A rather large volume of lat coins remains in possession of Latvian residents. A total of 354 million lat coins (815 tons) remain unexchanged for euro in Latvia.
More than half of the aforementioned 815 are ‘black’ coins – with nominal value of 1 and 2 santim. There is also a large amount of 1 lat coins – more than 120 tons. Among them are also coins with unique design.
For example – there were a total of 356 million coins (820 tons) at the end of March.
Last year and at the beginning of May 2014, 3%% of lat coins (135 million coins worth a total of LVL 25 million) and 92% of notes (46 million worth LVL 900 million) were exchanged for euro.
With the beginning of April there were 132 million coins and 45 million notes exchanged for euro in Latvia.
Euro notes worth a total of EUR 638.4 million were released into circulation in Latvia at the beginning of March. The total volume of lat notes that remained unexchanged for euro was equal to EUR 131.1 million.
Residents are still able to exchange lats for euro at commercial banks (until June 2014). The Bank of Latvia will maintain this service indefinitely.
Source: Baltic News Network
http://bnn-news.com/815-tons-lat-coins-remain-unexchanged-euro-113425