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Deze valuta’s daalden het meest in waarde

According to CBS, consumer goods and services were 7.6 percent more expensive in the month of January than a year earlier. But there are also some examples of countries where the price increase was a bit more extreme due to hyperinflation. As a result, a few 500 bills may not even be enough for your favorite cappuccino in the morning. MASTERS dives into history: which currencies depreciated the most?

Zimbabwe 

Since the introduction of the Zimbabwean dollar in 1980, the currency has been subject to inflation of more than 6500%. The highest number on a Zimbabwean banknote appeared in 2008: 100 trillion. Unfortunately, buying a nice home from this bill was out of the question; the bill was not even enough to ride the bus to work for a week. Therefore, starting in 2009, the country stopped printing new currency and switched to foreign money. In 2019 it was decided to reintroduce the Zimbabwe dollar, but again without success, inflation was immediately above 100% again. 

Venezuela

The bolivar is the currency of Venezuela. It was named after the founder of Venezuela in 1825, Simón Bolívar. Venezuela suffers from high inflation. In an effort to keep the economy going, a lot of extra money was put into circulation. Prices soared as a result. In 2021, for example, a 2-liter bottle of soda cost more than 8 million bolivars. To combat hyperinflation, it was announced last year that six zeros would be removed from the currency. 

Hungary

The Hungarian forint is a relatively young currency, having existed only since 1946. The pengő was Hungary's currency for nearly 40 years until it was abruptly replaced after World War II. Indeed, by the end of July 1946, this currency reached an inflation rate of 41,900,000,000,000,000,000,000% per month. The prices of products almost doubled every 16 hours. The country even put into circulation the bill with the highest face value ever. The bill of 100 million B-pengős was the designation for 100 trillion normal pengő. Just to clarify, that's a 1 with 20 zeros....

Indonesia

The currency of Indonesia was introduced on Nov. 2, 1949, when Sukarno declared independence. The Indonesian rupiah succeeded the Dutch East Indies guilder. The words rupiah and rupee are derived from Sanskrit rupya which means silver meaning. The Asian financial crisis in 1997 affected much of East Asia, which also had a major impact on the currency. Whereas before the crisis the rupiah had a relatively stable exchange rate of 2,000 to 3,000 rupiah per 1 US dollar, in 1998 it plummeted to a low of 17,500 per dollar.

Iran

In 1978, 71.46 rial was equivalent to one U.S. dollar. Last December, the rate dropped to nearly 370,000 rial for one dollar. The new currency-the toman-should cause the rial to "lose" four zeros, meaning 10,000 rial will soon be one toman.