Tremendously interesting story from Bloomberg. Some choice passages:
- The central bank is considering introducing a stability mechanism for the dinar, says Faleh Daoud Salman, the interim governor of the central bank... “At the moment, I can’t intervene in the currency market directly.... We’ve started our printing presses again and everyone in the market should be well supplied.”
- “We’ve been putting the word out through advertising that the 10,000 bill is legal tender and should be accepted at face value,” says Henry Janiszewski, a U.S. Treasury Department official.
- “The dinar isn’t a real currency, it’s ordinary paper,’’ says Basil al-Hussaini, an economist with the United Nations Development Program in Baghdad.
- “There’s no authority in Iraq, so traders can charge whatever amount they want,” remarked a currency trader who said his name was Adel.
