The letters MXN make up the official notation to refer to the Mexican peso, the official currency of the United Mexican States. Its currency symbol is "$", and it is very similar to the US dollar symbol (the Mexican peso has one vertical line and the US dollar has two).
With respect to its units, the lowest is one cent and the highest is 1,000 pesos. The most frequently used coins are 1, 2, 5, 10 and 50 pesos, while the most commonly used bills are 20, 50 and 100 pesos.
The currency in Mexico
The Mexican Mint was founded in 1535 and is the oldest in all of America. When the country was founded it was a Spanish colony and was known as New Spain. The first coin that was minted was called "real de a ocho" "peso hard" or "Spanish dollar" and it was made mainly of silver.
The word peso began to be used because when people did not have enough money to pay for something, the custom of paying "by weight" using some type of scale was incorporated. In this way, the popular denomination was extended and the currency ended up being called the Mexican peso.
During its long history, the Mexican peso has had recurring crises
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries it remained very stable, but at the end of the nineteenth a period of instability began. One of the most profound took place during the Mexican Revolution of 1910, when high military expenditures caused great inflation. At that time coins were issued without any state control and the new paper money of the revolutionary period was known as bilimbique.
As for its identification, originally the letters MXP were used and as of 1980 it was changed to the current MXN. It should be noted that Mexico is not the only country in the world whose currency is the peso, as this currency also exists in Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Cuba or Uruguay.
Currently the best known currencies on the international level are the dollar, the euro, the yen, the Swiss franc and the pound sterling.
Different words to refer to money
Although the official name of the Mexican currency is the Mexican peso, in the popular tongue all kinds of terms are used, such as fly, pasta, wool, viyuyo, chayo or morlaco, among many others.
This phenomenon is not unique to Mexico. In fact, in Spain, people talk about pasta, bitches, duros, twine or parné. Among Argentines, terms such as luca, chirola, gamba or copper are used. In Cuba you can say astilla, juaniquiqui, melon, lulas or cañas.
Photos: Fotolia - Piotr Pawinski / Fotopoly
