More than $360 million worth of new $50 notes will be pumped into circulation beginning Wednesday, as the country’s currency reforms continue, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) has announced.
Cash shortages are progressively easing as monetary authorities continue to drip-feed new notes into the market.
Banks would have to swap their balances to access the new notes from the central bank.
In a statement Tuesday, the RBZ said: “The bank shall release ZWL$360 million through the normal banking channels and banks are expected to fund their respective accounts held by the Reserve Bank and collect the cash by 7 July 2021.”
Announcing plans to introduce the new notes in its Monetary Policy Statement on February 18, 2021, the central bank reiterated that “banknotes, new or old, do not cause inflation in an economy since they do not increase money supply”.
Government gazzetted Statutory Instrument (SI) 196 of 2021 gazetted on Tuesday to pave way for the release of the new notes.
Higher denomination banknotes are expected to increase physical money supply and curtail prevailing cash shortages in the market.
Zimbabwe currently has the ZWL$2, $5 and $20 bank notes.
DESIGN OF NEW NOTES
- on the front side the dominant feature shall be the logo of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (three balancing rocks), with the visually impaired recognition feature to the left, latent image showing the denomination, windowed security strip inscribed “50” with colour shift from red to green, watermark with highlighted inscription “RBZ” and see-through of Zimbabwe Bird looking to the left in perfect register, as secondary features; and
- (b) on the back side there shall be an impression of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and the motif of Mbuya Nehanda, gold coloured iridescent band showing the denomination of the note and see-through of Zimbabwe Bird looking to the right.”
