The U.S. Treasury has been ordered to cease production of the one-cent penny coin.

America’s last penny was struck at the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia, the end of a coin production that started in 1793 and ended Nov. 12. We’re already starting to miss them.

Some stores have begun running short of pennies and have had to round cash transactions up or down to the nearest five cents when customers don’t have exact change, USA TODAY reported.

President Donald Trump order the Treasury Department to stop minting pennies as a budget-cutting measure in February. But a resulting shift to nickels, which are more expensive than pennies to produce, could cause other losses in the federal budget.

“For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents. This is so wasteful!” Trump wrote on Truth Social, his social media service. “I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies.”

The familiar Abraham Lincoln penny cost about 3.7 cents to produce in fiscal year 2024, according to the U.S. Mint's annual report. A nickel cost about 13.8 cents to make.

How much does it cost to make pennies and nickels?

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Pennies were among the first coins introduced by the U.S. Mint, a bureau of the Treasury Department, more than 230 years ago.

The cost of making both coins has increased over the past two decades. Some of that is attributed to the rise in raw material prices of copper, nickel and zinc.

Higher metal prices result in higher production costs. If production costs get too high, the seigniorage – the difference between a coin’s face value and the cost of putting it into circulation – make the coin worth less than what it costs to make it.

How many pennies are made every year?

About 3.2 billion pennies were manufactured in fiscal year 2024, a decrease from fiscal year 2023. The cost to produce and distribute a single penny, however, rose 20% from the same period.

Though coins remain in circulation unless damaged, many are accidentally lost or discarded. Inventories dropped significantly in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic and the Fed asked the Mint to increase supply, according to the Cato Institute.

Will pennies still be legal tender?

The Treasury Department placed its final order for penny blanks – the flat metal discs that used to make coins – in May, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.

While the penny "remains legal tender and will retain its value indefinitely," according to the Treasury Department, it will no longer be minted, USA TODAY reported. There are currently an estimated 300 billion pennies in circulation — "far exceeding the amount needed for commerce," Treasury said in a statement.

Some politicians and economists advocated discontinuing the penny. President Barack Obama said in an interview in 2013 that the penny is a “good metaphor” for problems facing lawmakers, ABC News reported.

Canada, Great Britain, Australia, Israel, Brazil, Norway, Finland and New Zealand are among nations that have either ceased to produce or have removed low-denomination coins, Reuters reported. Canada discontinued its penny in 2012, and financial transactions were rounded up or down to the nearest five cents.

CONTRIBUTING Mike Snider, Phaedra Trethan, Minnah Arshad, Kinsey Crowley and Fernando Cervantes Jr.

SOURCE USA TODAY Network reporting and research; Reuters; U.S. Mint; Department of the Treasury; coinnews.net

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Goodbye penny: What comes next as US officially ends penny production

Reporting by George Petras, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect