Trump says he has directed US Treasury to stop minting new pennies, citing rising cost
SUMMARY
President Donald Trump announced a directive to the Treasury Department on Sunday night, ordering a halt to the minting of new pennies, citing the coin's rising production costs. "For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful!" Trump posted on Truth Social. "I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies." The U.S. Mint reported a loss of $85.3 million in the 2024 fiscal year from the nearly 3.2 billion pennies produced, with each penny costing $0.037 to make. The rising cost of materials, primarily zinc with copper plating, has made penny production increasingly uneconomical. Trump’s directive is part of his administration’s aggressive cost-cutting measures, spearheaded by Musk, who aims to achieve $2 trillion in savings by targeting federal workforce reductions and wasteful expenditures.
