A collector has paid a world record Aus$495,000 (£336,000) for one of Australia's first coins, known as the "Holey Dollar". The coin is one of 40,000 Spanish Silver Dollars that Governor Lachlan Macquarie bought in 1812 to solve a currency shortage in the fledgling penal colony of New South Wales. Macquarie enlisted the help of a convicted forger, William Henshall, to cut a hole in the centre of each to prevent the coins leaving the colony in payment of imports. The resulting "donut" was then stamped over with the words New South Wales, the value Five Shillings and the date 1813 to create Australia's first coin.Picture: AFP PHOTO/COINWORKS

Credit : AFP PHOTO/COINWORKS