Wednesday, 7 February 2018

Money


My broken foot is mending but I am still spending most of my time at home.  Boredom has forced me to explore a few corners of the house that I rarely visit and one such expedition proves just what a lousy housekeeper I am.  A voyage to the depths of the under-the-stairs box files turned up 3,000 Turkish Lira. A momentary whoop was crushed by the realisation that these notes were long out of circulation. I cursed my carelessness and began to calculate what I could have done with this money back in the last century and I'm sorry to say the answer is 'not much' which is why they were languishing in the murky depths. This was very small change. 
In 1980, 1 US dollar bought 90TL; in 1988 - 1,300TL;  1995 - 45,000TL and 2001 1 US dollar got you 1,650,000TL.  
The dollar rate today is 3.78  (which equates to 3,780,000TL in pre-2005 Turkish Lira)
Today there is a rumour circulating that foreign currency will no longer be issued from ATM machines in Turkey and banks are offering over 30% a year interest if one agrees to keep lira in their accounts for 3 years.  I'm not an economist and could never understand how the enormous inflation rates were stemmed early this century (please explain below if you know). I'll hang to my old Turkish Lira as a reminder that for a brief period 18 years ago I was a multi-billionaire. 
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12 comments:

  1. the fly in the web7 February 2018 at 17:59

    Bring back the Maria Theresa thaler...

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    Replies
    1. BacktoBodrum8 February 2018 at 09:01

      If I'd found a trio of these under the stairs I would be a very happy bunny

      Delete
  2. Alan8 February 2018 at 08:45

    30% over three years? You'd be better off stuffing it under the mattress (or stairs), at least it would have curiosity value.

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  3. Mark and Jolee8 February 2018 at 12:11

    So, that's what it takes to get you to clean out the dark corners of the house! (We're so good at collecting junk, I'm glad our apartment is so tiny.) Carry on and report on other cool stuff you find. xoxo J and M

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  4. Jack Scott8 February 2018 at 15:16

    Oh, how I remember having to put my thumb over the last three zeros to make sense of what I was spending!

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  5. Dee9 February 2018 at 21:31

    Dear Annie, oh the vagaries of the economy and the stock market and all that has to do with money! I'll never understand it and I did at one point study both micro- and macro- economics. I was too young to appreciate what I was learning so none of it "stuck." Peace.

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  6. Noreen10 February 2018 at 18:42

    I'll need to buy some Euro for traveling to Ireland in the summer. Should I buy it now?, I wonder.

    ReplyDelete

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