currencyvalue: November 2010

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Coins of the United States Dollar

Top row: Sacagawea Dollar, Lincoln Cent, and Roosevelt Dime.
Bottom row: Kennedy Half Dollar and Westward Journey Series Jefferson Nickels

2005 State Quarters: California, Minnesota, Oregon, Kansas, and West Virginia

United States coinage was first minted by the new republic in 1792. New coins have been produced every year since then and they make up a valuable aspect of the United States currency system. Today circulating coins exist in denominations: $0.01, $0.05, $0.10, $0.25, $0.50, and $1.00. Also minted are bullion and commemorative coins. All of these are produced by the United States Mint. The coins are then sold to Federal Reserve Banks which in turn are responsible for putting coins into circulation and withdrawing them as demanded by the country's economy.

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[edit] Current coinage

Today four mints operate in the United States producing billions of coins each year. The main mint is the Philadelphia Mint, which produces circulating coinage, mint sets and some commemorative coins. The Denver Mint also produces circulating coinage, mint sets and commemoratives. The San Francisco Mint produces regular and silver proof coinage, and produced circulating coinage until the 1970s. The West Point Mint produces bullion coinage (including proofs). Philadelphia and Denver produce the dies used at all of the mints. The proof and mint sets are manufactured each year and contain examples of all of the year's circulating coins.
The producing mint of each coin may be easily identified, as most coins bear a mint mark. The identifying letter of the mint can be found on the front side of most coins, and is often placed near the year. Unmarked coins are issued by the Philadelphia mint. Among marked coins, Philadelphia coins bear a letter P, Denver coins bear a letter D, San Francisco coins bear a letter S, New Orleans coins bear a letter O and West Point coins bear a letter W. S and W coins are rarely, if ever, found in general circulation, although S coins bearing dates prior to the mid-1970s are in circulation. CC and D mint marks were used for a short time in the early-to-mid-nineteenth century by temporary mints in Carson City, Nevada and Dahlonega, Georgia, respectively; all such coins are now in the hands of collectors and museums.

[edit] Coins in circulation

Value	Image		Common Reference
Value	Obverse	Reverse	Diameter	Thickness	Mass	Composition	Edge	Obverse	Reverse
$0.01			19.00 mm	1.55 mm	1909-1982 3.11 g	copper 95% tin/zinc 5%¹	Plain	Abraham Lincoln	Wheat	1909–1958	wide²	Wheat Penny, Penny, Cent
			19.05 mm		1909-1982 3.11 g	copper 95% tin/zinc 5%¹			Lincoln Memorial	1959–2008	wide
		see article: 2009 Redesign			1982- present 2.50 g	core: zinc 97.5% plating: copper 2.5%¹			Lincoln bicentennial series	2009
					1982- present 2.50 g	core: zinc 97.5% plating: copper 2.5%¹			Union shield	2010–present
$0.05			21.21 mm	1.95 mm	5.00 g	copper 75% nickel 25%³	Plain	Thomas Jefferson	Monticello	1938–1942, 1946–2003	wide	Nickel
	see article: Westward Journey nickel								Westward Journey Series	2004–2005
									Monticello	2006–present
$0.10			17.91 mm	1.35 mm	2.268 g	copper 91.67% nickel 8.33%⁴	118 reeds	Franklin D. Roosevelt	Torch, oak branch, olive branch	1946–present	wide	Dime
$0.25			24.26 mm	1.75 mm	5.67 g		119 reeds	George Washington	Bald Eagle	1932–1974, 1977–1998⁵	wide	Quarter
									Bicentennial colonial military drummer	(1975) 1976⁵
		See article: 50 State Quarters							State Quarter Series	1999–2008
		See article: D.C. and U.S. Territories Quarters							D.C. and U. S. Territories Quarters	2009
		See article: America the Beautiful Quarters							America the Beautiful Quarters	2010–2021
$0.50			30.61 mm	2.15 mm	11.34 g		150 reeds	John F. Kennedy	Seal of the President of the United States surrounded by 50 stars	1964–1974, 1977–present⁵	limited⁶	Half dollar, 50-cent piece
$0.50			30.61 mm	2.15 mm	11.34 g		150 reeds	John F. Kennedy	Independence Hall	(1975) 1976⁵	limited⁶	Half dollar, 50-cent piece
$1			26.50 mm	2.00 mm	8.10 g		reeded	Susan B. Anthony	Apollo 11 mission insignia	1979–1981, 1999⁸	limited⁶	SBA, Suzie B.
			26.50 mm	2.00 mm	8.10 g	copper 77% zinc 12% Manganese 7% nickel 4%	plain	Sacagawea	Bald Eagle in flight	2000–2008		Gold(en) dollar, Sacajawea, Sackies
		see article: Native American $1 Coin Act					Plain w/ incused inscriptions	Sacagawea	Native American Themes	2009–present		Gold(en) dollar, Sacajawea, Sackies
	see article: Presidential $1 Coin Program⁷						Plain w/ incused inscriptions	Each deceased president	Statue of Liberty	2007–present		Gold(en) dollar
These images are to scale at 2.5 pixels per millimeter. For table standards, see the coin specification table.

