5 Dollars - Elizabeth II 3rd Portrait, Crossed hammers

New Zealand's 1998 commemorative dollar-denomination coinage was produced during a period when the Reserve Bank was actively reassessing the country's circulating coin program — the aluminium bronze dollar and two-dollar coins had only been introduced in 1990, and collector issues were being used partly to test public appetite for themed coinage. The crossed hammers motif places this piece within New Zealand's mining heritage series, referencing the goldfield history of regions like Otago and the West Coast, where rushes from the 1860s onward shaped the country's early colonial economy.

KM#112 is a relatively low-distribution commemorative; surviving examples in original packaging outnumber circulated pieces substantially.