Zimbabwe has scrapped the dollar – several years after people stopped using it and turned to the US version. Confidence in the currency was long ago shattered by hyperinflation: when the government stopped publishing data in 2008, the annual rate was 231 million per cent.
The worst daily rate was almost 100%, second only to Hungary’s hyperinflationary episode in 1946. “The central bank just kept printing notes until the last batch weren’t worth enough to purchase the ink to produce the rest,” says Tim Worstall on forbes.com.
The amount on the largest banknote was Z$100trn. Land grabs in 2000 led to food shortages, exacerbated by price controls, and the government also went on a spending spree to placate voters and neutralise rivals. As tax revenues slid and debt soared, the government kept printing money to fill the gap, stoking inflation. Today the greenback buys 35 quadrillion (15 zeros) Zimbabwean dollars.