What is the actual name of the Chinese currency? I have seen “yuan” and “renminbi”.
Both. Renminbi is the name of the currency, yuan is the principle unit.
One could kinda make a comparison to a “Federal Reserve note” and a dollar.
“Renminbi” is the official name of the currency. The “yuan” is one of its units. 1 yuan = 10 jiao = 100 fen.
Just to pointlessly elaborate:
Renminbi is to Sterling what yuan is to pound.
Ah, okay, thanks!
So “renminbi” means something like “the people’s currency” and “yuan” is the unit. “CNY” makes sense then.
How many other money systems have two grouping levels like that? Are fen minted (or printed)?
(OK, technically American money has mills, but they are strictly for tax purposes. Mills are not minted by the US Treasury.)
That’s like saying 1 dollar = 10 dimes = 100 pennies in english.
Both, actually, although I believe the printed fen may be phased out. The fen coins are made of something that feels a lot like aluminum, and the notes are like two and a half inches wide.
Here’s some pictures: link
And that link described the yuan notes and coins as being denominated in RMB, even though the one of the coins says “1 yuan” on it! (I have one; it was given to me by a co-worker.) That’s the kind of thing that confused me in the first place…
I don’t think so, or else the jiao wouldn’t have been called out like that.
But that is the way U.S. currency was originally described: 1 Eagle = 10 dollars = 100 dimes (called dismes originally) = 1000 cents = 10,000 mills.
In fact if you look at a dime, you’ll note it still does not say on it that it’s ten cents. It says only it’s a dime, while the penny and nickel give their values on cents and the quarter says it’s a quarter dollar.