Vietnam

Can someone tell us what Vietnam uses for coinage - they appear to have not had coins since 2003?

Banknotes, as they are more convenient as I heard. Coinage never appears in circulation after somewhere in the mid-2000s.

Thanks for info - they did produce set of coins in 2003, but appears to be the last.

Been there I think in 2005, very rare I got some coins in change but I remember well having a super large stash of bankotes which actually had not much value.

There are 26,000 Dong in a Euro, so the highest denomination coin (5,000 Dong) is worth less than €0.20. Still that coin should have decent purchasing power in a country like that. Perhaps people just prefer banknotes, or coin supply is small as the old ones have slowly disappeared and no new ones were made.

At least officially those 2003 coins are still in use:

https://www.sbv.gov.vn/webcenter/portal/en/home/sbv/bac/mic?_afrLoop=8210556548048432#%40%3F_afrLoop%3D8210556548048432%26centerWidth%3D80%2525%26leftWidth%3D20%2525%26rightWidth%3D0%2525%26showFooter%3Dfalse%26showHeader%3Dfalse%26_adf.ctrl-state%3Dj6pb5lezb_128

Tourist info site says no longer coins in use:

https://www.tripsavvy.com/money-in-vietnam-1629945

So the smallest denomination is VND 10.000, which is less than €0,40. It sounds a bit high if they really don't use coins. There are smaller banknotes still in legal tender, but those are printed 25 years ago so they are surely gone.

I travelled through Vietnam for three weeks in 2014: not one single coin in change, all paper down to the lowest denominations.
Coins from the 2003 series are sold above face value (but still for little to nothing) in tourist shops or on 'antique' markets.

I was there in 2015 and 2016... not a single coin in circulation!!! but you might be able to get some with friends or any relative.

I have been travelled there few years ago. And what I told by a Vietnamese was, they hate to receive any coins due to two reasons.

- heavy and inconvenient
- symbolises poor (just like you beg someone on the street and they throw a coin to you?)

The coins in 2003 serie are actually made of old Finnish 50 penniä and 5 markkaa coins as Vietnam ordered its coins from Mint of Finland. Order was over one billion coins total and it recuired ten boats to ship them to Vietnam.

Source (in Finnish only) says also that some other countries buried their pre euro coins into salt mines (!):

http://www.ts.fi/uutiset/talous/1074020505/Miljardi+suomalaiskolikkoa+sulatettiin+dongeiksi