10 Years of Euro Banknotes and Coins

The euro has become a major force in Europe and around the world, establishing itself as a global player in the international monetary system. The motifs arranged around the euro sign symbolise the currency's significance for ordinary citizens, the financial sector (the ECB tower), trade (ships), industry (factories), energy, and research and development (wind turbines). The designer Helmut Andexlinger's initials appear beneath the ECB tower. The names of the issuing states in their national languages are struck centrally above the design; the years 2002–2012 below.

Third EU joint issue. All 17 eurozone states released a coin with this design on the anniversary date, 1 January 2012. The coins differ only in the inscription, which appears in the respective national language. San Marino also issued a coin with the same design, which is not officially part of the joint issue.

With the introduction of euro cash on 1 January 2002, twelve European countries simultaneously carried out the largest currency changeover in history: around 300 million people exchanged their national currencies for the common cash overnight. Behind this changeover lay an integration process that had been legally anchored since the Maastricht Treaty of 1992 and steered by strict convergence criteria — inflation rate, government debt, exchange-rate stability. The euro subsequently became the world's second most important reserve currency and formed the basis of a unified payment area that had grown to 17 member states by 2012. The European Central Bank, which directs monetary policy for the entire eurozone from Frankfurt, had in this decade to manage both the expansion of the currency area and the sovereign debt crisis that began in 2010.

Portugal was among the founding members of the euro area and introduced euro cash on 1 January 2002 together with the other eleven countries. The transition from the escudo proceeded smoothly in Portugal; the escudo had already been firmly pegged to the euro since 1999. Portugal had made significant economic-policy adjustments in the 1990s to meet the Maastricht criteria for euro participation. Precisely for this reason, the sovereign debt crisis after 2010 hit Portugal especially hard: the country took an international bailout programme in 2011 and underwent a comprehensive reform programme under EU and IMF supervision. To mark the tenth anniversary of euro cash, all euro states — Portugal among them — issued a joint commemorative coin in 2012.