1994 Year of the Family 50 Cent Date Varieties
In 1994 the Royal Australian Mint issued a commemorative 50c piece for the Year of the Family. The coin is quite common given its mintage but is one of a few Australian decimal coins that has date varieties.
On most 1994 Year of the Family 50c pieces the date is narrow and the digits are approximately equally spaced. On a small number the date is more widely spaced: the 1 and 9 are similarly spaced to the narrow date but the first 9, second 9 and 4 are further apart than the 1 and 9. While the wide date is uncommon it is not particularly rare: the narrow date accounts for around 94% of 1994 50c pieces in circulation while the wide date accounts for around 6% of 1994 50c pieces in circulation.
It is believed that most or all of the mint sets contain the wide date variety, though further research is required on the baby and proof sets. Given that the mint sets at least seem to be mostly or entirely wide dates, it seems likely that the wide date coins were struck first as mint sets are typically struck and released in the previous year.