20 Cash Urumchi, type 2

Urumchi (Ürümqi) operated as one of several provincial mints attempting to stabilize Sinkiang's chronically fragmented monetary situation during the late Republican period. The Type 2 designation distinguishes this issue from its near-identical predecessor by subtle die differences documented in the Y# series — the kind of variation that emerges when remote mints worked with limited supervision and inconsistent tooling. Sinkiang's distance from Nanking meant monetary policy was effectively local, and these large copper cash pieces circulated in an economy that still ran partly on barter and Russian-influenced silver.