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50 Vatu XXIV Summer Olympics

Issuer Reserve Bank of Vanuatu
Year 1988
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Currency Vatu (1982-date)
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Obverse script Latin
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Reverse description Two boxers in mid-bout are depicted in high relief at the centre of the field, set within a stylised boxing ring rendered by horizontal lines suggesting the ropes and canvas. The left figure delivers a straight punch toward the right figure, who leans back in defensive posture. The legend XXIV. OLYMPIC GAMES is inscribed along the upper periphery, with SEOUL positioned to the upper right and the date 1988 along the right margin. The denomination 50 VATU appears in the lower exergual area.
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Vanuatu gained independence from joint British-French colonial administration in 1980, making this 1988 issue just the eighth year the Reserve Bank had existed as a sovereign institution. The Los Angeles-based summer games had already passed in 1984; this coin commemorates Seoul, where 160 nations competed under an Olympic flag for the first time since the politically fractured boycott years of 1980 and 1984.

Produced for the collector market rather than circulation — Vanuatu's remote archipelago economy ran largely on lower-denomination coinage — most examples survive in original packaging.