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The 10 yuan coin was issued by the People's Bank of China on 29 January 2021 to mark the Year of the Ox in the Chinese lunar calendar. New Year commemorative 贺岁 coins are released ahead of the Spring Festival and are distributed to the public at face value.
Image description
The main subject of the reverse is an ox with its head raised, rendered as a combination of traditional jianzhi paper-cutting and the decorative idiom of the nianhua New Year print. The background of the composition is formed by festive lanterns and the "five grains" (五谷), a collective image of the staple crops of Chinese agriculture and of a good harvest; the cyclical year mark "辛丑" appears on the left. The obverse carries the inscriptions "中国人民银行" (People's Bank of China), the denomination "10元", the romanisation "SHIYUAN" and the year of issue "2021", set against a tuanhua ornament in the form of a rounded floral rosette.
Historical context
The Ox (牛, niú) is the second sign of the 12-year Chinese zodiac cycle, and 2021 corresponds to the cyclical pair 辛丑 (xīnchǒu) — the year of the Metal Ox. Draught cattle underpinned Chinese agriculture: the ox-drawn plough with an iron share and a paired harness spread under the Han dynasty (206 BC – AD 220) and shaped the country's rural economy for two millennia. From this came the rite of the "spring ox" (春牛): at the start of spring, on the day of Lichun, officials ceremonially struck a clay ox figure with a whip to open the farming season — a ritual attested as early as Han times and finally codified under the Song. The "spring ox picture" (春牛图) became one of the favourite subjects of the nianhua New Year print, whose decorative language this coin borrows alongside the art of jianzhi paper-cutting, inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2009.
Numismatic significance
The issue belongs to the 贺岁普通纪念币 series of circulating New Year coins, which the People's Bank of China strikes in mass mintages and releases at face value through advance reservation and exchange at banks. The 2021 mintage is 150 million pieces — 140 million for reservation and exchange and a further 10 million supplied in presentation sets — which makes the coin both affordable and widely represented in collections. The Year of the Ox is the seventh coin of the second cycle of the bimetallic zodiac series, opened by the Goat in 2015 and closed by the Horse in 2026; a complete set of twelve is valued appreciably higher than individual pieces. In Chinese tradition the ox stands for perseverance, endurance and honest labour, so a gift of this coin at the Spring Festival reads as a wish for prosperity earned by one's own effort.