Sample of Rupiah banknote

The rupiah is the monetary unit of Indonesia (currency code IDR).

The name derives from the Indian monetary unit rupee. Indonesia used the Dutch guilder from 1610 to 1817, when the Dutch East Indies guilder was introduced. The rupiah was first introduced by during the World War II Japanese occupation, and after the end of the war the Java Bank briefly issued its own Java rupiah as a replacement. The Netherlands' Nica guilder and various guerrilla-linked currencies were also in use around the archipelago.

Four years after independence, the Indonesian rupiah was introduced on November 2, 1949 as the new national currency. The Riau islands and the Indonesian half of New Guinea (Irian Barat) had their own variants of the rupiah, but these were subsumed into the national rupiah in 1964 and 1971 respectively. Devalued by rampant inflation, on December 13, 1965 the New Rupiah was introduced at a rate of 1000 old rupiah to one new rupiah.

The Asian economic crisis of 1997-1998 reduced the rupiah's value by 35% overnight and was a major factor in the overthrow of President Suharto's government. The rupiah had traded at about 2000-3000 rupiah per 1 US dollar, but reached a low of 16800 rupiah per dollar in June 1998.

The rupiah is a freely convertible currency, but trades at a penalty due to continued high inflation. As of December 2004, 1 US dollar is approximately equal to 9,160 rupiah.

External links

• Latest Rupiah exhange rate (from US Dollar) (http://quote.yahoo.com/m5?a=1&s=USD&t=IDR), (from British Pound) (http://quote.yahoo.com/m5?a=1&s=GBP&t=IDR)
• Information on Rupiah (http://www.expat.or.id/info/rupiahworld.html)
• Images of banknotes Rupiah (http://www.banknotes.com/id.htm)
• Images of banknotes Guilder (http://www.banknotes.com/nli.htm)