10 Bani ROMINA

Romania's postwar currency reform of 1952 slashed the leu at brutal exchange rates — as punishing as 400 old lei to one new leu for cash holdings above a threshold — effectively wiping out private savings while stabilizing the state's balance sheet. The 10 bani denominations that followed were workhorses of this new monetary order, circulating through a command economy where price controls made small change genuinely functional rather than vestigial.

The KM#84.3 designation distinguishes this from earlier variants in the series by its copper-nickel alloy, a material shift reflecting both postwar metal allocation priorities and Soviet-influenced industrial policy in Romanian manufacturing.