Euro in Madrid. The euro was introduced to world financial markets as an accounting currency on 1 January 1999, replacing the former European Currency Unit (ECU) at a ratio of 1:1 (US$1.1743). Physical euro coins and banknotes entered into circulation on 1 January 2002, making it the day-to-day operating currency of its original members, and by March 2002 it had completely replaced the former currencies. While the euro dropped subsequently to US$0.83 within two years (26 October 2000), it has traded above the U.S. dollar since the end of 2002, peaking at US$1.60 on 18 July 2008. In late 2009, the
Euro sign Euro sign The euro sign (€) is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the European Union (EU) and other non-EU countries (Kosovo and Montenegro). The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. The international three-letter code (according to ISO standard ISO 4217) for the euro is EUR. In Unicode it is encoded at . In English, the sign precedes the value (for instance, €10, not 10 €, unlike most other European languages). In some style guides, but not others, the euro sign is unspaced. The first letter of