 | |
| ISO 4217 | |
|---|---|
| Code | XEU |
| Unit | |
| Symbol | ₠ |
| Nickname | ECU |
| Demographics | |
| Date of introduction | 13 April 1979 |
| Replaced | European Unit of Account |
| Date of withdrawal | 31 December 1998 |
| Replaced by | Euro |
| User(s) |
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| Valuation | |
| Pegged with |
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| This infobox shows the latest status before this currency was rendered obsolete. | |
TheEuropean Currency Unit (French:Unité de compte européenne,Spanish:Unidad Monetaria Europea,German:Europäische Währungseinheit ; ⟨₠⟩,ECU, orXEU) was aunit of account used by theEuropean Economic Community and composed of abasket of member country currencies. The ECU came in to operation on 13 March 1979 and was assigned theISO 4217 code.[1] The ECU replaced theEuropean Unit of Account (EUA) at parity in 1979, and it was later replaced by theeuro (EUR) at parity on 1 January 1999.[1]
As a unit of account, the ECU was not a circulating currency and did not replace or override the value of the currency of EEC member countries. However, it was used to price some international financial transactions and capital transfers.[2]
Using a mechanism known as the "snake in the tunnel", theEuropean Exchange Rate Mechanism was an attempt to minimize fluctuations between member state currencies—initially by managing the variance of each against its respective ECU reference rate—with the aim to achieve fixed ratios over time, and so enable the European Single Currency (which became known as the euro) to replace national currencies.[citation needed]
In 1990 the BritishChancellor of the ExchequerJohn Major proposed the creation of a 'hard' ECU, which different national currencies could compete against and, if the ECU was successful, could lead to a single currency.[3] The move was seen by France and Germany as a wrecking tactic, especially when the increasinglyEuroscepticThatcher announced her outright opposition to theEuropean Economic and Monetary Union (EMU), and the idea was abandoned.[3]
On 1 January 1999, the euro (with the code EUR and symbol ⟨€⟩) replaced the ECU at par (one-to-one).[1] Unlike the ECU, the euro is a real currency, although not all member states participate (for details on euro membership seeEurozone). Two of the countries in the ECU basket of currencies, the UK andDenmark, did not join the eurozone, and a third,Greece, joined late. On the other hand,Finland andAustria joined the eurozone from the beginning, even though their currencies were not part of the ECU basket, since they had joined the EU in 1995, two years after the ECU composition was "frozen".
Due to the ECU being used in some international financial transactions, there was a concern that foreign courts might not recognize the euro as the legal successor to the ECU. This was unlikely to be a problem, since it is a generally accepted principle ofprivate international law that states determine their currencies, and that therefore states would accept theEuropean Union legislation to that effect. However, for abundant caution, several foreign jurisdictions adopted legislation to ensure a smooth transition. Of particular importance, theU.S. states ofIllinois andNew York adopted legislation to ensure a large proportion of international financial contracts recognized the euro as the successor of the ECU.[4]
The ECU's symbol,₠, consists of an interlacedC andE —the initials of "European Community" in manylanguages of Europe. However, the symbol was not widely adopted. Few computer systems utilized by financial institutions and governments could render it, and commercial payment systems were obliged to use the ISO code, XEU, as with other currencies without widely recognised currency symbols. TheUnicode designation for the ECU symbol (U+20A0 ₠EURO-CURRENCY SIGN) was not implemented on many personal computer operating systems until the release of Unicode v2.1 in May 1998, which also introduced theeuro sign (U+20AC €EURO SIGN).Microsoft did include the ECU symbol in many of its European versions ofWindows beginning in the early 1990s; however, accessing it required the use of anAlt code, and not all typefaces provided a glyph. By 2009, Microsoft referred to the ECU symbol as "historical".[5] Support among other operating systems, includingMacintosh operating systems, was inconsistent.
Although the acronym for ECU is formed from the English name of the unit, theécu was a family of gold coins minted during the reign ofLouis IX of France. The name of the ECU's successor, theeuro, was chosen because the name did not favor any single language, nation, or historical period.[6]
As the ECU was only an electronic unit of account and not a full currency, it did not have any officialcoins ornotes that could be used for everyday transactions. However, various European countries and organizations like theEuropean Parliament madecommemorative andmock-up coins and notes. A common theme on the coins was usually celebratingEuropean unity, such as celebrating membership of the European Union.
Gibraltar issued commemorative coins from 1993[7] through 1998,[citation needed] though these were (nominally)legal tender only in Gibraltar, which uses thepound sterling.
| Period | No. of national currency units (weight, i.e. % contribution to total value) | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1979–1984[α] |  BEF |  DEM |  DKK |  FRF |  GBP |  IEP |  ITL |  NLG |  LUF[β] | |||
| 3.80 (9.64%) | 0.828 (32.98%) | 0.217 (3.06%) | 1.15 (19.83%) | 0.0885 (13.34%) | 0.00759 (1.15%) | 109 (9.49%) | 0.286 (10.51%) | — | ||||
| 1984–1989[γ] | BEF | DEM | DKK | FRF | GBP | IEP | ITL | NLG | LUF[β] | |||
| 3.85 (8.57%) | 0.719 (32.08%) | 0.219 (2.69%) | 1.31 (19.06%) | 0.0878 (14.98%) | 0.00871 (1.20%) | 140 (9.98%) | 0.256 (10.13%) | — | ||||
| 1989–1998[δ] | BEF | DEM | DKK | FRF | GBP | IEP | ITL | NLG | LUF |  ESP |  GRD |  PTE |
| 3.301 (8.183%) | 0.6242 (31.915%) | 0.1976 (2.653%) | 1.332 (20.306%) | 0.08784 (12.452%) | 0.008552 (1.086%) | 151.8 (7.84%) | 0.2198 (9.87%) | 0.13 (0.322%) | 6.885 (4.138%) | 1.44 (0.437%) | 1.393 (0.695%) | |
| 1999 |  EUR[8] | |||||||||||
| 1.0 (100%) | ||||||||||||
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