Economy of Bulgaria (574 euro) (December, 2017). The national currency is the lev (plural leva), pegged to the euro at a rate of 1.95583 leva for 1 euro. The lev is the strongest and most stable currency in Eastern Europe. The strongest sectors in the economy are energy, mining, metallurgy, machine building, agriculture and tourism. Primary industrial exports are clothing, iron and steel, machinery and refined fuels. The trading partners with largest contribution to the import/export are Germany, Italy, Romania, Turkey, Greece, Russia, France, Spain, Poland, Netherlands, China, Hungary and Belgium. Sofia is the capital and economic heart of Bulgaria and home to
Phoenix (currency) additional 300,000 phoenixes as paper currency with no underlying assets to back them. As a result, the paper notes were universally rejected by the public. In 1832, with the arrival of King Otto as monarch, the currency system was reformed and the "drachma" was introduced to replace the "phoenix" at par. Phoenix (currency) The phoenix (, "foinix") was the first currency of the modern Greek state. It was introduced in 1828 by Governor Ioannis Kapodistrias and was subdivided into 100 "lepta". The name was that of the mythical phoenix bird and was meant to symbolize the rebirth of Greece during