimmoney.html

Is the above site really realiable ?? After they started warning of a "slow-down" in rates over the last few days I began to become suspicious that something was going on, other than pure reporting of rates. Today the ZIM$ fell by around 10 % against the dollar according to the official rate published by RBZ, yet it even supposedly rose (!) slightly in value against the Euro according to Siyabonga. I can think of no logical reason why the black market should suddenly regain confidence in the ZIM$ with the offcial rate in free fall and the political situaton the way it is. According to a site posted by a another user [2] the ZIM$ fell from 34 Billion to 78 Billion overnight, which is steep, but somehow more believable. All in all the following makes be suspicious about Siyabonga's rates :

• The rates are clearly approximations. They are based on a rounded figure (45 Billion, 40 Billion) etc. against the GBP and don't seem to be calculated based on any real data.
• It seems highly unlikely that the ZIM$ would suddenly rise in value or remain stable without any reason, especially with the offcial rates still falling dramatically.
• Other sites paint a completly different picture.
• As a money transfer company, Siyabonga has a vested interest to overstate the value of the ZIM$ - the less ZIM$ they have to pay out per unit of foreign currency the better for them.

Wondered if anyone else has an opinion on this. (Cross-posted on Talk:Least valued currency unit) Passportguy (talk) 16:02, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not entirely comfortable with using their rates, either. The rates given in news articles seem a better option, they're just rather infrequent. With the rates moving extremely fast at the moment one or two reports a week isn't really enough. Could we switch to reporting to OMIR instead? --Tango (talk) 16:16, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

In an attempt to quantify things. The website we're currently using reports a rate of $45 billion to £1, a UK broadsheet today reported a rate of $40 billion to £1 [3]. Given how quickly things move, they're pretty much in agreement. I also note that the site has a comment in the sidebar saying to email them about a better rate for transactions over £1,500. Without knowing what sized transactions the $40 billion figure is for, it's difficult to compare. --Tango (talk) 16:30, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Several companies' shares can be bought both on the Zimbabwean stock exchange and on exchanges overseas. As the shares as such as of equal value, they are a fairly good indicator of what the real value of the ZIM$ is. E.g. if one share of Old Mutual Plc trades for 1 GBP in London, for 15.80 rand in Johannesburg and for 154 Billion ZIM$ in Harare, then is it is fair to asume the real rate of GBP ro ZIM$ is 1:154 Billion. There will be minimal discrepancies between rates, but if the index is calculated with a basket of companies their effect is minimal. And out comes a very reliable indicator of the true value of a currency. Passportguy (talk) 16:42, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

A Western world example of the same thing :

Shell RDA A shares trade for € 25.33 in Amsterdam and 19.98 GBP in London today.

Gives you a rate of 1 GBP = 1.26777 €. Today's currency rate according to xe.com is 1.26401 (Minor differences are due to the fact that all of these rates change by the minute). Passportguy (talk) 16:51, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, that's the principle behind the OMIR. Is there a site that gives historical OMIRs? --Tango (talk) 20:07, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

I can't find an online site with complete data. There are a few sites that list past OMIR rates for specific dates. Until very recently the OMIR rate and the cash parallel rate were very similar, it seems that only in the last few weeks has this discrepancy appeared to the rates published by Siyabonga. The OMIR rate has quadrupled over the last few days alone,as the ZIM$ has apparently gone into freefall. Passportguy (talk) 20:46, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

The official rate fell by almost 10 % today, while Siyabonga rates once again remained at 45 Billion to the pound. With all the talk about supposed wiring problems on their page, it seems that the rates a no longer being updated on the site, at least for the time being. Another reason may be that Siyabonga is taking a massive premium to work around these problem, thus leading to their wiring rate no longer being a true reflection of the actual value of the currency. I'll see what the OMIR rate does today. As I see it, we will have to update the page with those rates in the future as the Siyabonga rates will be wildly out-of date in a matter of days. Passportguy (talk) 09:49, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

I suggest switching to OMIR from now on, possibly in a new column (the table will need tidying up to make it fit, though), and find as many past data points as possible. Historic stock prices are usually easy enough to find, so perhaps we can calculate it ourselves for missing dates? --Tango (talk) 15:00, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

I've been thinking about it for a while now, and I don't think either represents an adequate or completely accurate picture of what the $ZIM actually trades at. As for Siyabonga, they probably use round figures like that to make person-to-person transactions more convenient to some extent. When it takes thousands or tens of thousands of bills to satisfy a single transaction, it would save a lot of time and effort to not break bundles of notes. As far as the official rate goes, it's clear it's still being manipulated, and not very convincingly at all. If you figure up the inflation rate trading day to trading day, it behaves more like a mutant crawling peg.

May: 6-10.8% 7-1.8% 8-5.8% 9-4.4%

12-2.9% 13-3.8% 14-5.3% 15-4.1% 16-3.8%

19-7.6% 20-10.3% 21-11.1% 22-9.6% 23-9.8%

27-7.0% 28-12.0% 29-8.8% 30-9.7%

June: 2-11.6% 3-10.9% 4-17.5% 5-14.9% 6-14.1%

9-23.4% 10-23.1% 11-28.0% 12-35.1% 13-21.4%

16-21.3% 17-15.8% 18-17.5% 19-15.5% 20-10.7%

23-11.1% 24-9.0% 25-8.8%

It looks like whoever is controlling it sets a range for it to fall in value in. But as the value decreases, that range becomes smaller as a percentage. Then there's a correction period in the range and so on. Plus, those percentages are from trading day to trading day. Why would prices go up 10.7% from the 19th to the 20th, but only 11.1% from the 20th to the 23rd? The rate has to be falling as steadily over the weekends as it does during weekdays.

I think Siyabonga is somewhat opposite of that. Their rates were probably very close to the real thing until this last week's developments with the presidential election. Now it's certain there's almost no hope for even a relatively peaceful outcome. Mugabe will stay in power until he dies, there will be a civil war, outside miliary intervention, or a some combination of those three things. At that point rates probably started dropping at an even more accelerated rate. Siyabonga had it posted that rates would probably moderate or even improve in the coming week for several days, then when the presidential election went awry, they added that the elections were still technically scheduled for the 27th. What I'm not sure of is if they're profit taking or just trying not to look stupid as a result of a horrible prediction or both. Either way I do agree that their posted rates seem to have diverged from the actual rates this week.

OMIR might be a better gauge of long term developments, but in on shorter time scales I think it's even worse. It's rate is based on stock prices and the free market forces exterted on them, but right now the market forces in Zimbabwe are so distorted and amplified it's hard to tell what's going on day to day. In a stable environment, a stock or currency usually overreacts to news then yo-yos a little bit until it finds the proper trading range. But with Zimbabwe there are several problems with that. The hyperinflation doesn't help. It's been in recession for a decade or more. With how dangerous things have gotten, most people are likely dumping investments there and only a select few people are left trading the stocks. The resultant extremely low volumes are probably why the OMIR rate goes up extremely sharply then falls a little bit for two or three days then repeats the same pattern.

So in my opinion we should keep daily records of each price (official, Siyabonga, & OMIR) on the $Zim page. With the least valued currency page it's my opinion we should either keep using the Siyabonga rate or a 50/50 average between Siyabonga and OMIR. Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 16:02, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Keeping daily records of each rate (official, Siyabonga, & OMIR) sounds like the best option, IMHO, since the OMIR rate is /not/ a free-market rate but, as stated, a proxy rate totally unavailable "on the street". What is interesting is that the Siyabonga rate (which has been by far the most reliable indication for over a month given the large gaps in any newspaper-published sources - many of which are /well/ out of date - e.g. $7bn is actually more widely quoted within the last day or two vs. $40bn in other sources) has over the past week or two tended to converge with the OMIR rate, judging by the historical graphs on the site for the latter (for which link, many thanks). This may be potentially "interesting" for any researcher into hyperinflation investigating cause-effect and what factors might lead or trail.

I have confirmed by email that the Siyabonga rate is genuine and has been for the duration of its use here. It would certainly be easier to record and "see what happens", possibly adding a retrospective "health warning" if required rather than trying to back-fill at a later date, given the current short-term context.

