Coins heavily minted at the Paris Mint, almost a million euros destroyed

A million euro typo. According to La Lettre media, the Paris Mint, the institution responsible for minting coins in France, has decided to destroy coins worth millions of centimes. These cents will cost the organization between €700,000 and €1.2 million upon arrival. But why sacrifice this much money? Stars poorly engraved on parts are synonymous with a design that has been declared invalid by the European Commission.

According to the letter, Monnaie de Paris CEO Marc Schwartz wanted to impress Bruno Le Maire during his meeting on December 7th. On the eve of the visit of the Minister of Economy, the leader called on workers to mint 27 million coins in denominations of 10, 20 and 50 centimes of a new design. In late November, workers even worked “three shifts” for four days to satisfy their boss. However, Mark Schwartz failed to wait seven days for the regulator to receive approval from the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Economic and Financial Affairs.

Design rejected

So much so that six days before Bruno Le Maire’s reception, the EU rejected the new type of coin. The stars, symbols of Europe, would have been too difficult to read on the side that was supposed to represent the Old Continent. Thus, tons of centimes were destroyed before 27 million coins were urgently minted. Speaking to La Lettre, the CEO of Monnaie de Paris claims that “the postponement is beyond his control” and names the “French state” responsible for the error, which also amounts to 4% of the institution’s annual production.

Bercy Response: An evaluation will be run to determine the cause of this error. Mark Schwartz, for his part, intends to hand over hard cash, stumbling and above all valid, to Bruno Le Maire, confirmed by the head of his ministry, during a future meeting.