250 Gourdes European Market

Haiti's 1977 gold commemorative program was aimed squarely at European collector markets — hence the name — and was issued through international distributors rather than circulated domestically. The Banque de la République d'Haïti commissioned several denominations in this series during the Duvalier years, when hard currency was a political as much as an economic instrument. Jean-Claude Duvalier had assumed power in 1971, and prestige coinage of this kind was one mechanism the regime used to generate foreign exchange income while projecting an image of institutional stability it largely did not possess.