Regards & Best wishes, David.87.240.133.36 (talk) 23:48, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Where's this historical graph? I can't see the link you're thanking someone for... --Tango (talk) 00:05, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

=> http://www.zimbabweanequities.com/ - unfortunately, the scale has been somewhat compressed by the OMIR figure going ballistic these past 3-4 days (= implicit "market panic"? understandable, if so). 87.240.133.36 (talk) 02:16, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Taking an average of the rates is a bad idea. Unless we can show that someone else is using that averaged rate for something, we're probably in the realms of original research. Otherwise, I agree with pretty much everything. --Tango (talk) 00:01, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree that taking a average isn't the way to go. (Although I have to admit I was tempted at first). But taking just taking widely different rates and combining them won't really produce trustworthy results either. As for which rate we should use : Siyabonga's rates are clearly influenced by other factors than pure reporting of rates. The more they overstate the value of the ZIM$ (i.e the lower their rate of the pound against the Z$ is), the less Z$ do they have to pay for the foreign currency that people wiring money to Zimbabwe pay them, i.e. the hire their profits are. Now - don't get me wrong, the mayhem in the Zimbabwe baking system and the amount of work it takes to work around that may warrant a premium, but it distorts the rate. Their rate is now no longer the rate you'd get in Zimbabwe but rather a special rate for people wiring money in.

OMIR : Clearly this rate is much more volatile than any rate a bank would offer a customer. However it is also clear that with the current political climate such volatility is to be expected. The fact that the two oher rates (Siyabonag & Official) are rather stable doesn't vouch for their reliabilty, rather the opposite. The caveat, as stated rightly above, is that it is based on stock trades that are taking place in very low volumes, i.e. single trades have the theoretical potential to distort the value. However this effect is somewhat limited by the fact the OMIR is based on a comparison of same-company stock prices in London, Johannesburg & Harare. If the difference were to become too great, traders move in buying cheap shares in Harare and selling them immediately in London, leading to a convergence of prices. I would say that the current high volatility is more likely the result of panic in the market due to the (quasi)canceled election rather than low/high volume stock trades. The biggest problem I see with the OMIR is that there seem to be next to no sources for past rates. The http://www.zimbabweanequities.com/#c1 site only has current rates, the graph shown past ones isn't much of a source of information.

I agree that for the moment we should monitor all three. However in the medium term we need to find a better source for the ZIM$ rates. Surely there must be other sources ?? I can't believe that the only source available to Zimbabweans is the site of an internet money wiring service ?? Passportguy (talk) 07:31, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I kind of wonder about the usefulness of the OMIR rate since it's more than double the value reported by the Siyabonag and that it's not really the value that's being exchanged on the streets of Zimbabwe. Although I don't mind having it tracked with the un/official rate. Although I'd like to see some of their rates backed up from articles like from Zimbabwe Situation (if possible) which was pretty much the source of unofficial rate prior to Siyabonag Ruby Cored (talk) 11:28, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

OMIR is indeed not the rate you get on the street.

Almost invaribly, rates posted/used on pages like Highest valued currency unit are not street/private bank rates (like Siyabonga's), as these vary greatly from bank to bank depending on their profit margins. Normally interbank rates are used as reference, which are not available to the private customer at the teller. The only reason we post additional private rates for the Z$ is because the official interbank rates are grossly distorted in value by the Zimbabwean government and are not a true reflection of the value of the currency. Passportguy (talk) 11:39, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Can anyone make heads or tails of this: [4]? Bloomberg claims the official interbank rate is 91,800,000,000 and the parallel rate is 100,000,000,000 to the USD as of yesterday. Do they know something we don't??? Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 12:27, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Strange... the RBZ are reporting today's official rate at $10.5 billion. Either Bloomberg have simply miscounted the 0's, or something very interesting is going on. Could the RBZ site simply be lying? It wouldn't surprise me. It would also explain why the rate is meant to be floating but is so unrealistic - the actual rate is floating and is realistic, the central bank are just lying about what it is. The $100 billion figure is probably trustworthy though, we can report that in the article. --Tango (talk) 14:38, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

according to their exchange rate table http://www.bloomberg.com/markets/currencies/eurafr_currencies.html it showed $9.18 billion; so I'd say they just miscounted the zero's Ruby Cored (talk) 16:10, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

"Could the RBZ site simply be lying?" - Yes, they most certainly are. Well not technically lying, just purposefully overstating the value of their soft currency. A common pratice of authoritarial governments. The former Communist block countries did it for over 40 years. Two observations re the Bloomberg rate :
- 1) The rate is for the 25th not the 26th, i.e. it is concurrent with the OVIR rate-spike of the same day. I.e. the Z$ regained some of its value the day after (26th)
- 2) The Bloomberg black market rate is most likely an appoximation. The 91.8 vs 9.18 value if clearly a typo/mistake.
- 3) The Bloomberg rate shows that the Siyabonga rate is way off the actual value of the currency. Even though the latter devalued the Z$ by almost 50 % (22 Bil to 32 Bil), its stated price is still way off, even if you allow for the June 26 re-bound of the Z$. I.e. the OMIR rate is way closer to the actual value than the Siyabonga rate.
- 4) Since the massive discpepancy of the Siyabonga rate seems to be a fairly new phenomenon, I would say we should watch and see if they adjust their rates upward to converge with the OMIR rate. If they continue to leave their rates at 30-50 % of the black market and OMIR rates, I believe we need to switch to OMIR completely, at least for the values on Least valued currency unit. Passportguy (talk) 07:45, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

If the $91.8bn/US$ -> $9.18bn/US$ rate is a typo, taking a single street trader quote as being a definitive /free market/ quote for the entire country is similarly questionable. Even the major news sources are all over the place just now - for example the BBC's article on Biti's "bail (being) set at one trillion Zimbabwe dollars, the equivalent of about $200 (£100)" yesterday (26th June) yields a rate of 5 bn/US$ which is not even half the /official/ rate. ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7475297.stm )

re. "Siyabonga's rates are clearly influenced by other factors than pure reporting of rates. The more they overstate the value of the ZIM$ (i.e the lower their rate of the pound against the Z$ is), the less Z$ do they have to pay for the foreign currency that people wiring money to Zimbabwe pay them, i.e. the hire their profits are. Now - don't get me wrong, the mayhem in the Zimbabwe baking system and the amount of work it takes to work around that may warrant a premium..."

*g* This reads somewhat as a quasi-conspiracy; that they are not reporting the true "free market rate", but somehow profit taking/market fixing. Sorry, but the money transfer business *is* a free market and the UK has one of the largest Zimbabwean communities in the world: if they did not report pretty much the "best" rate they could get, people would go elsewhere.

This is far more "free market" than finding the right street trader in Harare. (aside: for real conspiracy, "Misheck Chinengudu" could just as easily be a government money changer who is quoting very high in order to encourage people to sell their greenbacks when the natural tendency would be to *try* to hold onto those or acquire more just now. The government /is/ sitting on large stocks of Zim$ banknotes and /does/ rely on street trades to try to acquire foreign currency for government purchases).

It might take a day or two for Siyabonga's rates to catch up with the realities on the ground or there may be other reasons why the rates /eventually/ diverge but simply reporting the "highest number seen" requires similar care and consideration, IMHO. Regards, David. Harami2000 (talk) 09:36, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

"*g* This reads somewhat as a quasi-conspiracy; that they are not reporting the true "free market rate", but somehow profit taking/market fixing. Sorry, but the money transfer business"

You are absolutely right. (I stated the same rurther above.) Naturally Siyabonga needs to make a profit and with money wiring getting more and more complicated and work.intensive, their profit margin needs to increase as well. The point I was making is that what we are usuing - in contrast to all other Wikipedia articles - is a bank sell-rate rather than an interbank rate. The prior includes a proft margin, the latter does not. Parallel example : The article Highest valued currency unit currency unit lists the value of the UK pound at 1.95925 (interbank rate or June 18). The current rate according to xe.com is 1.98696. However today's selling rate at Travelex is 1.92 for one GBP - i.e. they take roughly 0.07 cents as a profit. Encylocpedial articles shouldn't - and generally don't - use sell/buy rates as the profit margin will vary from bank to bank. In our case unfortunately there is no (real) interbank rate, so we have to go with second best. Up to now that was Siyabonga. But if that company now (quite understandibly) finds it necessary to massively increase their profit/safety marign, then their rate becomes unusable for an encylopedia article and we have to look for alternatives. Passportguy (talk) 10:12, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

>The current rate according to xe.com is 1.98696. However today's selling rate at Travelex is 1.92 for one GBP - i.e. they take roughly 0.07 cents as a profit.

