Thursday July 17, 2008

Runaway hyperinflation : Zimbabwe inflation rate hits 2.2 million percent officially

This article belongs to the Zimbabwe inflation watch story arc.

channelnewsasia.com :

Zimbabwe's annual rate of inflation has hit a new record high of 2.2 million percent, the central bank's governor Gideon Gono said on Wednesday [16 Jul 2008]. The figure is the first from the authorities in Zimbabwe since the announcement of the rate for February, when it was put at around 165,000 percent.

- So the Zimbabwe government has finally put out an official CPI inflation rate figure, after months of silence. The 2.2 million percent figure is probably understated though. A month back, international observers said that the actual rate was closer to 4 million percent, so it won't be too surprising if actual street price inflation is either already at or is soon going to hit 10 million percent. They ought to be switching over to scientific notation already, if only they had an electronic payment network to support that. For now, it's still currency notes, of which they issued the $500 million dollar banknotes a while ago, and chances are good that they would have to switch over to billion dollar notes soon, making holders of such notes instant "billionaires" - instant "trillionaires" should not be too far off.

Zimbabwe is the modern day hyperinflationary cautionary tale. Will the rest of the world take heed and avoid the same fate, or are we to also follow them down the current path, the path that leads us to global hyperinflation?

See also :

1. Zimbabwe: IMF estimates inflation at 150,000%
2. Zimbabwe inflation hits 165,000%
3. Zimbabwe adds $500 million dollar note as hyperinflation runs on
4. Runaway hyperinflation : Zimbabwe inflation rate now over 1 million percent

(2008-07-17 16:47:32 SGT) [Biz] Permalink Comments [2]

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