Short Stuff: Currency Symbols | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

[music]. Hey and welcome to the short stuff. I'm. Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here. too sitting in for Dave. So this is. short stuff and Chuck, we've talked so. much about currency over the years, but. we've never talked about this and I. think it's high time. This is a good. pick for you. >> Thank you. Uh we're talking about. currency symbols and what they mean and. where they came from. And we'll start. with the dollar. We're looking at you, United States and Canada and Namibia and. New Zealand and 17 other countries that. use the dollar. Uh it comes from the.

Spanish peso apparently which has been. around since the 15th century. Uh the. peso de oo or pieces of eight. >> Did not know that. >> And the eventual United States uh would. model their dollar after the peso. >> Did not know that either. And in fact, Chuck, they think that the dollar sign. came from people abbreviating the word. peso. They would say PS. And somebody. eventually was like, "You know what? I. could really save some space if I wrote. the S over the P. Someone else came.

along and said, "You know what? We could. save even more space if we got rid of. the round part of the P." And someone. else said, "Oh my god, you guys just. created a dollar sign.". That's right. Uh that first appeared in. print as the dollar sign after 1800. Uh. and there are three iterations, I guess. the the first uh PS was the first one. The single stroke through the S was the. second one. And then as all elementary. school children know and love, the.

double vertical lines through the S is. yet another version. >> I've always I've never really thought it. out loud, but I I've always thought of. that as meaning like now you're talking. real money, so you have to put two. >> Oh, really? >> two vertical lines through it. Yeah. >> Oh, that's funny. But yes, so that you. could call the uh Randian um version. because Einran took a crack at it and. just made up this idea that the two. lines are actually a S over a U and. someone got rid of the loopy bottom of.

the U and that U and S stood for United. States. And that's where the double line. dollar sign came from. And everybody's. like, good try, Iron Rand. Um, those two. vertical lines going through some sort. of symbol is actually pretty common. among currencies. >> Yeah. And PS, you just made that up. >> Exactly. [laughter]. P.S. I love you. >> PS. I love you. So, like I said, there. are 20 countries that use the dollar. sign. >> and uh how you designate it is with the.

the um abbreviation or I guess the. initials for the country before like US. dollar, CA for Canadian dollar, etc. Yeah, I think that's such a great burn. that Canada adopted the dollar and. abandoned the pound. Way to go, Canada. >> Uh, should we move on to the euro? >> Yes, because that's a very very new. currency, one of the newest. Um, it was. the the um euro wasn't around until the. 21st century in 2002.

>> Yeah. Yeah. the the EU had been around. since 1992 when 12 European countries uh. got together to form that body uh the. following year. Uh and you know creating. a single currency was one of the things. behind it. >> Yeah, it was a big deal. Um, the symbol. itself is it's a curvy E and then it has. two horizontal lines going through it. And that's based on the Greek letter. epsilon or E essentially, which is E in.

English. E is the first letter in. Europe. You're starting to get this now. >> There you go. >> The two lines um represent stability. And then very mysteriously, the Euro. designer has never been revealed by the. EU. I suspect it's because an it's an. American and they hadn't looked into the. person's background yet uh when they. hired him. And I also suspect that that. American is Eddie Money, >> which is why they hired him in the.

[laughter] first place, but they didn't. realize he was American. [sighs and gasps]. >> That's funny. He had two tickets to. Paradise and two strokes through a E. >> Yeah, he strokes it to the east, strokes. it to the west. >> [laughter]. >> Uh like I said that was launched with uh. in 2002 and originally there were seven. banknotes and eight coins and the. banknotes are identical everywhere but I. did not know this because I haven't I. have been there since the euro actually. but the um or have I yes I have. Uh the.

coins have a common design on one side. and each country has their own design on. the flip side. >> Yeah, I think that's sweet. >> Pretty cool. >> It's like don't forget about your. heritage. The UK was part of uh the EU for a long. time. It was one of the founding members. in 1992 and in 2020 it left. Um I didn't. know that. Did you? >> Uh they they Brexited. >> Yeah, I know. I'm just kidding. They. they kept the uh pound the entire time. though. They're like, "Yeah, we helped. found the EU, but we're not adopting the.

euro." And actually, I agree with this. for good reason. The pound sterling is. the oldest living continuous currency in. the world. And brother, it is old. >> Yeah, they're like, "We're not going to. flush that down the toilet for your. fancy new money.". >> Why would you? >> Uh, it's super old. I think uh 928 CE. Is that right? >> Yep. >> Well, that's when it was officially. adopted by King Athlon. >> Yeah. >> But they apparently had been in.

circulation even before that and. accepted like the pound sterling, which. I think originally was like one pound of. silver. >> Yeah. equals whatever this note is worth. >> I don't know where you got this one, but. I love this sentence that no one's sure. where the term pound sterling. originated, but experts agree it has. some connection to weight and silver. [laughter] Yeah. Do you think so? You. know what? I could have said that, too. And I'm not even a currency expert. >> Yeah. And of course, the pound symbol,

um, I guess it looks sort of like if an. F and an L had a baby. Oh yeah, good. one. A lower case and lower case. Yeah, for sure. It's really hard to do by. hand, I found. >> Oh, I have never tried to write that. >> But the L is for libra, which is Latin. for scales or balances because again, this has to do with weighing in and. silver. Um, and uh the slash through it.

is a mystery from what I can tell. >> Yeah, I don't think uh I don't think. anyone knows. which is good enough for me. I mean, keep it mysterious a little bit. Pound. sterling. >> Yeah. And that, you know, no other. nation uses the pound sterling. Uh but. there are some former British colonies. who have a pound that's just not the. pound sterling. Like you can have a. Nigerian pound, >> right? Or an Egyptian pound. >> Yeah. And it's the same symbol, but they. have again the designation with the. letter of the country.