Thanks; and for the example. *nods* From that 3-4% margin, there is presumably a small profit remaining once running costs have been removed from the equation and that (UK£->US$) transaction is relatively "effortless", perhaps, compared with one to Zimbabwe in Zim$. This sort of margin is still somewhat less than the Zim$ deflates on an (average) daily basis, so it becomes difficult to see quite where the various factors are when attempting to disentangle those. (Good luck, again, to any researchers!).

> But if that company now (quite understandibly) finds it necessary to massively increase their profit/safety marign...

Easy to hypothesise that, but still hypothetical. If the rate they quote is too far short of the "best available" via the money transfer market, business will go elsewhere. To that extent, Siyabonga's rate (given the frequency of update and additional commentary) seems to be a reasonable and useful indication of the "free market" rate; even if that's "within their business" and not an (unobtainable) perfect average of the current "free market on the street" rate.

At best, Siyabonga will probably lag a little behind the situation on the ground but I still can't find a better, consistent source for daily/weekly changes within /a/ "free market". Harami2000 (talk) 12:30, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Just one further observation, aside. The initial concerns re. the Siyabonga rates was that those were higher than any of the other "obvious sources" for money transfer. Now, the concern appears to be that those rates are, for reasons valid or otherwise, too low (i.e. /specifically/ compared with that single $100bn/$ market trader quote - presumably from 24th June, rather than the 25th). And yet on another BBC article today, "When I arrived in Harare on Monday (23rd June), the Zimbabwean dollar had fallen to 9 billion to the US dollar. On Tuesday it was 12 billion, and on Wednesday (25th June) 15 billion" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7477107.stm). Do BBC reporters pay a 500-700% premium on the black market on the same day in the same city?

I can understand the reasoning to publish a "$100bn/$" quote over a lesser figure, but why is the BBC deemed less reliable than Bloomberg when the latter also had that $91.8bn/$ quote on the same "$100bn/$" article which was obviously shifted by one digit?

Unfortunately, newspaper sources conflicting to this degree (and others printing even lower exchange rates within the past few days) appear to be even less reliable in terms of providing a consistent "free market on the street" rate vs. the money transfer agents who /are/ working in a competitive "free market" albeit in a domain that is "one step removed". 02c/fwiw. David. Harami2000 (talk) 16:41, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

I've removed the $100 billion figure as being unreliable. It contradicts everything else, and the article was verifiably incorrect about the official figure, so I think it's best to ignore that article completely. I'm not really comfortable using the Siyabonga rate, but we don't really have a good alternative. --Tango (talk) 12:38, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Just a further observation of Siyabonga's rates : Compare their Rand rates (1 GBP = 13 rand) [5] to the current xe.com rate of 15.58 and you'll see where the problems here lie. I agree that unfortunately there seems to be no other sources available at the moment. But if this disparency of over 15 % for the Rand and up to 300 % for the Zim$ continues, I see no other option that to change over to the OMIR rate, however volatile those may be. Passportguy (talk) 14:57, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Where are you seeing a "300%" difference for the Zim% in free market currency exchange - cash dollars for cash zimdollars? The highest current rate quoted on *any* news items as of yesterday (29th June) was Zim$40bn/US$ for the vet's bill on http://www.zimbabwesituation.com/jun29c_2008.html with every other news article bar one trailing at lower, often much lower rates. No-one, anywhere is quoting Zim$160bn/US$. Siyabonga's rate today is now greater than that Zim$40bn/US$ quote and was well ahead of the rate the BBC was getting on the streets of Harare at the same time a week ago.

To re-iterate, the OMIR rate is not a free market rate and "having no option but to change over to that" and treating it as such is not an option IMHO since that would totally lose anything approaching a like-for-like comparison in the history. If it is a *true* representation of the "value" of the Zim$ the free market currency rate will converge, as happened a couple of weeks ago. Harami2000 (talk) 20:00, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Inflation rate for June 2008

Thanks for finding other source to replace the obviously-erroneous (far too low and incredibly precise) "advance quote" of 3,140,335% for year to /end/ of June 2008 when the article in question failed even to realise that three zeros had been lopped off the currency.
The previous figure I'd sourced as an "estimate" (and which had been in use for nearly a month on Wiki) was the "leaked" CSO figure of 1,694,000% as of May 23rd. Since that was not an official release, I'd flagged that as "estimate". http://www.thezimbabweindependent.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=20637 in addition to reiterating that 1,694,000% figure publishes a further CSO figure of 9,030,000% as of June 20 which, whilst perhaps not officially released (unstated), looks like a good enough "peg" to use until the next similar, or official release, occurs. Harami2000 (talk) 09:58, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

Inflation data

Can someone please chart the data of the inflation data rather than having it presented on the article? The ending table looking so terrible in quality - we don't need to list the percentage the inflation is everyday...oh my god. An Excel data graph would be so much better. Douglasr007 (talk) 06:38, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

?? The inflation rates listed in the table aren't per day, they are annual. Listed for every year since 1980, with 2008 being a projected figure. A graph wouldn't be of any use, as the figures for the first few years wouldn't be identifiable on a graph also showing this year's inflation of 9 million percent. Passportguy (talk) 07:18, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

A logarithmic graph would work. I'm not sure it's necessary, though - the relevant point is that is stayed around 10-20% for 20 years and then went crazy, and you can see that from the table. You need to be careful with logarithmic graphs - they are easy to misinterpret. --Tango (talk) 15:43, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Whoops - the exchange rate data is the one that is going by days and really does need cleanup. A whole lot of data tables would help. Douglasr007 (talk) 19:05, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I think I've commented on that before... I'm not really sure what to do about it, though. Reducing the table to just one data point per month wouldn't show the extreme of the inflation as well. We need to do something, though. --Tango (talk) 12:29, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, Douglasr007, not a bad idea. Why don't you just go ahead! ;) --217.91.33.230 (talk) 09:25, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Highest Value Banknote

Is the highest denomination banknote / bearer cheque really only $50,000,000,000 which at 30th June is very roughly 2USD or 1GBP. --193.133.92.229 (talk) 12:45, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes. The highest currently known denomination for Agro cheques is 50 billion, which at the currenty parallel market OMIR rate is around 30 US cents. The Z$ is loosing its value so fast that the government is apparently not able to print money fast enough. Passportguy (talk) 12:54, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

The value of the largest note is actually not too bad at the moment compared to past form. The value of the highest denomination note has fallen well below 2USD several times. When the agro cheques were introduced the denominations were a huge leap, and realistic at the time, thought that was quite a while ago now, in Zimbabwean terms. On the other hand, most most previous increases in the maximum denomination have been too little too late. Greg Grahame (talk) 13:57, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Btw : At midnight today all bearer cheque bank notes valued 50,000,000 and less will expire, levaing only the 100, 250 and 500 million bearer cheques as the 5, 25 and 50 billion agro cheques as legal tender. Passportguy (talk) 14:04, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

They've certainly had lower valued notes. When the 100K ceased to be the highest denomination it was worth about a third of a dollar, the 200K was 10¢ when the next batch were issued, 750K was at 20¢, the 10M at 15¢, the 50M at 25¢, and the 250M at 60¢. They don't actually hold the world record for the lowest value highest denomination banknote (yet). That honor goes to Somalia where the 1000 shilling note is the highest denomination worth a hair less than 3¢ at the black market rate of 34,000 shillings to the dollar.

