Zimbabwean Bond Coins

Zimbabwean bond coins
ISO 4217 code	USD
Country	Zimbabwe
Issuers	Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (2014–present)
Denominations	1, 5, 10, 25, 50 Cents, 1 Dollar

The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe began to release Zimbabwean bond coins on 18 December 2014. The coins are supported by a US$50 million facility extended to the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe by Afrexim Bank. To date coins worth US$15 million have been struck out of the total fifty million dollars available. The coins are denominated at 1, 5, 10, and 25 cents and are pegged to the corresponding values in United States currency. A 50 cent bond coin was finally released in March 2015.

The coins are being issued to remedy a lack of small change resulting from the absence of a solid seigniorage contract with the U.S., South Africa or any of several other countries whose currencies, including the U.S. dollar and the euro, are being used in the multi-currency system that arose in 2009, when Zimbabwe abandoned the Zimbabwean dollar in response to several cycles of hyperinflation. The Zimbabwean economy, being too frail and small to pay the interest which would come with a seigniorage contract, the country chose instead to implement a multi-currency environment based on the US dollar. However, this arrangement has meant a shortage of small change in coins.

Public reaction to the bond coins has been extremely skeptical, with widespread fear that they are the government's first step to reintroducing an unreliable Zimbabwean dollar. John Mangudya, the Governor of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe, has denied that the Zimbabwean dollar is being reintroduced.

The bond coins, struck at the South African Mint in Pretoria, are the first Zimbabwean coins since 2003.

A bimetallic 1 Dollar bond coin was released on 28 November 2016 along with the Zimbabwean Bond Notes for 2 & 5 U.S. dollars [1].

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