20 Centavos

Ecuador's nickel clad steel coinage of this period emerged from a practical monetary decision rather than a metallurgical preference — chronic shortages of solid nickel blanks pushed several Latin American mints toward cladding in the late 1950s. The Casa de Moneda de México struck much of Ecuador's circulating coinage during these decades under contract, a arrangement that was common across smaller Andean economies that lacked domestic minting capacity.

The KM#77.1c designation reflects a compositional subtype within a longer-running design series, with earlier versions struck in solid nickel.