From June 15, 2015, bank accounts with balances of up to 175 quadrillion Zimbabwean dollars will be paid $5, in a process that will legally end the local currency by September.
Zimbabweans will start exchanging “quadrillions” of local dollars for a
few U.S. dollars next week, as President Robert Mugabe’s government
discards its virtually worthless national currency, the central bank
said on Thursday.
The southern African country started using foreign currencies like the
U.S. dollar and the South African rand in 2009 after the Zimbabwean
dollar was ruined by hyper-inflation, which hit 500 billion per cent in
2008.
At the height of Zimbabwe’s economic crisis in 2008, Zimbabweans had to
carry plastic bags bulging with bank notes to buy basic goods like bread
and milk. Prices were rising at least twice a day.
From June 15, 2015, customers who held Zimbabwean dollar accounts before
March 2009 can approach their banks to convert their Zimbabwean dollar
balance into dollars, Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor John Mangudya
said in a statement.
The process will legally end the local currency. Zimbabweans have until
September to turn in their old bank notes, which some people sell as
souvenirs to tourists.
Bank accounts with balances of up to 175 quadrillion Zimbabwean dollars
will be paid $5. Those with balances above 175 quadrillion dollars will
be paid at an exchange rate of $1 to 35 quadrillion Zimbabwean dollars.
The highest — and last — bank note to be printed by the RBZ in 2008 was
100 trillion Zimbabwean dollars. It was not enough to ride a public bus
to work for a week.
The RBZ said customers who still have stashes of old Zimbabwean dollar
notes can walk into any bank and get $1 for every 250 trillion they
hold.
That means a holder of a 100 trillion bank note will on Monday get 40
cents. The RBZ has set aside $20 million to pay Zimbabwean dollar
currency holders.
