15 Roubles - Nicholas II

The 15-rouble denomination was struck only in 1897, introduced specifically to facilitate the gold standard reform engineered by Finance Minister Sergei Witte. The conversion pegged the rouble at two-thirds its previous gold value, meaning the new 15-rouble coin contained exactly the same gold as the old imperial 10-rouble piece — a deliberate accounting convenience that made the transition arithmetically clean for the treasury.

The denomination was abandoned almost immediately. By 1898 the mint had shifted to 10- and 5-rouble coins as the working denominations of the reformed system, leaving this single-year issue as the only evidence the 15-rouble unit ever existed.