[edit] Remarks

The mass and composition of the cent changed to the current copper plated zinc core in 1982. Both types were minted in 1982 with no distinguishing mark. Cents minted in 1943 were struck on planchets punched from zinc coated steel which left the resulting edges uncoated. This caused many of these coins to rust. These "steel pennies" are not likely to be found in circulation today, as they were later intentionally removed from circulation for destruction.
The wheat ear cent was mainstream during its time. Some dates are rare, but some can still be found in circulation.
Nickels produced from mid-1942 through 1945 were manufactured from 56% copper, 35% silver and 9% manganese. This allowed the saved nickel metal to be shifted to industrial production of military supplies during World War II.
Prior to 1965 and passage of the Coinage Act of 1965 the composition was 90% silver and 10% copper. The half-dollar continued to be minted in a 40% silver-clad composition between 1965 and 1970. Dimes and quarters from before 1965 and half-dollars from before 1971 generally don't remain in circulation due to being removed for their silver content.
In 1975 and 1976 bicentennial coinage was minted. Regardless of date of coining, each coin bears the dual date "1776-1976". The Quarter-Dollar, Half-Dollar and Dollar coins were issued in the copper 91.67% nickel 8.33% composition for general circulation and the Government issued 6-coin Proof Set. A special 3-coin set of 40% silver coins were also issued by the U.S. Mint in both Uncirculated and Proof.
Use of the Kennedy half-dollar, Susan B. Anthony and Sacagawea dollars is not as widespread as that of other coins in general circulation; most Americans use quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies only. Coins are minted for general release through banks and other financial institutions, and are also available for collectors in uncirculated rolls, mint sets and proof sets from the United States Mint.
The Presidential Dollar series will feature portraits of all deceased U.S. Presidents with four coin designs issued each year in the order of the president's inauguration date. These coins began circulating on February 15, 2007.
The Susan B. Anthony dollar coin was minted from 1979–1981 and 1999. The 1999 minting was in response to Treasury supplies of the dollar becoming depleted and the inability to accelerate the minting of the Sacagawea dollars by a year. 1981 Anthony dollars can sometimes be found in circulation from proof sets that were broken open, but these dollars were not minted with the intent that they circulate.

[edit] Bullion coins

Non-circulating bullion coins have been produced each year since 1986. They can be found in silver, gold and also platinum since 1997. The face value of these coins is legal as tender, but does not actually reflect the value of the precious metal contained therein.

Type	Diameter	Fineness	Face Value	Content
American Silver Eagle	40.6 mm	999 fine silver	$1	1.00 troy ounce (~31.10 grams)
American Gold Eagle	16.5 mm 22.0 mm 27.0 mm 32.7 mm	916 fine gold (22 karat)	$5 $10 $25 $50	0.10 ozt (~3.11 g) 0.25 ozt (~7.78 g) 0.50 ozt (~15.6 g) 1.00 ozt (~31.10 g)
American Platinum Eagle	16.5 mm 22.0 mm 27.0 mm 32.7 mm	999.5 fine platinum	$10 $25 $50 $100	0.10 ozt (~3.11 g) 0.25 ozt (~7.78 g) 0.50 ozt (~15.56 g) 1.00 ozt (~31.10 g)
American Buffalo	32.7 mm	999.9 fine gold (24 karat)	$50	1.00 ozt (~31.10 g)
America the Beautiful Silver Bullion Coins	76.2 mm	999 fine silver	25¢	5.00 ozt (~155.5 g)

[edit] Commemorative coins

Modern commemoratives have been minted since 1982. A complete list is available here.

Composition of US Modern Commemorative Coins
Type	Total Weight	Diameter	Composition	Precious Metal Content
Half Dollar	11.34 g	30.61 mm (1 in)	Cu 92%, Ni 8%	none
Dollar	26.73 g	38.1 mm (2 in)	Ag 90%, Cu 10%	silver 24.057 g (~0.773 ozt)
Half Eagle	8.359 g	21.59 mm (1 in)	Au 90%, Ag 6%, Cu 4%	gold 7.523 g (~0.242 ozt)
Eagle	16.718 g	26.92 mm (1 in)	Au 90%, Ag 6%, Cu 4%	gold 15.05 g (~0.484 ozt)
First Spouse Eagle Bullion	14.175 g	26.49 mm (1 in)	Au 99.99%	gold 14.175 g (~0.456 ozt)

United States Dollar

The United States dollar (sign: $; code: USD) is the official currency of the United States of America. The U.S. dollar is normally abbreviated as the dollar sign, $, or as USD or US$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies and from others that use the $ symbol. It is divided into 100 cents.
The U.S. dollar is the currency most used in international transactions and is one of the world's reserve currencies.^[13] Several countries use it as their official currency, in many others it is the de facto currency,^[14] and it is also used as the sole currency in some British Overseas Territories.

