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A currency symbol or currency sign is a graphic symbol used to denote a
currency A currency, "in circulation", from la, currens, -entis, literally meaning "running" or "traversing" is a standardization of money in any form, in use or circulation as a medium of exchange, for example banknotes and coins. A more general ...
unit. Usually it is defined by the monetary authority, like the national
central bank A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is an institution that manages the currency and monetary policy of a country or monetary union, and oversees their commercial banking system. In contrast to a commercial bank, a centra ...
for the currency concerned. In formatting, the symbol can use various formattings: before, between or after the numeric amounts: , and , for example; this positioning is determined by national convention. The symbol is not defined or listed by ISO 4217: that only assigns three-letter codes to currencies (like for Azerbaijani manat) and special cases like gold and silver ( and respectively) that are used as financial instruments.


Usage

When writing currency amounts, the location of the symbol varies by language. Many currencies in English-speaking countries and Latin America (except Haiti) place it before the amount (e.g., R$50,00). The
Cape Verdean escudo The escudo (sign: ; ISO 4217: CVE) is the currency of the Republic of Cape Verde. One escudo is subdivided into one hundred ''centavos''. Amounts are generally written by using the () as the decimal separator, such as for 20 escudos, or for ...
(like the
Portuguese escudo The Portuguese escudo was the currency of Portugal from May 22nd 1911 until the introduction of the euro on January 1st 2002. The escudo was subdivided into 100 . The word derives from the scutum shield. Amounts in escudos were written as ...
, to which it was formerly pegged) places its symbol in the decimal separator position (e.g. 20$00). Banco de Cabo Verde.
Moedas
." Accessed 25 Feb 2011.
In many European countries such as France, the symbol is usually placed after the amount (e.g. 20,50 €). The decimal separator also follows local countries' standards. For instance, the United Kingdom often uses an interpunct as the decimal point on handwritten price stickers (e.g., £5·52), but a full stop (e.g., £5.52) in print. Commas (e.g. €5,00) or decimal points (e.g. $50.00) are common separators used in other countries.


Design

Older currency symbols have evolved slowly, often from previous currencies. The modern dollar and peso symbols originated from the mark employed to denote the Spanish dollar, whereas the pound and lira symbols
evolved Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variati ...
from the letter L (written until the seventeenth century in blackletter type as \mathfrak) standing for , a Roman pound of silver. Newly invented currencies and currencies adopting new symbols have symbolism meaningful to their adopter. For example, the euro sign is based on , an archaic form of the Greek epsilon, to represent Europe; the Indian rupee sign is a blend of the Latin letter ' R' with the
Devanagari Devanagari ( ; , , Sanskrit pronunciation: ), also called Nagari (),Kathleen Kuiper (2010), The Culture of India, New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, , page 83 is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental writing system), based on the ...
letter ( ra); and the Russian Ruble sign is based on (the Cyrillic capital letter 'er'). There are other considerations, such as how the symbol is rendered on computers and typesetting. For a new symbol to be used, its glyphs needs to be added to computer fonts and
keyboard mapping A keyboard layout is any specific physical, visual or functional arrangement of the keys, legends, or key-meaning associations (respectively) of a computer keyboard, mobile phone, or other computer-controlled typographic keyboard. is the actua ...
s already in widespread use, and keyboard layouts need to be altered or shortcuts added to type the new symbol. For example, the
European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body ...
was criticized for not considering how the euro sign would need to be customized to work in different fonts.Westcott, K. (2009
India seeks rupee status symbol
, BBC 10 March 2009, accessed 1 September 2009
The original design was also exceptionally wide. These two factors have led to most
type foundries A type foundry is a company that designs or distributes typefaces. Before digital typography, type foundries manufactured and sold metal and wood typefaces for hand typesetting, and matrices for line-casting machines like the Linotype and ...
designing customized versions that match the 'look and feel' of the font to which it is to be added, often with reduced width.


List of currency symbols currently in use


Rupee symbols by language


List of historic currency symbols

Some of these symbols may not display correctly.


See also

* List of currencies * List of circulating currencies *
Currency Symbols (Unicode block) Currency Symbols is a Unicode block containing characters for representing unique monetary signs. Many currency signs can be found in other Unicode blocks, especially when the currency symbol is unique to a country that uses a script not general ...
* International currency symbol


References

{{Currency symbols