Niue has long functioned as a licensing vehicle for the New Zealand Treasury, issuing legal tender collector coins under agreements that have little to do with the island's 1,600-odd residents and everything to do with international bullion and novelty markets. This piece falls squarely into that category — a DC Comics character on a coin nominally issued by a Pacific territory with no independent central bank.
Shazam, originally published as Captain Marvel by Fawcett Comics in 1939, was the subject of a landmark copyright dispute with DC that ran for over a decade before Fawcett ceased publication in 1953.
Niue has long functioned as a licensing vehicle for the New Zealand Treasury, issuing legal tender collector coins under agreements that have little to do with the island's 1,600-odd residents and everything to do with international bullion and novelty markets. This piece falls squarely into that category — a DC Comics character on a coin nominally issued by a Pacific territory with no independent central bank.
Shazam, originally published as Captain Marvel by Fawcett Comics in 1939, was the subject of a landmark copyright dispute with DC that ran for over a decade before Fawcett ceased publication in 1953.