The Malaysian ringgit
Currency · MYR · RM · 1 country
Bank Negara Malaysia took sole charge of the country's currency on 12 June 1967, when its new Malaysian dollar replaced the Malaya and British Borneo dollar at par. A law gazetted on 28 August 1975 made ringgit and sen the legal names. Since 1 December 1992 the official symbol has been RM, for Ringgit Malaysia.
The abbreviation
RM stands for Ringgit Malaysia. Bank Negara Malaysia made it the official symbol on 1 December 1992, in place of M$, for use in both Malay and English. The country name sets the currency apart from the Singapore and Brunei dollars, which Malay also calls ringgit.
- ISO code
- MYR
- ISO number
- 458
- Subunit
- sen, 1/100
An amount, written out
RM 1,234.50
- RM 1,234.50English, MalayMalaysia
Where the Malaysian ringgit is the official currency
Malaysia uses the ringgit on its own. Singapore and Brunei ended the interchangeability arrangement with it in May 1973 and kept their two dollars interchangeable with each other.
About the Malaysian ringgit
How Bank Negara took over from the currency board
The Central Bank of Malaya Ordinance of 1958 created the central bank in January 1959 and gave it the authority to issue currency. It did not use that power for eight years, and the Board of Commissioners of Currency Malaya and British Borneo went on issuing notes and coins, at a fixed 2 shillings and 4 pence to the dollar, and the board converted sterling at a small charge.
On 12 June 1967 Bank Negara Malaysia began issuing its own dollar. Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei agreed that the board's old dollar would stay legal tender in each of them for a while, and in Malaysia the old notes circulated beside the new ones until 16 January 1969.
Five months after the launch, sterling was devalued. The board's dollar, tied to sterling by the Currency Agreement of 1960, fell with it. The bank's dollar had a par value in gold, and afterwards bought 2 shillings and 8.67 pence.
Why the ringgit parted from Singapore and Brunei
Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei had begun as members of one currency union, and an interchangeability agreement kept their three new dollars exchangeable at par. On 8 May 1973 the Malaysian government announced that the Singapore dollar would no longer be interchangeable with the Malaysian one, and on 22 May the Brunei Currency Board ended the arrangement with Malaysia too. The monetary authorities of Singapore and Brunei still kept their two currencies interchangeable in 2021.
How the exchange rate was set and unset
After Britain dismantled the sterling area, Malaysia made the US dollar its intervention currency on 24 June 1972. A year later, on 21 June 1973, it let the currency float, and from 27 September 1975 the bank measured the ringgit against a basket of the currencies of its main trading partners.
The Asian financial crisis brought a peg back. On 1 September 1998 the government imposed selective exchange controls, and the next day it fixed the rate at RM3.80 to the US dollar. In 1999 the bank demonetised the RM500 and RM1,000 notes, which it had stopped printing in 1996 over money laundering and capital flight. The peg lasted until 21 July 2005, when a managed float replaced it.
What the word ringgit once described
Ringgit is an obsolete Malay word for jagged. It described the serrated edges of the Spanish pieces of eight that reached the region through the Spanish Philippines. Malay still calls the Singapore and Brunei dollars ringgit as well, which is why the Malaysian one is written Ringgit Malaysia. Tamil speakers in Malaysia say veḷḷi, silver, for the ringgit, and in the northern states of the peninsula ten sen is a kupang.
Which coins still turn up in change
The bank demonetised the 1 ringgit coin on 7 December 2005, after forgeries and two different versions of the coin caused trouble. Since 1 April 2008 shops round the total of a bill to the nearest 5 sen, a rule meant to make the 1 sen coin irrelevant, and the bank stopped minting it that year. The coins of the third series, issued from 16 January 2012 under the theme Distinctively Malaysia, come in 5, 10, 20 and 50 sen and are struck at the Bank Negara Mint in Shah Alam, while the notes in common use run from RM1 to RM100.
Common questions
Questions about the Malaysian ringgit
What does the word ringgit mean?
It is an obsolete Malay word for jagged. The word once described serrated edges and came to mean the Spanish pieces of eight, rough silver coins that circulated in the region because Spain held the nearby Philippines. Today the word is used almost only for money.
Why is the Malaysian ringgit written RM?
RM is short for Ringgit Malaysia. Malay calls the Singapore and Brunei dollars ringgit too, a leftover of the currency union the three shared, so the country's name is added. Bank Negara Malaysia made RM the official symbol on 1 December 1992, replacing M$, and the same abbreviation serves in Malay and in English.
Are 1 sen coins still used in Malaysia?
Rarely. Since 1 April 2008 the total of a bill is rounded to the nearest 5 sen, a rule Bank Negara Malaysia announced in 2007 to make the 1 sen coin irrelevant. Single items can still be priced to the sen, and only the final total is rounded: two items at RM4.88 and RM3.14 come to RM8.02, which is charged as RM8.00. Minting of the 1 sen stopped in 2008, and the coin series issued in 2012 starts at 5 sen.
When was the ringgit pegged to the US dollar?
From 2 September 1998 to 21 July 2005. During the Asian financial crisis the government imposed selective exchange controls on 1 September 1998 and fixed the ringgit at RM3.80 to the US dollar the next day. A managed float replaced the peg in 2005. The ringgit had also been tied to the US dollar earlier, as the intervention currency from June 1972, before it was floated in June 1973.