Banks closed Monday in Venezuela as they prepared to release the "sovereign bolivar," a new currency printed with five fewer zeroes in a bid to tame soaring inflation.

Here are a few pictures that illustrate the limited purchasing power of the old bolivar.

This stack of 14,600,000 bolivars, or about $2.22 U.S., would buy this chicken at a mini-market in Catia, a low-income neighborhood of Caracas on Aug. 16.

A kilogram, or 2.2 pounds, of tomatoes cost 5,000,000 bolivars, or 76 U.S. cents.

Venezuela was once among Latin America's most prosperous nations, holding the world's largest proven oil reserves, but a recent fall in oil prices accompanied by corruption and mismanagement under two decades of socialist rule have left the economy in a historic economic and political crisis.