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Italy Mulls Plan to Scrap 1c and 2c Coins from 2018

Started by Bimat, May 18, 2017, 05:26:50 AM

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Bimat

Italy mulls plan to scrap one- and two-cent coins

AFP
17 May 2017
08:22 CEST+02:00

Italy's ruling Democratic Party on Monday unveiled a proposal to get rid of one- and two-cent coins from 2018 onwards.

Scrapping the small change would amount to savings of €20,000 each year, said the party's Head of Innovation Sergio Boccadutri, who proposed the measure as a budgetary amendment.

According to the MP, each one-cent coin costs 4.2 cents to manufacture, while a two-cent coin costs 5.2 cents.

Since the introduction of the euro in Italy, the mint has spent billions on creating the small denominations, which are rarely accepted in parking meters, toll booths, or vending machines - meaning they often end up forgotten in drawers or old coat pockets.

Across the eurozone, four countries have already largely stopped the production of the two lowest-value coins.

In Belgium, Finland, Ireland and the Netherlands, prices are often rounded to the nearest five cents when consumers pay with cash, though the small coins remain legal tender.

Boccadutri previously suggested introducing rounding in Italy in 2014, when he was an MP for the now-defunct Left Ecology Freedom party.

The Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of Italy's parliament, voted almost unanimously in favour of the proposal, committing the country to "examine the possibility of introducing measures to reduce significantly the demand for one- and two-cent coins".

Source: The Local
It is our choices...that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. -J. K. Rowling.

Figleaf

I like the way this goes: each country deciding for itself, without losing the common coherence. It will be impossible to blame the EU for retaining as well as for getting rid of the small change. I am now looking forward to bleating that the EU is "losing power" as member-states decide stuff for themselves ::)

Peter
An unidentified coin is a piece of metal. An identified coin is a piece of history.

ART

The proposal was accepted today by the parliament.

Bimat

Quote from: Bimat on May 18, 2017, 05:26:50 AM
Scrapping the small change would amount to savings of €20,000 each year, said the party's Head of Innovation Sergio Boccadutri, who proposed the measure as a budgetary amendment.

According to the MP, each one-cent coin costs 4.2 cents to manufacture, while a two-cent coin costs 5.2 cents.

Since the introduction of the euro in Italy, the mint has spent billions on creating the small denominations,

May be I'm missing something, but is that number mentioned in first sentence (annual saving of €20,000 each year) correct? If it's correct, then how did the mint end up in spending billions of euros in creating small denominations since the introduction of the euro?

Aditya
It is our choices...that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. -J. K. Rowling.

Bimat

Italy to stop producing 1- and 2-cent coins

Italy will no longer mint 1- and 2-cent euro coins from 2018, a parliamentary committee decided at the weekend.

The move means all prices in Italy will be rounded to the nearest 5 cents.

Italians were receiving the small copper coins as change but were not spending them, claimed Sergio Boccadutri, the member of the ruling center-left Democratic Party who proposed the measure.

The coins are not accepted by parking meters, vending machines or toll booths, he told national business daily Il Sole 24 Ore. He said they were often left in drawers at home, abandoned in car doors or left at the supermarket checkouts to avoid cluttering pockets.

"In short, it is a production loss, because they cost more than they are worth," he told the newspaper.

Since the euro was introduced in 2004, Italy has spent millions on manufacturing the coins, whose inside is made of iron and whose outside is copper.

In Belgium, Finland, the Netherlands and Ireland, prices are often rounded to the nearest multiple of 5 cents to avoid using the smaller denominations, though they remain legal tender.

Germany keeps the change

Other European Union countries, including Germany, have also considered scrapping the 1- and 2-cent coins, but decided against it.

In 2013 the European Commission reported that the difference between production costs for the small coins and their face value since their introduction had grown to more than 1.4 billion euros (US $1.8 billion at the time).

Stefan Hertel, press spokesman for the German trade association HDE, told Deutsche Welle at the time, "There are relevant surveys, including from the German Central Bank, that show that a huge majority of consumers like the 1- and 2-cent coins and want to keep them."

In Germany an estimated 79 percent of all transactions are conducted in cash.

German retailers also wanted to keep the coins, if only to continue the trend of so-called psychological pricing (sometimes called charm pricing) - for instance, when a product is listed at 9.99 euros rather than the full 10.

Last year the Governing Council of the European Central Bank decided that it would phase out the 500-euro note to curb terrorist financing and money laundering. It became the first and only euro denomination to be discontinued since the euro's introduction.

Source: DW
It is our choices...that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. -J. K. Rowling.