Bit (money)
From Free net encyclopedia
The bit is a unit of money worth 1/8 of a Spanish dollar (peso).
The term derives from the practice of cutting a peso into eight radial slices to make change. Each of these pieces was called a bit, and equal in value to a Spanish real.
United States
The term persists colloquially in the United States as a holdover from colonial America when Spanish dollars minted in Mexico, Bolivia and other Spanish colonies were the widest circulating coin. Spanish dollars were deemed equivalent in value to a U.S. dollar. Thus, twenty-five cents was dubbed "two bits," as it was a quarter of a Spanish dollar. Correspondingly, the terms "four bits" and "six bits" referred to fifty and seventy-five cents, respectively.
Because there was no one-bit coin, a dime (10c) was sometimes called a short bit and 15c a long bit. For example, "Six-Bits Blues" by Langston Hughes included the following couplet: Gimme six bits' worth o'ticket/On a train that runs somewhere….
The New York Stock Exchange continued to list stock prices in eighths of a dollar until June 24, 1997, at which time it started listing in sixteenths. It did not fully implement decimal listing until January 29, 2001, according to the research staff at the NYSE.
Image:Stamp Danish West Indies 1905 20b.jpg
Danish West Indies
From 1905 to 1917, the Danish West Indies used stamps denominated in bits and francs with 100 bits to the franc; the lowest value was five bits.