Croatian kuna

During his visit to Bulgaria, Croatian Central Bank Governor Boris Vujcic reassured that Croatia's transition to the euro did not result in a significant uptick in prices.

Although the residents of Zagreb complain that everything has become more expensive and many explain the increase in prices with the switch to the European currency, the Croatian National Bank said that the entry into the eurozone did not significantly affect the rise in prices, writes the Belgrade newspaper "Politika", quoted by BTA.

The chief of the European Union visited Croatia on Sunday to celebrate the "immense achievements" of the newest EU member nation, which switched to using the euro and joined the world's largest passport-free travel area on New Year's Day.

Croatia will finally adopt the euro on 1 January 2023.

This became clear today after the Council of the EU signed the last three legal acts necessary for this purpose.

Croatia plans to replace its national currency, the kuna, with the euro from January 1 next year

Croatia announced on Wednesday that the final proposals for the motifs for future Croatian euro coins, which will replace today's national currency, the kuna, are the Croatian coat-of-arms, a geographical map of Croatia, the marten - the animal after which kuna was named, the Glagolitic script - the oldest known Slavic alphabet and the inventor Nikola Tesla who was born in central Croatia.

Croatian Finance Minister Zdravko Marić and Central Bank Governor Boris Vujčić urged Croatia to join the European Central Bank's Unified Supervision Mechanism, which is the first step towards joining the eurozone. According to media in Zagreb, the procedure for replacing the Croatian kuna with the euro could happen after five years, Nova TV reported.

Croatia has stepped in to help borrowers with increasingly expensive loans in Swiss francs by freezing the exchange rate for a year.

Since last Thursday, the exchange rate of the franc to Croatian kuna has risen by about 20 per cent.

A leap sudden leap in the value of the Swiss franc in relation to the euro has caused a knock-on effect Croatia, bringing bad news to Croats holding loans in the Swiss currency.

During a single day the franc rose by 15.8 per cent in relation to the kuna.

The kuna is linked to the euro, to which the Croatian national bank, HNB, tries to keep the kuna pegged.