Belarus Issues New 200,000 Banknote After 108.7% Inflation

New 200,000 Ruble Belarus Banknote.

Belarus’s central bank unveiled a 200,000-ruble ($24) banknote, twice the denomination of its current largest bill, aiming to lighten people’s wallets after the national currency lost two-thirds of its value last year.

“The decision to issue the new note was made in order to improve the cashflow structure,” central bank Deputy Chairman Vladimir Senko told reporters today in the Natsionalnyi Bank Respubliki’s headquarters in the capital, Minsk.

The new bill is green-colored and depicts an art museum in the eastern city of Mogilev. The former Soviet republic saw its currency depreciate 64 percent against the dollar last year as inflation soared to 108.7 percent. A Belarusian citizen will need 14 new banknotes and a little extra change to pocket an average monthly salary of 2.9 million rubles.

While consumer prices rose 107.4 percent in February from a year earlier, the monthly rate slowed to 1.5 percent from 1.9 percent in January, the Minsk-based state statistics committee said on its website today. The government and the central bank declared battling inflation as their priority and seek to cap price growth at 19 percent to 22 percent this year.