![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/1762854847_857_grey-placeholder.png\")
![\"AFP](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/1388fe50-bfe0-11f0-ae46-bd64331f0fd4.jpg.webp.webp\")
AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\nNatalie ShermanBusiness reporter<\/p>\n
AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
Pennies, which are worth one cent, cost nearly four cents to make.<\/p>\n
The US is set to make its final penny.<\/p>\n
The Philadelphia Mint will strike its last batch of one-cent coins on Wednesday, after more than 230 years of production.<\/p>\n
The coins will remain in circulation but the phase-out has already prompted businesses to start adjusting prices, as they say pennies are becoming harder to find.<\/p>\n
The government says the move will save money, or as President Donald Trump put it in February when he first announced the plans: “Rip the waste out of our great nation’s budget, even if it’s a penny at a time”.<\/p>\n
Pennies, which honour Civil War president Abraham Lincoln and are made of copper-plated zinc, today cost nearly four cents each to make \u2014 more than twice the cost of a decade ago, according to the Treasury Department. It estimates the decision to end production will save about $56m a year.<\/p>\n
Officials have argued that the rise of electronic transactions is making the penny, which first went into production in 1793, increasingly moot. <\/p>\n
The Treasury Department estimates that about 300 billion of the coins will remain in circulation, “far exceeding the amount needed for commerce”.<\/p>\n
Many pennies end up falling out of use. About 60% of all coins in circulation in the US – or about $60-$90 for the typical household – sits stashed at home in piggy banks, deemed not worth trading in, according to a 2022 government analysis<\/a>.<\/p>\n