GBP stands for Great British Pound or simply British Pound which literally means “English pound”, the official currency of the United Kingdom. Another name by which the English pound is known is Pound Sterling (Pound Sterling). The word “libra” comes from Latin and the word “sterling” is of French origin.
The GBP code was assigned to Pound Sterling through the "ISO 4217" standard, established by International Organization for Standardization (ISO), the international organization that approves standards for standardization in technical fields. Like GBP, other currency codes are:
- BRL (Real, official currency of Brazil)
- EUR (Euro, official currency of the European Union)
- JPY (Yen or Yen, official currency of Japan)
- USD (US dollar, official currency of the United States and other territories)
The Pound Sterling is considered to be the most valued currency on the market. In the past each pound sterling was divided into 20 shillings and each shilling was divided into 12 pence, requiring 240 pence to form a pound. As of February 15, 1971 (known as the Decimal Day), one Pound Sterling is divided into 100
pence (cents). the singular of pence é penny (penny). The Pound Sterling symbol is £.