What was the lowest denomination coin to be in circulation?

Discussion in 'World Coins' started by Williammm, Jun 15, 2019.

  1. swish513

    swish513 Penny & Cent Collector

    Didn't Coin World do an article on this recently? The lowest-value coins from Rome were the quadrans. They were 1/64th of a denarius.
     
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  3. Dnas

    Dnas Active Member

    In absolute terms, the Rin was not worth as little as that. It last minted in 1892, when the yen was 26.96gm (about 1oz) of silver, or equal to a Morgan dollar. 1 sen was 1/100 of a yen, or equal to one cent. So with 10 rin to the sen, the rin was equal to about 1/10 of a US cent. Still small, but not $0.000095, more like around $0.001
     
  4. Finn235

    Finn235 Well-Known Member

    Japan was one of the few "dollar" economies to make a 1/1,000th unit a viable reality, although all coins below 1 yen were demonetized in 1953:
    https://www.boj.or.jp/en/announcements/education/oshiete/money/c07.htm/

    The yen was fixed to the USD under the Bretton Woods system at 1:360, thus a rin was technically worth 0.000278 of a US cent between 1949-1953, although the lowest to actually circulate was the 50 sen coin, worth .14 US cent then, or a few cents today.
    Japan rin meiji 17 1884.jpg

    Better yet, when Japan was transitioning from the Tokugawa monetary system to the new Yen, from 1870-1877 the old currency could be exchanged for new at the rate of 1 Ryo = 1 Yen, thus you needed 4 Mon coins to exchange for a rin
    Kanei tsuho bun edo 1668.jpg
     
  5. tibor

    tibor Supporter! Supporter

    What was the lowest denomination coin? That's easy.
    The one that cashed my last paycheck!!:(:(:bigtears::bigtears:
     
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