[edit] Overview

The Constitution of the United States of America provides that the United States Congress shall have the power "To coin Money".^[15] Laws implementing this power are currently codified in Section 5112 of Title 31 of the United States Code. Section 5112 provides that United States dollars shall be issued in two forms: (1) a coin made of a copper alloy and (2) a coin made of pure silver.^[16] Those coins are both designated in Section 5112 as "legal tender" in payment of debts.^[16] The Sacagawea dollar is one example of the copper alloy dollar. The pure silver dollar is known as the American Silver Eagle. Section 5112 also provides for the minting and issuance of other coins, which have values ranging from one-hundredth of one dollar to fifty dollars.^[16] These other coins are more fully described in Coins of the United States dollar.
The Constitution provides that "a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall be published from time to time".^[17] That provision of the Constitution is made specific by Section 331 of Title 31 of the United States Code.^[18] The sums of money reported in the "Statements" are currently being expressed in U.S. dollars (for example, see the 2009 Financial Report of the United States Government).^[19] The U.S. dollar may therefore be described as the unit of account of the United States.
The word "dollar" is one of the words in the first paragraph of Section 9 of Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution. In that context, "dollars" is a reference to the Spanish milled dollar, a coin that had a monetary value of 8 Spanish units of currency, or reales. In 1792 the U.S. Congress adopted legislation titled An act establishing a mint, and regulating the Coins of the United States. Section 9 of that act authorized the production of various coins, including "DOLLARS OR UNITS—each to be of the value of a Spanish milled dollar as the same is now current, and to contain three hundred and seventy-one grains and four sixteenth parts of a grain of pure, or four hundred and sixteen grains of standard silver". Section 20 of the act provided, "That the money of account of the United States shall be expressed in dollars, or units... and that all accounts in the public offices and all proceedings in the courts of the United States shall be kept and had in conformity to this regulation". In other words, this act designated the United States dollar as the unit of currency of the United States.
The U.S. dollar bill uses the decimal system, consisting of 100 equal cents (symbol ¢). In another division, there are 1,000 mills or ten dimes to a dollar, or 4 quarters to a dollar. However, only cents are in everyday use as divisions of the dollar; "dime" is used solely as the name of the coin with the value of 10¢, while "eagle" and "mill" are largely unknown to the general public, though mills are sometimes used in matters of tax levies and gasoline prices. When currently issued in circulating form, denominations equal to or less than a dollar are emitted as U.S. coins while denominations equal to or greater than a dollar are emitted as Federal Reserve notes (with the exception of gold, silver and platinum coins valued up to $100 as legal tender, but worth far more as bullion). Both one-dollar coins and notes are produced today, although the note form is significantly more common. In the past, "paper money" was occasionally issued in denominations less than a dollar (fractional currency) and gold coins were issued for circulation up to the value of $20 (known as the "double eagle," discontinued in the 1930s). The term eagle was used in the Coinage Act of 1792 for the denomination of ten dollars, and subsequently was used in naming gold coins. In 1854, James Guthrie, then Secretary of the Treasury, proposed creating $100, $50 and $25 gold coins, which were referred to as a "Union," "Half Union," and "Quarter Union,"^[20] thus implying a denomination of 1 Union = $100.

Series of 1917 $1 United States bill

Today, USD notes are made from cotton fiber paper, unlike most common paper, which is made of wood fiber. U.S. coins are produced by the United States Mint. U.S. dollar banknotes are printed by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, and, since 1914, have been issued by the Federal Reserve. The "large-sized notes" issued before 1928 measured 7.42 inches (188 mm) by 3.125 inches (79.4 mm); small-sized notes, introduced that year, measure 6.14 inches (156 mm) by 2.61 inches (66 mm) by 0.0043 inches (0.11 mm).

Current Account

In economics, the current account, is one of the two primary components of the balance of payments, the other being the capital account. The current account is the sum of the balance of trade (exports minus imports of goods and services), net factor income (such as interest and dividends) and net transfer payments (such as foreign aid). You may refer to the list of countries by current account balance.

