The central bank said yesterday that it would roll out the first batch of a new circulation coin with a nominal value of NT$10 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of the late president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) next Tuesday.
The commemorative coin will be circulated with current NT$10 coins upon its issuance and the public can exchange the new currency NT$500 at a time, at local branches of the Bank of Taiwan, the central bank said.
“Fifty million units [of these commemorative coins] will be issued in the first batch,” central bank Governor Perng Fai-nan (彭淮南) told a media briefing, saying that the minting volume would increase depending on public demand.
The governor said that the new coin was designed with anti-counterfeiting features such as two latent images of “Taiwan” and “plum blossom” inscribed inside the Arabic numeral “0” on the reverse face of the coin.
“The image of Taiwan represents the place where we live and the plum blossom is our national flower,” Perng said.
The obverse face of the coin features a portrait of Chiang, below which is inscribed in Chinese, “Centenary of the late President Chiang Ching-kuo” (蔣故總統經國先生百年誕辰紀念), he said.
The central bank plans to issue three other kinds of commemorative coins, including the Chiang Wei-shui (蔣渭水) NT$10 commemorative coin in August, the 100th year of the Republic of China (ROC) NT$10 coin next January and the ROC centennial commemorative silver coin in October next year.
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