10 000 Pesos Elephant

Guinea-Bissau's national bank issued a series of silver wildlife coins in the early 1990s as part of a broader African trend of producing collector issues for the hard-currency export market — revenue that mattered considerably for one of the world's poorest economies following years of post-independence instability. The Banco Nacional da Guiné-Bissau had itself only been established after the country's separation from the Cape Verde monetary union in 1975.

These pieces were never intended for domestic circulation and were largely distributed through European numismatic wholesalers.