New currency: The Egyptian Pound

The Egyptian Pound (جنيه مصرى ) is the current legal currency of Egypt. The pound is divided into 100 piasters (قرش qirsh), or 1,000 milliemes (مليم mallim) issued by the Central Bank of Egypt.

 

 

Its ISO 4217 code is EGP, which is also the symbol used internationally. Within Egypt the same symbol is used as the pound sterling (£) which is known as the pound, or also the symbol "LE", which is the acronym for livre egyptienne in French.

The origin of the Egyptian pound dates back to 1834, when the creation of a coin on a bimetallic basis was approved. The new currency came to replace the Egyptian qirsh as currency (although it continued to circulate until it was integrated into the exchange system with the value of one piastre).
The first pound notes were issued on April 3, 1899. Currently, the Central Bank of Egypt is the body responsible for issuing all Egyptian pound notes and coins.
The origins of the Egyptian national currency date back to the mid-19th century, when the country was still part of the Ottoman Empire. It was then, specifically in 1834, when a decree was issued establishing a legal tender for Egypt based on a bimetallic standard (gold and silver).

This coin, called the Egyptian pound (Arabic geneih), replaced the earlier Egyptian piastre (ersh), which nevertheless continued to circulate as fractional currency. Each new pound was equal to 100 piastres and, from the year 1916, also to 1,000 milliemes (malleem).
During the British colonial period, the Egyptian pound was pegged to the British pound. This parity was maintained until 1962, when it became pegged to the US dollar.
The Egyptian pound was also legal tender in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan between 1899 and 1956, and also in the region of Cyrenaica (in present-day Libya) between 1942 and 1951. Today it is also used as a regular currency in the state. Palestinian.

 

 

The design of Egyptian banknotes always follows the same scheme: the most important and representative mosques of the country are shown on the obverse, while the reverse pays homage to the glorious legacy of Pharaonic Egypt.
The texts on Egyptian banknotes are written in Arabic with Eastern Arabic numerals on the obverse and in English with Westernized Arabic numerals on the reverse.
The current denominations of the Egyptian pound banknotes are the following: 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 and 200 pounds.