The krona is the currency of Sweden. The official ISO code is SEK and the Swedish krona is abbreviated to SKR.
History of the Swedish currency
The krona has been the official currency in Sweden since 1873, replacing the Reichstaler that had been in effect until then. When it was first introduced, it was still valid in Denmark, Norway and Iceland, i.e. in all of Scandinavia except Finland, which at that time belonged to Russia.
In 1924 the Scandinavian Monetary Union was dissolved and each of the three countries has had its own krona since then. At the same time, Sweden reintroduced the gold standard, which was suspended after the beginning of the First World War, but which was replaced by the paper standard in 1931. In that year, Sweden was also the first country to introduce stable price levels as a monetary policy target. A consumer price index was introduced for this purpose.
In order to achieve the goal of monetary stability, the Swedish krona was pegged to the British pound in 1933. Since there were increasing inflationary tendencies in the UK in the 1930’s, the decision was made to peg the krona to the US dollar as early as 1939 (USD 1 = SEK 4.20).
Sweden has been a member of the Bretton Woods international monetary system since 1951. After the American central bank lifted the gold standard of the US dollar in 1971, Sweden decided in 1973 to leave the Bretton Woods system and join the European Exchange Rate Association (EKV).
Just four years later, Sweden left this again because it no longer saw stability after the first round of EU enlargement and tied the Swedish krona to the currencies of the 15 most important trading partners. In 1991 the kroon was linked to the European Currency Unit (ECU). A year later this peg was lifted again in the wake of the pound crisis. The Swedish krona has been free since then. Sweden joined the European Union in 1995, but has not yet adopted the euro.
Exchange into Swedish kronor
As a rule, the exchange in Sweden itself is cheaper. A German giro card can be used to withdraw money at many, but not all, machines. Good rates can usually be obtained from banks. Of course, you can also withdraw money by credit card in the form of Swedish kronor.