Slovenia adopts the euro

The only new European Union member state to have filled the Maastricht criteria, Slovenia will be in sixty days the thirteenth European Convention country to adopt the euro. From next 1st January and during fifteen days, 1 450 tons of coins and 73 tons of bills will have to replace the old medals and cuts in tolars. While avoiding, if possible, the waltz of the labels.
After fifteen years of good and faithful services since independence, the tolar will thus fall into the past of the Slovenian history. Without regret. The fear of a loss of national identity is evoked by only 2,4 % of the population, according to a June survey of Banka Slovenije. While 82 % of of the interviewed people are accustomed with the European currency, according to Eurobarometre of July.
A currency of transition, whose name resounds like that of the American currency, the tolar has been especially used to drive out the dinar, the hated symbol of the monetary sovereignty of Belgrade, federal ex-capital of Yugoslavia during the socialist era. The hyperinflation which corroded this currency during decades, ended up before 1990, when one could go freely to Germany or Austria to exchange dinars against marks or shillings.
After the birth of the euro in 2002, the Sloveniens hurried to exchange their last marks and shillings against the new European currency. Which explains why 84,1 % of them can already recognize the euro coins and bills. But the borrowers especially understood the interest of this new currency. At at the end of 2005, the interest rate of the ECB was lower of 2 points than that of Banka Slovenije. To finance the acquisition of an apartment in euros thus cost twice less expensive than in tolars.
As for the companies almost all already rocked: as of the end of 2004, the three quarters of the professionals' payments were made out in euros, according to the statistics of the International Monetary Funds. A company such as Groenije, the Slovenian flagship of the electric household appliances, which realize more than 90 % of its sales turnover abroad, does not need more tolars for a long time. And even the State was there: the deputies examined for the first time this autumn the bill of finances presented in euros.
There is only one true obsession: inflation. Whereas it gallopped at the speed of 500 % per annum the following day after the independence, it fell down to 7,2 % in 2002, before totaling 2,5 %. The customers are convinced that after January 1st, there will be abuses on behalf of the tradesmen, exactly as in Italy. Nearly three Slovenians out of four indeed fear a loss of purchasing power after January 1st, according to the survey of the central Bank. Slovenians take very seriously this fear which is likely to deform the perception that the consumers will have on the real evolution of inflation. This is why the State created an institution which will monitor the evolution of the prices, alongside the consumers' associations. This "thermometer" of the prices, functioning independently of the official Institute for Statistics, will avoid the disputes between the consumers and the government on the reality of inflation.
In Frankfurt, the European central Bank (ECB) worries especially about the good course of the heavy logistics of the passage to the euro. Some 1 450 tons of parts will be transported in the greatest secrecy from Finland, the manufacturing country, to Ljubljana, as they will have to replace in two weeks the thousands of tons of tolars currently in circulation. A heavy "big-bang" which is not without risk. A spectacular hold-up which took place one year ago at SKB revealed the faults of the systems of safety of the banks. And the authors always escaped from the justice.

The only new European Union member state to have filled the Maastricht criteria, Slovenia will be in sixty days the thirteenth European Convention country to adopt the euro.

Marcus Laval is a senior analyst with an experience of more than 20 years, who has written more articles and published them at Press Centre