Swiss franc

The Swiss franc, or simply the franc, is the currency and legal tender of Switzerland and Liechtenstein. It is also legal tender in the Italian exclave of Campione d'Italia, which is surrounded by Swiss territory. The Swiss National Bank (SNB) issues the banknotes, and the federal mint Swissmint issues the coins. The franc is also designated through the currency signs Fr. in German; fr. in French, Italian, and Romansh; and CHF (for Confoederatio Helvetica Franc) in any other language. CHF also serves as Switzerland's ISO 4217 currency code, used by banks and financial institutions. The smallest denomination, a hundredth of a franc, is a Rappen (Rp.) in German, centime (c.) in French, centesimo (ct.) in Italian, and rap (rp.) in Romansh. The official symbols Fr. (in German) and fr. (in the Romance languages) are widely used by businesses and advertisers, including in English. However, according to Art. 1 SR/RS 941.101 of the federal law collection, the internationally official abbreviation – regardless of national languages – is CHF, which is also to be used in English; respective guides also request that the ISO 4217 code be used. The use of SFr. for Swiss Franc and fr.sv. are outdated. As previously indicated, the "CH" stands for Confoederatio Helvetica; given the different languages used in Switzerland, Latin is used to make a language-neutral name for "Switzerland" and "Swiss".