2 Euro CC -- Rules Changed

Not quite; it was actually the European Parliament that introduced the idea to allow two commems per year. The Commission had proposed the regulation - after all, so far we have not had a regulation at all, just non-binding "recommendations" - but wanted to keep the limit at one country-specific issue per year. The EP then suggested two: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides...&language=EN

Other suggestions of the European Parliament, notably regarding the continuation (or not) of the 1 and 2 cent coins, have also been included in the new regulation. But of course that part is kept rather vague. And while the text proposed by the EP actually said "one commem every six months", that was changed in the final version. It's now "two per year", so theoretically a member state can issue two on the same day. ;)

Christian

The European Parliament did, in late 2011, make several changes to the original Commission draft. One of the ideas behind this move (which was not initiated by Mr Schäuble but by the EP's committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs) was to do something about the currently odd status of the collector coins. The latter are legal tender in the issuing member state only - how's that for a currency union? ;)

So the ECON Committee, and ultimately the European Parliament, voted to amend the proposed regulation in a way that would (1) allow member states to have more commemorative €2 issues (which are, like circulation coins, legal tender in the entire currency union anyway), and (2) extend the legal tender status of collector coins. Other proposed changes were about whether it would make sense to do away with 1 and 2 cent coins and/or introduce 1 and 2 euro notes.

The German government supported part (1), for the reasons that you mentioned. The idea regarding low-value notes, however, was dropped (neither the European Central Bank nor the European Commission support/ed the idea), and so was the plan to give collector coins a regular (and not just "regional") legal tender status. What remained, by and large, is the vague idea to think about low-denomination coins ... and that thing regarding the commemorative €2 coins.

Basically two commems per year are OK by me. Keep in mind that some member states do not issue them anyway, unless there is a common issue. Collector coins (€5, €10, etc., usually silver or gold) continue to have their "second class money" status (with regard to their function as means of payment), but if people want to collect them, fine. The only problem I see is that, in a year with a common issue, there may be three commemorative coins now. A special design may also be used if the head of state is temporary or vacant.

Christian

Yes, there are lots of those pseudo-coins. Well, as long as they are issued at face value, I don't complain much about them. ;) In Finland that would be all or most of the €5 pieces, €3 in Slovenia, €10 in Germany, and so on.

Had the European Parliament's suggestion to make all those collector coins legal tender in all euro countries become part of this new regulation, that would have made collector coins more "legitimate" in my opinion. Sure, they would still not circulate - and in fact it would be quite difficult for cashiers if they did. But I could at the very least take the €3, €5 and €10 coins (that I mentioned above) to the very same central bank and get them exchanged ...

Are the 1 and 2 cent coins "needed"? Well, I live in Germany, not far from the Netherlands - and while in DE they are used every day, hardly anybody in NL deals with them. (In the Netherlands, rounding cash totals is allowed, and done by the vast majority of stores.) In Germany this is a psychological thing in my opinion. We had 1 Pfennig coins (basically half a cent) in circulation until the euro cash changeover, and doing away with them now would probably result in an outcry: Darn euro, darn inflation, etc. etc. So forget about that here. Obviously I much prefer the Dutch (and Finnish) approach. :)

Christian