5 Yuan Ship Building, Silver Bullion

China's silver bullion program in the early 1990s included a handful of thematic issues tied to state industrial achievements, of which shipbuilding was among the more commercially targeted — aimed squarely at export and collector markets in Japan and Southeast Asia rather than domestic circulation. The People's Bank issued these through the China Gold Coin Corporation, which controlled all foreign distribution.

The .900 fineness is notably lower than the .999 standard China adopted for most of its Panda bullion series, placing this issue in an intermediate category that satisfies neither pure bullion investors nor type collectors without reservation.