At the peak of Zimbabwe’s hyperinflation in 2008, central-bank officials could barely print new notes quickly enough to keep pace with prices, which were rising at an annualised rate of 231,000,000%. The game was up for the Zimbabwe dollar when the bank issued a new Z$100 trillion note and traders rejected it. Most preferred American dollars to the local kind, which had fallen so far that a loaf of bread cost the same as 12 cars a decade earlier. Since then commerce has been settled in a variety of currencies: mainly greenbacks but also South African rand and even euros or sterling. Today marks an admission of defeat for independent monetary policy in Zimbabwe, as the bank starts “demonetising” Zimbabwe dollars in exchange for American ones, at a rate of $1 per Z$35 quadrillion. On eBay, an auction site, collectors are willing to pay considerably more.