At the rate the $Zim is falling though, they're going to have to do something soon. My bet is on a rate of ~10 trillion to the USD by the end of July.Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 16:10, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't place bets on the Zim dollar that far in advance at the moment, it's very difficult to know what's going to happen politically in the next month and that will have a major impact on the currency. Will Mugabe be able to continue to resist the ever increasing international pressure? If so, then the currency will probably continue it's free fall, if not, then who knows? --Tango (talk) 16:28, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Who knows indeed ? If the current rate of devaluation continues (roughly 10000 % p.m.) we'll be at one hundred hexillion $ to one US$ by the end of the year. Factoring in the 1000:1 "sunrise" exchange, that's 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 old Z$ to 1. Passportguy (talk) 16:41, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

~5000% p.m. is bad enough... Dollarisation or introduction of a hard currency and refusing to print any more would stop that dead (relatively speaking) but that's not in the interest of the government, of course, both for financial and propaganda reasons. Given that G&D have been told in no uncertain terms to cease, the latter option is probably no longer available in order to achieve "relative" stability. Harami2000 (talk) 20:12, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Zimbabwesituation reported today that the German government is pressuring Giesecke & Devrient to stop supplying fresh banknotes to Zimbabwe. If they follow through with that, there soon will be a serious cash problem. Wonder what they'd do then ? Overstamp/-print old bills ?? Passportguy (talk) 16:18, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

That's an interesting development. There is a precedent for stamping banknotes in hyperinflationary environments - that would be my guess. --Tango (talk) 16:28, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

*nods* Overprinting was standard practice in Brazil, for example. Creates no end of potential for criminal activity, however, given the relative lack of sophistication. Harami2000 (talk) 20:12, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

If they won't be getting in new notes from G&D then I'd think overprinting would be the only way to go; though I am unsure of the RBZ have destroyed/sold their expired B. Cheques though... though it would also in interesting to see what sort of denomination they come up with; like with Nicaraguan Cordobas from 1980s Ruby Cored (talk) 10:15, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Yep, as stated by Greg Grahame, $50bn was a /large/ amount when those first came out last month... barely US$1 now. :/ Harami2000 (talk) 20:12, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I wonder if they'll eventually break Yugoslav dinar 's record of 500billion soon =D Ruby Cored (talk) 09:32, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

At the moment the Z$ is in fourth place, having overtaken Greece's 1940s inflation. Next up is Brazil's 1986-1994 period, which got up to 2.75 quintillion to 1. At the current rate we'll be there sometime in August/September. The Yugoslav Dinar's record (400 octillion) is still a ways off.

Btw : The Zimbabwe Times is reporting [6] that the RBZ is planning to slash 6 zeros off the currency, i.e. 1,000,000 second Z$ would become 1 third Z$. Howver it seems a bit unclear whether this will actually be done or will only be a measure in electronic trading. For a real re-denonination, slashing 9 or 10 zeros would make more sense, as even after the planned action the official rate of the Z$ would still be 12,000 : 1 (OMIR at 140,000 : 1) Passportguy (talk) 10:28, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

I was referring to the highest denomination of banknote issued; but interesting figures on the inflation nontheless. Also interesting how they're planning to knock "just 6" zeros off their banknotes; I would've thought it would be 9 zeros since given the the article under the "Proposed 3rd dollar" their $1000 note wouldn't even cope with the largest denomination in circulation... Ruby Cored (talk) 11:19, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Knocking 6 noughts off will be pointless - by the time they get it sorted out and actually do it, 1 new² dollar will be worth, what, one 10,000th of a US cent? What's the point of that? They need to knock of 9 noughts, at least. --Tango (talk) 13:59, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Rate divergence

The official and parallel market rates are diverging rapidly. Does anyone know why? Greg Grahame (talk) 14:00, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

The RBZ seems to have decided to stick with devalueing at a rate of $800 miillion per day, regardless of what is going on in the world around them. Siyabonga is lagging behind a bit on rate updates, as the rate has gone into free-fall, plus seems to have increased their trading safety margin as the Z$ is devaluing ever faster. The OMIR rate is highly volatile and (if I had to bet) is probably going to re-bound a bit tomorrow. Generally speaking the failed election has not helped prospects of a stable and responsible fiscal policy and financial markets don't like that at all. Passportguy (talk) 14:09, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

You're right, the official rate is clearly being controlled. I've just plotted a quick graph of it for June and, once you remove weekends, from the 10th to the 26th is almost a perfect straight line. It's a straight line before that, too, just with a different gradient. The figure for the 30th seems a little lower than it ought to be, I'm not sure why that would be (if they're changing the rate of increase again, it ought to be above the line, not below it, in order to keep the percentage increase roughly the same). I'll watch it over the next couple of days with interest. --Tango (talk) 16:23, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Money transfer does not particularly require a greater "safety margin" as far as I understand in times of volatility. It is US$ which are transferred, the Zim$ purchase rate having been agreed upon at the start of the transfer rather than a speculative "advance" rate (besides, the "safety net" would be vs. future deflation rather than current value given the average /daily/ decrease in the Zim$ in recent months). If you know otherwise, please let me know, or fire them over a query to check?

@Tango: yep, the new "official rate" is as much of a "fix" as before. Besides, Grace was still getting the Zim$30,000/US$1 rate after that had "officially" ceased to exist. Harami2000 (talk) 20:32, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

"Money transfer does not particularly require a greater "safety margin" as far as I understand in times of volatility."

??? ANY money changing business needs a safety margin for rate changes. If you go to your local high street bank in England and sell them your left over Dollars from your trip to the US, it will take them a while to resell the cash. If the dollar looses in value in the meantime, the bank looses money. I.e. they need to build a safety into their rates, in addition to their costs and their profit. The more volatile a currency becomes, the large that margin must become, otherwise the bank risks making a loss on your business. and in exactly the same way Siyabonga must factor this in, as they are essentially buying British pounds and selling you Zim$ (which they pay out to who ever you are sending the money to) Passportguy (talk) 21:08, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Money transfer UK/US->Zim does not involve the money transfer business carrying out any exchange/reselling of cash after the initial customer transaction and holding onto that "risk"/potentially losing any value in the interim in the manner you indicate, as I understand. What they are transferring to Zimbabwe *is* US$ for a previously agreed sum in Zim$ locally (not "essentially buying British pounds and selling you Zim$" at a future date). Any loss in the value of the Zim$ whilst the US$ are in transit is borne by the customer just as they would benefit should the exchange rate decrease.

If, however, by some fluke the Zim$ rose in value by 90% /during/ the business day the money transfer business could simply tell the customer that due to local circumstances they are unable to offer the rate quoted on further transfers.

If the exchange rate offered were not at-or-near the current day's local rate (and there are "free market" pressures in that competitive sector for rates to be "good") but instead some hypothetical/speculative "three days in the future" rate - i.e. for local currency to be purchased /once/ the US$ arrives - /then/ there would be a need for a "safety margin" vs. guesses as to how much the Zim$ might deflate over that period but that is not (again, as I understand) how such money transfer businesses work.

There is certainly no "300% margin" at play here, afaik. Regards, David. Harami2000 (talk) 22:48, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not going to get into a detailed explanation of how money wiring, future currency contracts and their re-financing works, as that would go way beyond the scope of this talk page.

Regadless of the details reasons of why they take comission, they clearly are taking it. They take roughly 15 % on the Rand [7], 12.5 % on Dollar cash wiring [8], and various other rates for other currencies. Because of the volatility of the Z$ and the costs they incur whilst buying (and holding for a certain time !) Zim$ to the be paid out to customers, they also charge a comission for that service. As the computer breakdowns, cash shortages and working around ever new restrictions by the RBZ make the process of money wiring to Zimabawe ever more labour and cost intensive and as the spiralling inflation makes rate calculations unprecdictable, so do the commission rates have to incease. Btw : The 300 % figure is based on today's OMIR rate vs today's Siyabonga rate. The two will very likely converge in the days to come, as the OMIR rate re-bounds and Siyabonga is pressured to raise rates. Passportguy (talk) 23:20, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

"Any loss in the value of the Zim$ whilst the US$ are in transit is borne by the customer just as they would benefit should the exchange rate decrease. "

I don't think so. If that were true, no-one would send money through the wire anymore. After 5 days, you'd have lost half of the money in the process. No customers would ever commit to that. They'd use the other serveice offered by the same company instead. Passportguy (talk) 23:27, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that is true - it's one of the things I had confirmed over a month ago whilst checking whether money transfer agencies were a valid "free market" "check" against local newspaper quotes, as was the original intention. It doesn't take 5 days for the funds to be released in Zim$ locally (2-3 days according to S-T's website) and there are good reasons not to be receiving money in a strong currency when the government is on the lookout for local people using that to /illegally/ purchase goods/services.

