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British currency became the official currency of the Australian colonies after 1825, with almost £100,000-worth of British coins being imported during 1824–25. The Holey dollar was no longer legal tender after 1829. The most notable Holey Dollar was the "Hannibal Head" a one of a kind coin that features the portrait of King Joseph I of Spain ...
Australian currency was originally based on British pounds, shillings and pence. That changed in 1966, when the country converted to Australian dollars and cents, similar to the U.S. system.
The Australian dollar (sign: $; code: AUD; also abbreviated A$ or sometimes AU$ to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; [2] [3] and also referred to as the dollar or Aussie dollar) is the official currency and legal tender of Australia, including all of its external territories, and three independent sovereign Pacific Island states: Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu.
Decimalisation or decimalization (see spelling differences) is the conversion of a system of currency or of weights and measures to units related by powers of 10.. Most countries have decimalised their currencies, converting them from non-decimal sub-units to a decimal system, with one basic currency unit and sub-units that are valued relative to the basic unit by a power of 10, most commonly ...
The "silver" 5c, 10c, and 20c coins can be counted by value using their weight, without the need to count the individual pieces, as they have the same weight per value, at 0.565g per cent, or 56.5g per dollar. This allows banks to count the value of a collection of any combination of those coins.
With decimalisation, the pound kept its old value and name in each currency, but the shilling was abolished, and the pound was divided into 100 new pence (abbreviated to "p"). In the UK, the new coins initially featured the word “new”, but in due course this was dropped. Each new penny was worth 2.4 old pence ("d.") in each currency.
When Australia was part of the fixed-exchange sterling area, the exchange rate of the Australian dollar was fixed to the pound sterling at a rate of A$1 = 8 U.K. shillings (A$2.50 = UK£1). In 1967, Australia effectively left the sterling area, when the pound sterling was devalued against the US dollar and the Australian dollar did not follow.
The Australian penny was a coin of the Australian pound, which followed the £sd system. It was used in the Commonwealth of Australia prior to decimalisation in 1966. One Australian penny was worth 1 ⁄ 12 Australian shilling, 1 ⁄ 24 Australian florin, 1 ⁄ 60 Australian crown, and 1 ⁄ 240 Australian pound.