5 Centavos

Guatemala's silver fractional coinage of this period survived into circulation well past the point most comparable Latin American nations had abandoned silver for base-metal substitutes. The Banco de Guatemala maintained the .720 fine standard through the early 1960s largely by inertia — the quetzal's fixed parity with the US dollar since 1925 had created little monetary pressure to debase small denominations until silver spot prices finally forced the issue later in the decade.