As you may or may not know, I collect modern circulating coins by date. One of the fun parts of this is that I often have to determine if a coin was issued for circulation, or sometimes if it even exists! Catalogs often end up with incorrect information, and there isn't really enough interest in recent base metal issues, such as the coins I'm about to discuss, that anyone feels the need to research further or correct the record. The coins in question here are: Andorra - 1999 1 Centim Cook Islands - 2000 5 Cents Namibia - 1999-2000 5 Cents Panama - 2000 1 Centesimo Samoa - 1999-2000 2 Sene Somalia - 1999-2002 5 Shillings and 10 Shilllings Tunisia - 1999-2000 1 Millieme Turkey - 1999 50000 Lira These coins have the following in common: All, except for the Turkey and possibly Cook Islands, were minted at the Slovak Mint in Kremnica. All have a different specification from the regular circulation coin in use at the time. Two can be immediately eliminated from further discussion: The Andorra 1 Centim, like all pre-euro Andorran coins, was a collectors issue. In fact, no official exchange rate with the French franc or Spanish peseta was ever set and they were never legal tender, so it is a bit of a stretch to even call it a coin. The Turkey 50000 Lira was minted and sold as a commemorative by the Turkish mint. It has a similar denomination side to other commemoratives of the period. I will now discuss the remaining coins individually. 2000 Cook Islands 5 Cents This coin is 24.00mm and 4.43g, minted in stainless steel. The regular issue coin was 19.41mm and 2.83g, minted in copper nickel. The denomination was most recently issued in 1992, and would have been removed from circulation around 2006 along with the equivalent New Zealand coins. I have seen these attributed to either no known mint or the British Royal Mint by various catalogs. This coin and the 2003 1 Cent types use what I believe to be a unique portrait of the Queen, similar but not identical to the Ian Rank-Broadley portrait in use at the time. I have never seen a circulated example of this coin, or of the seemingly-related 2003 1 Cent types. 1999-2000 Namibia 5 Cents This coin is 20mm and 3.1g, minted in stainless steel. The regular issue coin is 16.9mm and 2.2g, minted in nickel-plated steel. 1999 is much less common than 2000. I have never seen a circulated example of this coin. 2000 Panama 1 Centesimo This coin is 22.8mm and 1.64g, minted in aluminum. The regular issue coin is identical to a US cent. I have never seen a circulated example of this coin. 1999-2000 Samoa 2 Sene This coin is 21mm and 3.94g, minted in bronze. This is the closest of the group relative to the regular circulation coin. The regular issue coin is 21mm and 3.25g, minted in bronze. The denomination was most recently issued in 1996, and was removed from circulation in 2011. 1999 is much less common than 2000. I have never seen a circulated example of this coin, although I have seen ones that show marks and discoloration that imply some handling. 1999-2002 Somalia 5 and 10 Shillings These coins are presumed to be unofficial, as Somalia did not have a functioning central bank at the time. The relative sizes of these two coins would have made them hard to distinguish in daily use. 2000 is more common than the other two years for both denominations, but none are uncommon. Despite these having the best case of any of these coins to have never circulated, I have seen circulated examples of both denominations. However, I have not seen circulated examples of the related higher-denomination 2002 coins. 1999-2000 Tunisia 1 Millieme This coin is 21mm and 1.2g, minted in aluminum. The regular issue coin was 18mm and 0.65g, also minted in aluminum. The denomination was only minted in 1960 and was removed from circulation in 1990. From a post on another forum: "That reminds me - a long time collector contact of mine went to Tunisia five or so years ago [2004] - he asked - but they knew nothing of the Tunisia 1 Millim from this "series"." 1999 is much less common than 2000. I have never seen a circulation example of this coin. After typing this out, I'm pretty doubtful any of these were issued for circulation in their respective countries, although the Somalias may, somehow, be an exception. The question that then follows is how were they issued? All types are somewhat common, so they had to have been released into collector markets in large quantities. If anyone has any thoughts, information, or questions, I'd love to hear them.
Here are a few examples of these coins from my collection: Of note is the circulated 2002 Somalia 5 Shillings.
