Penny (Canadian Coin)

Penny (Canadian Coin)

In Canada, a penny is a coin worth one cent, or 1⁄₁₀₀ of a dollar. According to the Royal Canadian Mint, the official national term of the coin is the "one-cent piece", but in practice the term penny or cent is universal. Originally, "penny" referred to a two-cent coin. When the two-cent coin was discontinued, penny took over as the new one-cent coin's name. Penny was likely readily adopted because the previous coinage in Canada (up to 1858) was the British monetary system, where Canada used British pounds, shillings, and pence as coinage alongside U.S. decimal coins and Spanish milled dollars.

In Canadian French, the penny is called a cent, which is spelled the same way as the French word for "hundred". Slang terms include cenne, cenne noire, or sou noir (black penny), although common Quebec French usage is sou.

Production of the penny ceased in May 2012; however, like all discontinued currency in the Canadian monetary system, the coin remains legal tender.