1 cash - Small Kan'ei Tsuho - Vietnamese immitation

Vietnamese-cast imitations of the Japanese Kan'ei Tsūhō circulated informally across the Mekong Delta and coastal trading ports from at least the eighteenth century, filling chronic small-denomination shortages that neither the Nguyễn lords nor subsequent imperial administrations ever adequately resolved through official coinage. Chinese and Japanese cash coins had penetrated Vietnamese commerce so thoroughly that domestic minters — operating without any state sanction — simply copied whatever was already trusted in local markets. The Kan'ei type, first issued in Japan in 1636, was widely recognized across Southeast Asian trade networks and thus worth replicating.

These unofficial castings are typically identified by slightly irregular calligraphy, porous bronze surfaces, and a thinner flan than their Japanese prototypes.