>> Okay. I say that we take a break and. come back and talk about some other. currencies around the world. and their. symbols. >> Let's do it. [music]. Okay, Chuck, I feel like a total schmo. because I forgot to ask Yumi about this.

um very surprising uh statement in this. article that the Japanese yen is. pronounced N in Japanese. I have never. heard that before. I couldn't find it. anywhere else and I meant to ask Yi and. I failed to. So, I'm sorry about that. Yeah, it seems dubious to me, but uh. because this this came from house. stuffworks.com, by the way, >> and it says that they uh.

they found that people from other. countries pronounced it as yin. and that's why they put the Y in there. But the only reason I say that is. because there's a Y in there. >> It's just wrong. >> So, I can't figure it out. >> No, I think there's nothing to figure. out. And I'm glad I didn't ask you me. because I think she would have looked at. me like I was an idiot. [laughter]. >> Well, at any rate, the s the symbol for. the yen is a capital Y again with two. horizontal lines running through it. >> uh through the stem that is. >> and uh sometimes a single horizontal.

line just like uh the dollar and and. some others. >> Uh and it's the same thing as the. Chinese symbol for its uh you how would. you pronounce that? The yuan. Okay, that's what I thought. >> Yep. Uh but the they have a different. currency system, the ren minbi. Um and. the yuan is actually like a denomination. of it, but everybody including the. Chinese call it the yuan. Um but because. they use the same symbol, there's the CN. and then the Y symbol for the Chinese.

yuan and the JP Y symbol for the. Japanese yen. And this is true. If you. go to Japan today, you better bring a. lot of cash because there are a lot of. independent um like businesses, restaurants, that kind of thing. Especially further you get out of a city. that will be like cash only, buddy. And. we don't have an ATM. >> I love that. I miss cash. What does. Japanese cash look like? Is it cool? >> Do you remember? >> I don't remember. No.

>> All right. >> I'm sorry. It's been God, I think the. last time I was there was 2013, so you know, give me a break. >> Yeah. I still have some uh Canadian cash. in my purse, by the way. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. And every time I'm at the airport, I forget to go by the old Cambio. So, maybe I'll just wait till I'm back in. Canada and I'll spend that, invest in in. my friends from the north. >> Two things, Chuck. I think that your. bank that you have like a regular. account with will convert that for you.

>> I wondered about that. And well, three. things. Number two, if you do it at the. airport, you're gonna get completely. ripped off. I think the bank will. totally rip you off. Number three, I'm. so glad you brought that up because. Canada just announced that their new $5. bill has Terry Fox on it. >> Oh, no way. >> It's awesome looking, too. >> Oh, well, I'm definitely not getting rid. of this cash. I'll just go trade it in. for Terry Fox fivers. >> There you go. spin some of those on some maple syrup. and uh Montreal bagels and then pocket.

one just to keep forever. >> Very nice. And then drink a Molson. golden and then promptly vomit. >> All right. You want to finish up with. the rupee? >> Yes. It also is a very very old uh. currency, but it hasn't been in. continuous use like the pound has. But. it dates back to uh about 2600 years. ago, which makes it even more strange. that it didn't have its own symbol like. a dollar sign until 2010 when they held. a design um contest and this designer.

was named Professor D. Udia Kumar who. was a professor in design produced the. winning symbol for the rupee. >> Yeah. Prior to that, it had always just. been RS or RE. It was denoted by. letters. Uh, but how would you describe, you know, I encourage people if it's. safe to do so to look up the symbol for. the rupee, but how would you describe. this? >> I would think it's safe. Like, I don't. think you're going to get malware or. anything. >> No, I mean, if you're driving in a car. or something. Come on. >> Okay. Make an R, capital R.

>> Lop the top part off. >> so it's just flat. And then lop the. front bubble part off. And then get rid. [laughter] of the back stem. >> Okay. >> Now add another line. So there's two. lines and then the the the. >> the bottom coming out of the R. >> That's essentially it. I I I'm going to. try five or six different ways if you'll. bear with me. >> No. No. [laughter]. So apparently it has elements from uh a.

script used to write a lot of Indian. languages. uh deba debaagara. uh and then also Roman and Latin scripts. and uh the debonagara is rah for rupia. and the roman letter r for the English. word rupee and those parallel lines uh. represent theric-colored flag of India. as well as the equal symbol. >> booya you can also find rupes in. Indonesia the maldes Nepal Pakistan and. Sri Lanka among others but they don't.

use that R symbol the 2010 Rupy symbol. That's right, >> Chuck. I feel [music] like that's about. it. We've covered literally every single. currency in the entire world. [laughter]. >> So, I think short stuff is out. >> It's out. >> Stuff you should know is a production of. iHeart Radio. For more podcasts, iHeart. Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple. Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your. favorite shows.