Baht

The present decimal system, in which one baht = 100 satang, was introduced in 1897 by king Chulalongkorn. However until the 1940s it was named Tical, then renamed to Baht. Originally the term Baht was a weight unit of about 15g, and was adopted because one Tical was equivalent to 15g of silver.

Paper currency includes 1,000 (grey), 500 (purple), 100 (red), 50 (blue) and 20 (green) baht notes. The brown 10 baht banknote has become rare. Ten-baht coins are brass disks in a silver ring, and it has many commemorative 10 baht coins made for special events. Five-baht coins are silver with copper rims. One-baht coins are silver. The 50 and 25 satang coins are brass. Even though the satang coins are a legal tender small shops often don't accept them anymore. Older coins which are still in circulation only had the thai numerals, but the new design also has arabic numerals.

Exchange Rates Sampled on September 20, 2002.

• US dollar = 43 baht
• Euro = 43 baht
• UK pound = 67 baht