a term used in Commerce, to denote the difference between the real and the nominal value of money. In some states the coinage is so debased, that the real is greatly reduced below the nominal value. Sometimes this is owing to abrasion, and the wear of circulation. Where this reduction amounts, e.g., to 5 per cent., if 100 sovereigns were offered as payment of a debt in England, while such sovereigns were current at their nominal value, they would be received as just payment; but if they were offered as payment of the same amount of debt in a foreign state, they would be received only at their intrinsic value of L.95, the additional L.5 constituting the Agio. The same principle is applied to the paper currency of a country, when reduced below the bullion value which it professes to represent. According to the respective demand for gold or paper money for the purposes of commerce, it becomes necessary, in order to procure the one or other, as the case may require, to pay a premium for it, which is called the Agio.