As to how that all works being "beyond the scope of this talk page", I don't think so if there's a statement made about money transfer agencies having to "increase their margins" and that those sources are unreliable for that reason, if the manner in which they're understood to work isn't actually the case.

Will be looking out for that convergence again, anyhow, although it would be easy to understand why the OMIR rate is *way* too high at present given the demand for a safe haven investment (single company, in this case) - albeit there's also the obvious /potential/ for non-"free market" Zim$ in play causing there to be a surplus of those in certain hands leading to a hyping of that proxy "rate" even further beyond the public "free market" currency rate, such as that is. Harami2000 (talk) 01:23, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

It looks like they've increased the rate of depreciation of the official rate, but not by anywhere near enough for it to catch up with the parallel rate any time soon. --Tango (talk) 14:00, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Observation on the technical calculation of Siyabonga's rates

While updating the table, I noticed something peculiar today :

The base rate for Siyabonga's rates seems to be the GBP : Z$ rate. The other values are apparently derived from that rate. What I noticed however, is that if you factor in the interbank rates GBP to € and GBP to US$, you find that the rates given for US$ and € are lower, around 105.8 rather than the 110 billion to the GBP.

E.g. :

SBR : GBP £1 = 110,000,000,000
SBR : USD $1 = 53,049,500,000
SBR : EUR €1 = 83,542,500,000

According to xe.com, the current rate for US$ is 0.501361, i.e.

SBR : 1 USD 53,049,500,000 = GBP 0.501361

     GBP 1 = 105,810,980,000

Same with the Euro (0.789809):

SBR : 1 EUR = 83,542,500,000 = GBP 0.789809

     GBP 1 = 105,775,557,000

I.e. While the GBP is rate 110 billion, the other currencies are discounted by around 4.3 billion each (~ 4%). If the actual value of the US$ were used, the rate should be at 55,149,710,000 not 53,049,500,000. Unfortunately one can't check back rates. Does anyone know if this is a just a calculation mistake or has this always been this way ? If it always has, I would move that we take the GBP rate as base and do the conversion math with xe.com.

Passportguy (talk) 14:25, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

That's true IMHO. They are based on GBP. My browser has in memory 85'000'000'000 GBP for 30th. If I remember correctly, it were 45 billion and 65 billion on the previous days. This would match the dollar figures.

130.92.9.57 (talk) 14:47, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Yep; I have always observed this slight deviation since I have need observing that site, but the magnitude of rate change are quite linear though eventhough the rates between GBP and USD/EUR have fluctuated with it (that is. if the GBP rate dropped by 25% other rates would drop by 25+/- 0.5% . Though i don't know about using the GBP as base and divide through using xe's rate because then the numbers don't match up and there will be confusions about the rates; just personal observation Ruby Cored (talk) 16:32, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

*nods*. Consistent difference within their "free market" sector owing to being a UK-based company per my observation note 16:54, 6 June 2008 (UTC) above and (understandably) no decision at that point to take the GBP rate and divide out using xe.com owing to potential confusion. The difference is more often than not "lost" in a day's inflation...

This still seems to be the most consistent indicator of trend and, to be honest, it's looking increasingly uncertain as to whether there's even a consistent "free market" rate available within Zimbabwe - given the low rates quoted as fact in some (hotel-dwelling) journalistic sources in the past few days ($10-20bn/US$ range) vs. the regular "people on the ground" who appear to be getting a rate similar to Siyabonga's (highest still $40bn/US$ from a couple of days ago) vs. the /possibility/ of rates that are higher still existing depending on whom one knows (some absurdly high Zim$ quotes for shopping, etc., and the OMIR fly-away in the past couple of days might appear to indicate that there's /something/ strange going on at that end in addition to the manipulated-low Zim$ prices available at Zanu-PF-only "shops", but would require a reliable researcher in the field to confirm that). Could say the whole situation is a mess but that's a given, alas. Harami2000 (talk) 17:59, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

It is not so much an issue of "confusion" as of article quility. We are already using a buy/sell rate (something that normally should not be done anyway). If that rate is now found to be distored evern further - in this case most likely because Siyabonga trades in pounds and needs to surcharge other currencies due to fees they incur when exchanging these into sterling themselves -, then we at least need to go with the most reliable of the distored rates, and that is the GBP base from which Siyabonga rates are calculated. If we do anything else, we are perpetuating false numbers, something any encylopedia should be very careful not to do. I'll watch the rates for a week or two and see if the distortion/difference stays at around 4 %. If it does we'll have to resort to calculating the value of the US$/€ rates from the base GBP rate ourselves, or - alternatively - only quote GBP rates for the Siyabonga collumn. Passportguy (talk) 17:08, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

One more thing, as I have a feeling many people don't understand what I mean when I talk about buy/sell rates : High street banks and money exchangers usually have two rates, one for buying a foreign currency, one for selling it. For most currencies these are usually calculated by ading or subtracting a fixed commision percentage from the interbank rate.

E.g. If the interbank £:$ rate were 1.00:2.00, then the bank may take a 5 % commision, i.e. set a sell rate of 1.90 and a buy rate of 2.10. I.e. for every £ 100 you exchange you get $190, while in order to get back that £ 100 after your trip you need to pay them $210.

The Siyabonga rate is essentially a sell rate, i.e. you pay them £ 1 and they give you 110 billion Z$. Unfortuantely (to my knowledge) there is no online source for buy rates, i.e. how many Z$ I would have to pay to buy a US$ or Pound on the black market. That rate is likely to be significantly higher that 110 billion. Passportguy (talk) 17:28, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I think it's fine the way it is, unless you want to start quoting in both sterling and USD. If you start quoting only in sterling it'll be confusing because all the previous rates are in USD. You can't convert back and forth because the sterling/USD rate can and has been swinging back and forth by as much as 4% within the span of a few weeks and much more over the course of the last two to three years.

On a single given day 4% is quite a bit, but the long term trend is kept intact and well represented. Plus the OMIR rate is quoted in USD and while the official is quoted in both sterling and USD, it's primary peg is the USD from which all other values are derived from.Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 18:14, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I not quite sure if you understood my point. Yes, if the 4 % is a one-off, then I don't see a problem either. But if the Dollar (and other currency) rates are always discounted by 4 % as a matter of course, then there is definately a problem. Passportguy (talk) 18:31, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Then you either have to go back and change all of the Siyabonga rates and change them based on day to day historical exchange rates between sterling/USD or keep quoting the rate they have on their website. Starting to readjust them now doesn't help much if a big chunk of them are still wrong. Between a 10-50% daily inflation rate (and the delay and inherent inaccuracy in their rates as a result) and with what they're discounting the rates for sterling to begin with I don't really think it's that big of an issue. 53B vs. 55B doesn't matter when it's clearly an estimation based on the sterling rates changing now in multiples of 5B, the who knows how many percent they're scalping off the top after that, and the high likelihood that the rate will be 60-70B or more tomorrow. But if you want to look up the two months of sterling/USD figures (buy, sell, or interbank?) and refigure two months worth of Siyabonga figures go ahead. Just trying to save you the trouble. :)Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 19:49, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

As I stated above, the problem with back adjustment is that I don't have the old GBP Siyabonga rates. Thus I can neither check if the discount for other currencies has indeed been 4 % all along, or if this is a new development. Secondly if I don't have these rates, there is also obviously no base to calculate from. However just because old value are off, doesn't mean taht all future data also needs to be. Those could very well be adjusted. As I said above I'll watch it for a week or two and see if the discount remains at 4 %. Passportguy (talk) 07:01, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Alternative / Additional sources

In terms of solving this Siyabonga conundrum, two things would be immensly helpful :

1) Are there any additional sources on Zim$ rate by other banks (preferable buy & sell) ?
2) Does anyone have a source on sell-rates, i.e. on how many Zim$ you have to pay on the black market to get 1 Pound/US Dollar/Euro ?

