The Central Bank of Cuba (BCC) will announce this Wednesday the circulation of two new banknote denominations: 10,000 and 20,000 Cuban pesos, according to the state media Cubadebate.
The measure was presented this Tuesday by the president of the BCC, Juana Lilia Delgado Portal, during the television program "Mesa Redonda."
Delgado Portal justified the issuance as a necessity to "adapt existing denominations to the state of the economy, particularly to price conditions and the needs of monetary circulation."
The 10,000 peso bill features the image of Haydée Santamaría, while the 20,000 peso bill showcases the figure of Vilma Espín.
Both denominations join the monetary cone along with the 2,000 and 5,000 peso bills, which began to circulate on April 1 of this year gradually, although for months Cubans reported that they could barely find them on the street.
"With these new 10,000 and 20,000 Cuban peso bills, we complete the modification that we had announced for our monetary cone," stated Delgado Portal.
The context that forces the regime to issue banknotes in increasingly higher denominations is that of an economy in free fall.
The official inflation reached 20.70% year-on-year in July, according to the National Office of Statistics and Information (ONEI), with food being the main driver of the increase.
The dollar was trading in the informal market at around 698 Cuban pesos in the last session, compared to 435 pesos in December 2025.
The prices of basic goods illustrate the extent of the devaluation of the national currency: a pound of rice reaches 360 pesos, black beans cost 450, a carton of eggs is priced at 3,000, and a liter of oil exceeds 2,000 pesos, making low-denomination bills virtually useless for everyday purchases.
The new banknotes are part of a broader package of banking reforms presented during the same "Round Table," which includes the opening of a private currency exchange that is already in operation, changes to expand credit and digital channels, and the regulation of foreign currency bank accounts without prior authorization from the BCC.
The regime also authorized private banking for the first time in decades last June; and the following month, it removed the limit of 5,000 pesos for cash transactions between economic actors.
Delgado Portal assured that the underlying objective of all these transformations is to progress towards "a safe, modern, agile, and efficient banking and financial system, capable of contributing to economic recovery and responding more quickly and effectively to the needs of its clients," although there is no independent verification that such goals are achievable in the short term given the structural deterioration of the Cuban economy.
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