100 Yuan Great Wall, Pattern

The Great Wall gold series launched in 1979 as China's first modern bullion coinage aimed at foreign exchange markets — the People's Republic had no domestic retail gold trade at the time, and these coins were sold exclusively through the Bank of China to overseas buyers. The 1982 pattern designation for this particular piece indicates it was struck as a trial or proof of concept rather than for release into that export channel.

Pattern coins from the People's Bank during this period were rarely documented with surviving mintage figures, and official records from the Beijing Mint remain largely unpublished in Western reference literature.