Passportguy (talk) 19:00, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

as I mentioned before; I'd like to see the exchange rates from Zimbabwe Situation being reposted sometime Ruby Cored (talk) 19:17, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I suppose we have 2 solutions if siyabonga does not fix its rates. We could try to find another bank, or use OMIR however they might not be right either. The other thing we could use is The Zimbabwe suituation, But they are not updated frequently enough so where can we find another solution ? $1000000000ten0one1 (talk) 03:16, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

If you look here [9] it says 1 USD was trading at 55 billion on Monday, but here [10] it says 25 billion today. I don't think Zim Situation is going to be a whole lot more reliable, but I agree it should probably be quoted as well to help develop a more complete picture. Where to put those figures is another matter... Ideas? Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 21:53, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Zimbabwesituation.com is that it is a complilation of third party sources and that sometimes means that figures are outdated. The 25 billion figure is clearly a couple of days old (older than the 55 billion figure).

Siyabonga didn't update their rate today - I'm a bit unsure how to read their page - are they indicating that they have changed to weekly updates ??.

SW Radio Africa has a little infobox on their site indicating the value of the Z$, which according to them today is at 125 bilion for the pound, i.e. roughly 63 billion to the dollar. The problem with that figure is the same as with Siyabonga - it's only a rough estimation and probably not researched but rather taken from elsewhere. Passportguy (talk) 00:29, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Needs major revisions for tense and readability

I understand that the economic situation in Zimbabwe is changing rapidly, but this article is suffering badly from incremental updates. One symptom is the growing number of future- or present-tense statements about the past. There is also a slew of single statements noting certain values at certain dates with no attempt to tie them together into some kind of whole idea or indicate why they're important. Perhaps they would serve the article better condensed into a timeline or table. The redundancy between the information in the "History" and "Banknotes" sections does not seem to serve any purpose, either.

I don't feel qualified to make these sweeping changes, but I offer them up here for discussion. —HorsePunchKid (talk) 2008-07-02 15:44:26Z

I've had a go at refactoring the "Proposed third dollar" section to try and address these issues - what do you think? Should we do something similar with the rest of the article? --Tango (talk) 01:06, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

There is already a smaller article Hyperinflation in Zimbabwe. I suggest most of the content of Inflation, Money supply and Exchange rate history sections, including the daily updates, be moved to there with a reference. This article then returns to being a historical study of the currency, and would be more stable.

Also, has anybody got a scan of the agro cheques? The ZWD250M at the top of the article is now worth very little - a person who has forgotten his password. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.238.139.18 (talk) 08:23, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I have seen a scan at http://garrysue.net/Zim $1000000000ten0one1 (talk) 12:55, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I get an access forbidden message on that URL. --Tango (talk) 13:20, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

It's actually at [11]. I've added it to the article under "External links" - person who has remembered his password TiffaF (talk) 07:11, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Siyabonga rates once again

The rates haven't changed at all for two days. This morning they put a big announcement on their page that "rates will change today - check this site later", however they just updated their site with still the same rate (110 billion to the pounds, with slight adjustments for the dollar rate). As the official rate continues to devalue I am a bit confused as to how they arrive at their rates. All of this doesn't seem to fit with their "The rates have changed - we expect massive increases in the ZWD rates over the next few weeks as it readjusts to inflation" post on the page. Passportguy (talk) 13:51, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

The rates on 3rd July stated that "Rates will stay the same" dispite earlier update stating it will change Ruby Cored (talk) 13:28, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Giesecke & Devrient stopped delivering paper to the RBZ

Would be a good addition to the article. [12]. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 05:29, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

SW Radio Africa "rate"?

The SW Radio Africa rate per http://www.swradioafrica.com/ appears to be being quoted as though that was "independent" but is in reality, I suspect, actually just a reposting of the Siyabonga rate. The two have co-incided in GBP->Zim$ terms when I've examined those, anyhow, and applying an xe.com (or equivalent) exchange USD=>GBP to obtain a "new" US$->Zim$ rate cannot work when it is impossible for the public to exchange USD to GBP at the xe.com/similar rate.
Having these two different rates claiming to be from different sources, but are actually the same (I believe) is more confusing than not.
Would it not be easier to post those as a range from a single source (i.e. quoted US$->Zim$ and extrapolated from GBP to US$->Zim$) and explain /why/ that is being done if this is /really/ what is "desired"/"needed"? Cheers, David. Harami2000 (talk) 02:42, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

You are probably right. I've had that supsiction too at times. However on a couple of days, SW Radio had the rate a lot earlier (up to 12 h) than Siyabonga, which seems to suggest they both have a common third source, rather than SW Radio taking the information from Siyabonga directly. But you are right, having two sources that don't really differ is confusing. I suggest we wait and see if they diverge again over the coming days - if they do not, it's always easy to delete one. Passportguy (talk) 10:04, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree. SW Radio is still a great source for days when Siyabonga doesn't update it's rate. I've been checking them for a while and they do sometimes change the rate on Saturdays and Sundays. Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 11:03, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Siyabonga rate calculation

As discussed before, I move that from today we use the GBP Siyabonga or SW Radio rate as calculation base and calculate the USD and EUR values for our table using xe.com or similar sources for interbank rates.
When looking at today's rates, you see that Siyabonga has a rate of 750 billion Z$ for 1 GBP, up from yesterday's SW Radio rate of 720 billion. When computing the USD value via xe.com, the current value of a Zimbabwe dollar is roughly 360 billion to 1 USD. Siyabonga however lists a rate today of 359,319,000,000, i.e. less than 360, even though their GBP rate is higher ! Why is this so : It's rather simple. Siyabonga is a British company. Therefore it must first exchange any foreign currency rewmitted to its branched into GBP before then sending the money to Zimbabwe. However it is not a bank. Therefore any currency exchange incurrs bank changes (around 3-4 %), which naturally have to be reflected in the rates Siyabomga can offer for currencies other than the pound. However this is purely due to the nature of the Siyabonga business and has nothing to do with the value of the ZIM$. I.e. the only directly usable value on the Siyabonga site is the GBP rate. All other rates must be calculated using current interbank rates, in order to make rates comparable and usable on pages like Least valued currency unit. I will therefore add the adjusted Siyabonga rate for now on with the GBP value in brackets. Passportguy (talk) 14:21, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

If we're going to do this (and it makes a certain amount of sense), we'll have to report the GBP rate and give the USD rate in brackets afterwards. --Tango (talk) 20:18, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

New Z$ 100,000,000,000 note

According to a report out today [13], Zimbabwe is due to introduce a new $100 billion agro cheque on Monday. Surely this one won't be the last, as even that at current parallel market rates it is only worth around 12 US cents. Other sources, e.g. the Zimbabwe Independant and Zimbabwe Situation put the rate even lower, at 1.4 trillion to the GBP and 5 trillion to the USD respectively - although the latter article seems to have at least some of its numbers wrong. Passportguy (talk) 11:13, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

I really don't see the point in issuing a new note that's only twice the size as the last one when prices are doubling every few days. All it will do is give them a few days before things become just as bad again. If they're going to introduce new denominations, they need to bite the bullet and issue sensible sized ones (1, 2, 5 and 10 trillion, perhaps - that should give them a few weeks). --Tango (talk) 00:09, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Exactly; like on the day when they firstly issued the first Agro Cheque series the Z$50 Billion was over $200 even on the black market back then (not to say it only took them 28 days to erode its value down to a dollar) with the rate it's going they will also need to start preparing 25 and 50 trillion cheques soon Ruby Cored (talk) 09:07, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually it sounds to me like this could potentially be the last large denomination for a short while at least since they appear to be planning another revaluation this time at 1 million to 1 (see the info from an anonymous source in the article on July 1st). I can't be bothered doing the maths but I guess they will need at least a month before reaching the same value again if they cut of 6 zeros. Of course if things continue as now they will either need to revalue or have something larger then 100 billion soon enough but they're still a while away from the 5 revaluations of the Yugoslav dinar. (If I was them I would have chosen 100 billion to 1 this time around but I guess people are going to complain if they receive a war pension of $1.09...) Nil Einne (talk) 06:09, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Btw : You can see a picture of the new 100 billion dollar banknote at http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/06/04/arts/zimb531.jpg

Guardian quote: millions or billions?

