Bulgaria and the euro a stable ERM-II member for a minimum of two years. While Bulgaria has not formally joined the exchange rate mechanism, the ±15% floating band permitted within ERM II is less restrictive than Bulgaria's current strict peg of 1.95583 BGN to 1 EUR. The lev has been pegged to the euro since its launch, and prior to that was pegged on par to the German Mark. While the currency board which pegs Bulgaria to the euro has been seen as beneficial to the country fulfilling criteria so quickly, the ECB has pressured Bulgaria to drop it as it did not know
Currency a circulating medium could only be as sound as the forces that defended that store. Trade could only reach as far as the credibility of that military. By the late Bronze Age, however, a series of treaties had established safe passage for merchants around the Eastern Mediterranean, spreading from Minoan Crete and Mycenae in the northwest to Elam and Bahrain in the southeast. It is not known what was used as a currency for these exchanges, but it is thought that ox-hide shaped ingots of copper, produced in Cyprus, may have functioned as a currency. It is thought that the