United States President, Donald Trump on Sunday said he had told the country’s Treasury to stop producing new pennies coins.
According to Trump, the decision will help to cut down on government spending.
“For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform as he returned to Washington from the Super Bowl.
“I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies.
“Let’s rip the waste out of our great nations budget, even if it’s a penny at a time,” he added.
Media Talk Africa gathered that one-cent coin, also known as a penny, was first issued by the federal government in 1793.
However, the issue of eliminating the pennies was part of Trump’s election campaign.
Trump’s mega-billionaire ally Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE, had raised the prospect in a post on X last month highlighting the production cost.
The United States Mint reportedly lost $85.3 million in the 2024 fiscal year that ended in September on the nearly 3.2 billion pennies it produced.