Quote from the article here: "In the Guardian, on the 18 July 2008, a report on Zimbabwe's inflation, said that an egg costs ZW$50 million (GBP 0,17, USD 0,32), and it showed adverts for prizes of Z$100 trillion in a Zimbabwean derby and ZW$1,2 quadrillion ($1 200 000 000 000 000, ~GBP 2100, USD 4200) in a lottery. It also showed a monthly war pension is currently is ZW$109 million (GBP 0,37, USD 0,74), shops can only cash cheques if the customer write double the amount, because the cost will go up by the time the cheque has cleared, and people can only withdraw a maximum of ZW$100 million from cashpoints." I'm not sure, but it seems to me that each "million" in this sentence should be replaced by "billion". I.e., an egg costs 50 bn, the war pension is 109 bn and one may withdraw 100 bn from the cashpoints. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.128.50.184 (talk) 12:10, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

I've checked the source and you are correct. I've fixed it. --Tango (talk) 15:53, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Value of demonetized currency?

The article says that 22% of the old Zimbabwean dollars were not traded in and have been demonetized. Since no more of them are being printed, has their value remained relatively constant (as non-legal tender) during this period? Wnt (talk) 16:04, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

They're not legal tender and are just pieces of paper, so they have no value at all, just like any other scrap of paper. --Tango (talk) 16:45, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, even in the U.S., a Confederate dollar (or a counterfeit thereof) is typically worth more than a legal tender dollar, because no one prints any more of them. In the case of Zimbabwe, even if they retain only the value of a piece of paper they should be worth more than the cash value of new notes of the same denomination. Still, I wonder if some people there might still exchange them based on speculation that the old currency would be recognized in some future monetary reform. Wnt (talk) 13:21, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

If you are talking about value in twerms of what collector might be willing to pay, then yes, that value is almost always higher than the face value. However as far as value in any future exchange goes : very probably not. Even if they were re-monetized, their face value would be so minute (e.g. currently 0,0000013 US$ for the 1 million Z$ bearer cheque), that their real-term value would be negligible. Passportguy (talk) 13:56, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Value of paper?

Just for grins, could someone work out the value of the piece of paper they print this currency on, and how long it takes for the currency to become worth less than this? (Have they considered using blank paper?) Wnt (talk) 16:10, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

The paper was (until recently when they stopped shipments) supplied by Giesecke & Devrient. If you can find out how much RBZ was paying them for it (I've done some searching, but haven't found a number), then you can work that out. Of course, all they have to do to avoid that situation is keep printing larger denominations. I expect the smallest notes that are still legal tender (Z$250,000, perhaps? I'm not sure if the ones before that have all expired yet or not.) are worth less than the paper they're printed on. Z$250k is about 0.004 US cents. Fancy paper with lots of watermarks and things has got to cost more than that.) --Tango (talk) 17:18, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Many of the older bearer cheques expired on July 1st. The only cheques still valid are those with a value of 100 million and more, plus the agro cheques (5, 25, 50 & 100 billion) Passportguy (talk) 21:53, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

I feel for the people of Zimbabwe. The figures for inflation are beyond the scope of conception. Once you get into the high hundred millions/ billions, the brain meshes the amounts into a nonsensical sea of zeros. Jendeyoung 07:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jendeyoung (talk • contribs)

Soon, all those zeros will take far too much space on their bills. All they need to do is start printing exponents instead. (At least until the next revaluation.) For one trillion, they should just have the bills say "10^12" on the four courners instead of the all-out 1,000,000,000,000. --Let Us Update Special:Ancientpages. 08:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

10¹² would be better, though! ;) --Tango (talk) 17:24, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. Superscripts would conserve even more paper space! Why don't they make history and become the first country in the world to issue currency in exponential form? --Let Us Update Special:Ancientpages. 03:33, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Or follow the example of the Hungarian pengö. It had notes up to one billion, the ten billion note was "ten thousand million" (with the number 10000 on it), it went so up to one billion million after which they started counting trillions (i.e., the ten quadrillion pengö note was "ten thousand trillion pengö"). I think. Z$, if they don't redenominate, should do the same, only counting in billions and not millions. I.e., the one trillion note will have "one trillion dollars" in words on it but "1000 billion" on the place where the number usually is.--77.128.31.226 (talk) 17:45, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

You're largely right. See Hyperinflation for more examples/discussion. The largest bank note with all the actual zeros printed on so far was the 500000000000 (500 billion) Yugoslav dinar (see article for images). So the Zimbabwean dollar hasn't made a world record yet and since they seem to be in the late stages of a revaluation, perhaps won't this time around. Of course, they could always go the route of the Hungarian pengő [14] and Weimar Republic mark [15] and not bother with all the zeroes in which case they still have a fair way away before they beat the 100 quintillion pengő if they go this router. Nil Einne (talk) 20:35, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

It looks like they are working on a 500 Billion note [16]. I'm thinking the one trillion note can't be too far off. That is unless they run out of paper. Jd.mackiewicz (talk) 13:02, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Premium for cash

According to [17], there is a factor of 4.25 difference between the cash exchange rate and the electronic one, due to cash shortages. Which exchange rate should we be reporting? For reference, the implied rate in the article is Z$141 billion per US$1 for cash and Z$600 billion electronically. Finding regular and reliable reports of the cash rate is probably difficult, but perhaps we should try and report both where possible (with the cash rate in the notes section, perhaps?). --Tango (talk) 20:20, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

That article appears to be a copy of the original here dated 27/7/08. BTW the article says "Z$1,2-quadrillion. .... equivalent of about .... $8 500 at the black market cash exchange rate, or $2 000 at a third exchange rate used in electronic money transfers". I.e.:

1.4 quadrillion (10^15) / 8500 --> USD 1 = ZWD 160 billion for cash.

1.4 quadrillion (10^15) / 2000 --> USD 1 = ZWD 700 billion for electronic transfers.

This implies cash is more valuable than deposits in banks? Is this because of the reported withdrawal limits preventing people getting there money out of banks before it reduces in value?

P.S. Why are rates quoted to 13 figures? The source data (e.g. [18] is only to two figures). TiffaF (talk) 12:23, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, there is a cash shortage. Lack of supply with constant demand increases price, that's supply and demand. As for the excessive precession, you are correct, it should be rounded after converting from GBP to USD, I'll do that now. --Tango (talk) 18:17, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Inflation rate

The inflation rate is officially at 2.2 million percent, while the last unofficial estimate is around 10 million. However, if you take the value of the Z$ to the US$ (parallel rate) as base, and assume that the rate was 2,000,000 on Jan 1st and will be 750,000,000,000 on Aug 1, you get a month to month inflation rate of 525.591 %, or an annual inflation rate of of roughly 3,593,237,355 %.

Date	Rate in millions
January 1	2
February 1	12.51
March 1	78.27
April 1	489.67
May 1	3,063.32
June 1	19,163.84
July 1	119,887.24
August 1	750,003.76
September 1	4,691,956.02
October 1	29,352,454.61
November 1	183,626,314.32
December 1	1,148,749,696.02
January 1	7,186,474,710.81

Divide 7,186,474,710,81 by 2 gets you an annual inflation rate of 3,593,237,355.41 % or roughly 3.6 billion percent, with a projected parallel rate on Jan 1, 2009 of 7,186,474,710,810,000 or roughly 7 quadrillion to the US$.

So : Is the ZIM$ devaluing a lot faster than it is losing local value or are the inflation estimations (2.2. & 10 million %) just wildly off ?

