50 Manat The 20th anniversary of national currency

Turkmenistan introduced the manat as its national currency in November 1993, replacing the Soviet ruble at a rate of 500 rubles per manat — one of the more unfavorable conversion rates among the post-Soviet republics. A second redenomination followed in 2009, when the new manat replaced the old at 5,000 to one, effectively erasing decades of inflation from the books in a single administrative stroke.

The 2009 redenomination is what this 2013 issue actually commemorates — twenty years from the 1993 introduction, not from any subsequent reform.