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Argentina will issue a new 2,000-peso bank note in response to rising inflation, the country’s central bank has confirmed.
The BCRA will issue the new notes – worth $11 (£9) – as consumer prices rose nearly 95 per cent in the 12 months to the end of December, marking the fastest pace of inflation in the country since 1991.
The largest peso bill is currently 1,000 pesos, worth only $2.75 in international markets.
BCRA said in a tweet that the new note “will commemorate the development of science and medicine in Argentina”.
The note will feature pioneering doctors Cecilia Grierson and Ramon Carrillo, the central bank confirmed, although there was no further information on the circulation date.
The initial circulation of the currency was seen in 1992 when it was pegged to one US dollar. After the financial crisis, however, the initial fixed exchange rate system was abandoned after Argentina plunged into a financial crisis in 2001 and 2002.
Rising prices have been blamed on central-bank money printing, as well as the war in Ukraine.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) approved a further $6 billion (£4.9bn) in bailout money for South America’s second-largest economy in December. The country already owes more than $40 billion to the IMF.
The country saw three economy ministers in the space of four weeks last summer, a sign of the complex nature of the economic turmoil facing the country.
The central bank has raised key interest rates to 75 percent as it tries to rein in the rising cost of living. Argentina faces some of the highest inflation in the world, with rates above 70 percent.
The country has had financial problems since the 2018 economic crisis, from which Argentina has yet to fully recover.
Poverty levels in the country are estimated at around 40 percent, compared to when the crisis started where levels were around a quarter.
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