Brother, Can You Spare a Z$200,000 Note?

Hyperinflations would be almost comic if it were not for the misery they inflict on the people they affect. In the misruled African country of Zimbabwe, the inflation rate of the Zimbabwean dollar has reached an annualized rate of 13,000 percent. According to a story Thursday in the Financial Times, an IMF official predicts the annual rate could be heading towards an incredible 100,000 percent.

One sure sign of a hyperinflation is that the central bank must issue new currency notes in ever higher denominations so that people won’t have to carry bags or wheelbarrows of money around to make everyday purchases. Sure enough, the government of Zimbabwe is now wrestling with that very question. According to the FT story:

The launch yesterday of a new large-denomination bank note of Z$200,000—worth [US$13] at the official exchange rate and [US$1.30] at the more realistic parallel rate—underlines the disarray. The central bank had wanted to issue a Z$500,000 note, but a bank official said this was vetoed by the finance ministry because senior staff thought such a large denomination would have reinforced an impression that inflation was out of control.

At a 13,000 percent rate, that cat is probably already out of the bag.