Malaysia Ringgit Story

Malaysia ringgit history start since Portuguese colonial era. The word ringgit come from the word "jagged" in Malay. It was originally used to refer to the serrated edges of silver Spanish dollars which circulated widely in the area during the 16th and 17th century Portuguese colonial era. What you see in here is a Mexico coin. I am not sure whether this is the same coin used in Portuguese colonial era at that time or not. By the way, this is a replica coin.

Malaya gained its independent on 31st August 1957 to form Malaysia on 16 September 1963. Bank Negara Malaysia has been given the authority to issue Malaysia currency since 1958. This authority was given under Bank Negara Tanah Melayu Ordinance 1958. The Board of commissioners of Currency Malaya and British Borneo still continued to issue currency until 12 June 1967. On 16 January 1969, the old Malaya currency legal tender value been ceased. Before that, it been circulated alongside 1st Malaysia currency since June 1967.

The Malay names ringgit and sen were officially adopted as the sole official names in August 1975. Previously they had been known officially as dollars and cents in English and ringgit and sen in Malay, and in some parts of the country this usage continues. For example, in Malaysia one ringgit is "one dollar" in English and "tsit8-kho·1" (蜀塊/蜀块) in Hokkien. In the northern states of Peninsular Malaysia, denominations of 10 sen are called kupang in Malay ("poat8" in Hokkien), e.g. 50 sen is 5 kupang. The use of the dollar sign "$" (or "M$") was not replaced by "RM" (Ringgit Malaysia) until the 1990s, though internationally "MYR" (MY being the country code for Malaysia) is more widely used.

The first series of sen coins were introduced in 1967 in denominations of 1 sen, 5 sen, 10 sen, 20 sen, 50 sen, followed by the introduction of the 1 ringgit coin (which continued to use the $ symbol and is the largest coin in the series) in 1971. Bank Negara Malaysia first issued Malaysia paper money in June 1967 in $1, $5, $10, $50 and $100 denominations. The $1000 denomination was first issued in 1968. Malaysia paper money have always carried the image of Tuanku Abdul Rahman, the first Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia.

In 1999 the RM500 and RM1000 notes were discontinued and ceased to be legal tender. This was due because of the Asian monetary crisis of 1997 when huge amounts of ringgit were taken out of the country to be traded in these notes. In effect the notes were withdrawn out of circulation and the amount of ringgit taken out of the country in banknotes was limited to RM1000. In 1993, $1 notes were discontinued and replaced by the $1 coin. In 2000, the RM1 note was reintroduced, replacing the RM2 note, which remains legal tender.

In 1986, Malaysia 5 ringgit banknote have been redesign because of some issue regarding a flag pole with a cross. Most Malaysian is Islam and they don't want to carry a money with a cross on them. Bank Negara never make a statement about this. The 1984 banknote had been replaced with almost same design 5 ringgit banknote without a cross flag pole on them. I am not sure whether the same happen to Istana Negara Flag pole. In 1995, 20 ringgit banknote were discontinued and ceased to be legal tender.

In 2004, Bank Negara issued a new RM10 paper money with additional security features including the holographic strip previously only seen on the RM50 and RM100 notes. A new RM5 polymer banknote with a distinctive transparent window was also issued. Both new banknotes are almost identical to their original third series designs. According to Bank Negara, all paper notes will eventually be phased out and replaced by polymer notes.

On December 7, 2005, the 1 ringgit coin was demonetised and withdrawn from circulation. This was partly due to problems with standardisation (two different versions of the second series coin were minted) and forgery. On November 2007, Bank Negara Malaysia announce that 1 sen coin will start to be discontinued. this is because of the high cost to produce them and with some 4.4 billion minted and 99% have been lost in circulation. 

The 1 sen coin is still in legal tender but most seller in this country will not except them. A new rounding mechanism introduced with whereby the total bill amount (including goods and services subject to tax) is rounded upwards or downwards to the nearest multiple of 5 sen. In this regard, total bill amount that ends in 1, 2, 6 and 7 sen will be rounded down while 3, 4, 8 and 9 sen will be rounded up to the nearest multiple of 5 sen. 

Source: wikipedia, wapedia, Bank Negara Malaysia, 

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