The current account balance is one of two major measures of the nature of a country's foreign trade (the other being the net capital outflow). A current account surplus increases a country's net foreign assets by the corresponding amount, and a current account deficit does the reverse. Both government and private payments are included in the calculation. It is called the current account because goods and services are generally consumed in the current period.

The balance of trade is the difference between a nation's exports of goods and services and its imports of goods and services, if all financial transfers, investments and other components are ignored. A nation is said to have a trade deficit if it is importing more than it exports.
Positive net sales abroad generally contributes to a current account surplus; negative net sales abroad generally contributes to a current account deficit. Because exports generate positive net sales, and because the trade balance is typically the largest component of the current account, a current account surplus is usually associated with positive net exports. This however is not always the case with open economies such as that of Australia featuring an income deficit larger than its trade deficit.
The net factor income or income account, a sub-account of the current account, is usually presented under the headings income payments as outflows, and income receipts as inflows. Income refers not only to the money received from investments made abroad (note: investments are recorded in the capital account but income from investments is recorded in the current account) but also to the money sent by individuals working abroad, known as remittances, to their families back home. If the income account is negative, the country is paying more than it is taking in interest, dividends, etc.
The difference between Canada's income payments and receipts have been declining exponentially as well since its central bank in 1998 began its strict policy not to intervene in the Canadian Dollar's foreign exchange.
The various subcategories in the income account are linked to specific respective subcategories in the capital account, as income is often composed of factor payments from the ownership of capital (assets) or the negative capital (debts) abroad. From the capital account, economists and central banks determine implied rates of return on the different types of capital. The United States, for example, gleans a substantially larger rate of return from foreign capital than foreigners do from owning United States capital.
In the traditional accounting of balance of payments, the current account equals the change in net foreign assets. A current account deficit implies a paralleled reduction of the net foreign assets.

current account = changes in net foreign assets

Fixed Exchange Rate

A fixed exchange rate, sometimes called a pegged exchange rate, is a type of exchange rate regime wherein a currency's value is matched to the value of another single currency or to a basket of other currencies, or to another measure of value, such as gold.
A fixed exchange rate is usually used to stabilize the value of a currency against the currency it is pegged to. This makes trade and investments between the two countries easier and more predictable, and is especially useful for small economies where external trade forms a large part of their GDP.
It can also be used as a means to control inflation. However, as the reference value rises and falls, so does the currency pegged to it. In addition, according to the Mundell-Fleming model, with perfect capital mobility, a fixed exchange rate prevents a government from using domestic monetary policy in order to achieve macroeconomic stability.
There are no major economic players that use a fixed exchange rate (except the countries using the Euro and the Chinese Yuan). The currencies of the countries that now use the euro are still existing (e.g. for old bonds). The rates of these currencies are fixed with respect to the euro and to each other. The most recent such country to discontinue their fixed exchange rate was the People's Republic of China, which did so in July 2005However, as of September 2010, the fixed-exchange rate of the Chinese Yuan has already increased 1.5% in the last 3 months.

Friday, November 26, 2010

The Renminbi came into force in October 1949 when the communist took power on the Chinese mainland. China has become the world's biggest exporter, second largest economy and biggest manufacturer in the world.
For most of its early existence, the Renminbi was pegged to the US Dollar. Its value gradually decline as China embarked on a new economic course during Deng Xiaoping's leadership and transformed into a more market capitalistic economy.
Since 2005, the Chinese government eliminated its policy of pegging the Renminbi to the US Dollar. The Renminbi has now been floating within a small margin to a basket of currencies selected by the Chinese government. This is seen as a move to a more fully free-market floating of the Renminbi. However the People's Bank of China have set a band of ±0.3 percent movement around the currency.
During the onset of the Global financial crisis, the Renminbi was unofficially repegged to the US Dollar.
The Renminbi has appreciated 22 percent since the mechanism reform in 2005 of the Yuan exchange rate.
The Chinese government has recognized the Renminbi needs to slowly increase to boost domestic consumptionIt has enacted a combination of interest rate hikes, reserve requirement hikes and currency appreciation to reduce inflation.

Background

Renminbi Currency Value

Renminbi currency value is a issue which is now at the forefront in world economic circles. Some have described it as a trade tension.The emergence of China as a growing economic power due to its vast population, resources, economic reforms and industrialization. Its official currency Renminbi which is is classified as a fixed exchange rate to a basket of currencies is drawing attention or scrutiny from other western industrialized nations which have freely floated currency and has become a source of trade friction. Its chief protagonist is the United States who have labelled the persistent fixed rate as making Chinese goods unfairly competitive and cheaper, slowing the recovery of the United States employment and economic growth.
Some have argued with the current economic conditions, the value of the Renminbi should appreciate from 20 to 40 percent against the US Dollar.

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