IMF wants Zimbabwe’s gold-backed ZiG to become sole currency

The International Monetary Fund said it would like to see the ZiG “fully becoming a national currency,” as it weighs whether to place Zimbabwe on a staff-monitored program.

The ZiG, short for Zimbabwe Gold, succeeded the Zimbabwean dollar in April 2024 after multiple crashes.

It’s the country’s sixth attempt since 2009 to replace the dollar as the southern African nation’s main transacting currency, but is yet to succeed.

Several measures will need to be adopted to boost ZiG usage, including deepening the foreign-exchange market to ensure full price discovery, said Wojciech Maliszewski, the Washington-based lender’s mission chief, who is in Zimbabwe to review its request for a new SMP.

The nation’s last program ended abruptly in 2019 after the central bank printed money that fueled the collapse of the local currency.

“Right now we see good stability in the official market and we also see a convergence between the parallel and official rate,” he told reporters