Jamaican dollar
| Jamaican dollar | |
|---|---|
1 dollar coin
|
|
| ISO 4217 | |
| Code | JMD |
| Denominations | |
| Subunit | |
| 1/100 | cent |
| Symbol | $ |
| Banknotes | |
| Freq. used | $50, $100, $500, $1000 |
| Rarely used | $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $5000 |
| Coins | |
| Freq. used | 25c, $1, $5, $10, $20 |
| Rarely used | 1c, 10c, 50c |
| Demographics | |
| User(s) |
 Jamaica
|
| Issuance | |
| Central bank | Bank of Jamaica |
| Website | www |
| Valuation | |
| Inflation | 10.2% |
| Source | Bank of Jamaica Economic Data, 2009 |
The dollar has been the currency of Jamaica since 1969. It is often abbreviated "J$", the J serving to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies. It is divided into 100 cents.
The history of currency in Jamaica should not be considered in isolation of the wider picture in the British West Indies as a whole. See British West Indies dollar. The peculiar feature about Jamaica was the fact that it was the only British West Indies territory to use special issues of the sterling coinage, apart from the four-pence groat coin which was specially issued for all the British West Indies, and later only for British Guiana.
The earliest money in Jamaica was Spanish copper coins called maravedíes. This relates to the fact that for nearly four hundred years Spanish dollars, known as pieces of eight were in widespread use on the world's trading routes, including the Caribbean Sea region. However, following the revolutionary wars in Latin America, the source of these silver trade coins dried up. The last Spanish dollar was minted at the Potosí mint in 1825. The United Kingdom had adopted a very successful gold standard in 1821, so 1825 was an opportune time to introduce the British sterling coinage into all the British colonies.
An imperial order-in-council was passed in that year for the purposes of facilitating this aim by making sterling coinage legal tender in the colonies at the specified rating of $1 = 4s 4d (one Spanish dollar to four shillings and four pence sterling). As the sterling silver coins were attached to a gold standard, this exchange rate did not realistically represent the value of the silver in the Spanish dollars as compared to the value of the gold in the British gold sovereign, and as such, the order-in-council had the reverse effect in many colonies. It had the effect of actually driving sterling coinage out, rather than encouraging its circulation.
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Wikipedia