Btw : At this inflation rate the ZIM$ is going to overtake Yugoslavia's inflation by January 2010 and surpass Hungary's alltime record sometime in March 2010, when one US$ will be worth around 1 octillion current Z$ or 1 nonillion old Z$ (1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000)

Passportguy (talk) 17:38, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The quoted inflation rates are probably year-on-year rather than instantaneous rates, meaning they're the difference between now and a year ago rather than the rate prices are increasing at the moment. That means you can't just take the monthly rate and scale up, since the monthly rate is increasing. Put simply, the annual rates are dragged down by the (relatively speaking) low inflation a year ago. --Tango (talk) 18:25, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, if you base the inflation rate on the OMIR rate, you get a year-on-year increase of more than 300 million percent, with it being over 500 million percent when the OMIR rate shortly climbed up to 690 billion Z$ per US$--Alexmagnus2 (talk) 19:48, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Really? If so, that would suggest a 3000% real terms devaluation of the currency in a year, which is quite something, although not entirely surprising. Where did you find the OMIR for a year ago? Our article doesn't seem to have one. --Tango (talk) 20:12, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Found it, [19] has a Year-on-year figure of 350 million percent! The currency really has devalued enormously, probably due to the complete lack of any real exports (I believe tobacco was the main export before the "land reform") and lots of imports (pretty much everything - nothing is made in Zim anymore). --Tango (talk) 20:15, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Revaluation - 10 zeros removed

Its being widely reported that from 1st August 10 zeros are being removed. So Z$10,000,000,000 becomes Z$1 [20]. I suppose the main page will need to be updated to reflect this major change. Pity, I was looking forward to a Z$500Billion dollar note. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.157.246.18 (talk) 10:10, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

This new information needs to be added to wikinews as well. Quite a lot will be happening on this page it seems, so we need to keep it updated (I am far too lazy!)--HandGrenadePins (talk) 12:42, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Anyone know which denomination will be issued ? $1, $5, $10 $20 ??? [21] suggests that banknotes as high as $500 will be issued. Passportguy (talk) 13:55, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I found the answer here : http://www.zimonline.co.za/Article.aspx?ArticleId=3487. The planned denominations are $5, $10, $20, $100, $500. Plus coins at $5, $10 and $25. Passportguy (talk) 14:07, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

What is the point of issuing coins? They're going to be worthless in a few weeks... I know Gono says they're going to make sure the zeros don't come back, but he hasn't said how they're going to do that. --Tango (talk) 17:53, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

What is even more interesting is that the old coin will suddenly be worth 10 Billion times more on Aug 1st. I wonder what their melt value is? I wonder if anyone stashed away a bunch of them? 163.11.83.13 (talk) 18:45, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Surely not, they're demonetising the old currency, aren't they? It would seem very strange to do otherwise. --Tango (talk) 19:03, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Apparently not:

The biggest laugh is for those people who did not throw out the erstwhile useless coinage from long ago, which Gono stated was never demonetised and will now be back in circulation as legal tender. Gono mentioned specifically people who either threw away these coins or gave them to domestic workers. -[22]

What a strange decision... why on Earth would they multiply the value of existing coins by a factor of 10 billion? It makes a mockery of the whole thing... --Tango (talk) 23:31, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Given how "bad" the inflation went; and assuming no new coins were minted since their last release in 1997; I doubt there would be a sizeable (however may still be large) number left in circulation except those either thrown away or sold to collectors and other people alike. But then again how much can the bi-metallic $5 buy after the revaluation? a Loaf of bread would cost even greater than $10 after the revaluation Ruby Cored (talk) 00:34, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

well they're not the first to do such thing; the cents of Suriname Gulden was declared legal tender when they revalued their currency in 2004 by a factor of 1,000... Ruby Cored (talk) 00:34, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

The Soviets did the same thing in 1947 and 1961 with the ruble, knocking one zero off the value of banknotes, but leaving coins as they were. Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 21:12, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

The old ZIM$ bearer cheques will still remain valid until Dec 31st. I'm not quite sure if this is just for exchange or a legal tender.

On the coin front : You are absolutely right Tango. It is rather strange to issue coins, especially as notes with the same or a similar value will also be issued. Passportguy (talk) 19:10, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree; It would've made more sense if those coins were denominated in cents... Ruby Cored (talk) 19:23, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I somehow doubt these coins are ever really going to be issued. Given the high cost of coinage and the fact that we'll be back at 7 million Z3rd$ to the US$ at the end of this year unless there is a radical change in fiscal policy (unlikely unless there is a change of leadership), it doesn't really seem worthwhile to issue coins which will in all probability be worthless by the end of the August. Passportguy (talk) 20:56, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, does anyone know where they're getting the paper for these new notes? --Tango (talk) 19:48, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I think an Austrian company - I forget the name - is still supplying them with paper. Passportguy (talk) 20:48, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Is is said that these notes were already the printed-but-never-released the revalued notes prepared back in 2007; but maybe they would just be making a complete new design for this case perhaps? Ruby Cored (talk) 00:34, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

This would be funny if it wasn't so tragic. I also read that they are bringing coins back, and encouraging people to use old ones if they still have them. The article mentioned one woman who had a whole bucket of them, making her a multitrillionaire. However, she said there is nothing to buy so it seems pointless. The article also quotes Mugabe threatening to stop inflation with "emergency measures" and hinting "they can be tough rules". Menacing enough??? When will they realize that printing higher denominations, revaluing, and threats won't stop inflation, and actually produce goods so the money is worth something? Though there is something to be said for a government with the foresight to print notes a year in advance on the off-chance of multi-million percent inflation... JKRS ONE (talk) 07:14, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

The thing is, their "tough rules" are presumably just strictly enforced price controls. That's never going to work when most products are only available on the black market as it is. The zeros are going to come back, and quickly. Revaluing all the existing coins is going to dramatically increase the money supply, for a start. --Tango (talk) 16:53, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

[23] claims new $1,$2,$5,$10,$20,$100 and $500 notes rather than just $5, $10, $20, $100 and $500 and new $5, $10 and $25 coins, while All old coins are legal tender. It also claims the new notes will actually be "banknotes" rather than "bearer cheques". $1000000000ten0one1 (talk) 09:40, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I added what I imagine is the last updated rate at siyabonga-tatenda.com before they knock all those zeroes off on the first of August, but I wasn't sure how many significant digits to use. The GBP/USD rate was given with five digits, so I rounded to the nearest 10 million, but if someone wants to make a rounder figure, go ahead. The Z$ has actually gained some ground if you look at swradioafrica.com (is that an actual offer, or just for informational purposes?), so maybe we won't see such ludicrous numbers once all these long-stored third dollars come out. Heian-794 (talk) 13:42, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

So, is this officially the third Zimbabwean dollar? If so, it should be indicated in the article that the second dollar is through, and this is lucky number 3. 76.66.209.194 (talk) 13:45, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Does anyone know if there will be a currency code change from ZWD ? $1000000000ten0one1 (talk) 06:03, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

In theory there should be, see ISO 4217. But since the Zimbabwean Reserve Bank were unable to adjust to a change in code last time and that was only 2 years ago (see the article or [24]), I'm not sure if they'd be able to this time Nil Einne (talk) 06:23, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

xe.com seem to think that it'll be ZWR, but we'll see whether it won't just be the same as last time (when they first rolled out ZWN, but then went back to ZWD immediately). —Nightstallion 13:25, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Reuters apparently disagrees. —Nightstallion 13:36, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

And now xe.com has removed ZWR, so I think something similar happened this time -- is anyone up to finding out whether ZWR was actually introduced this time, as well, or whether that was xe.com's mistake? —Nightstallion 17:34, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Should we update the picture and the coins & banknotes section of the Zimbabwe dollar to match the new dollar (third) ? $1000000000ten0one1 (talk) 09:13, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

The list of current notes and coins should include the new values for the old ones still in circulation. The 100 million, 250 million, 500 million, 5 billion, and 25 billion notes would be worth 1¢, 2½¢, 5¢, 50¢, and $2.50 and if the old coins are being made legal tender for the third dollar, 1¢, 5¢, 10¢, 20¢, and 50¢ should be included in that list. Goldenbarrel88 (talk) 21:12, 1 August 2008 (UTC)