The Case: The Gold of France Rebuilt, at One-Twentieth the Supply of Its Companion Coin

When Napoleon’s empire ended at Waterloo in June 1815, the Bourbon monarchy returned to a France that had to be rebuilt — politically, financially, and monetarily. The 40 franc gold pieces of Louis XVIII are the large gold coins of that reconstruction, struck at the Paris Mint between 1816 and 1824 as the restored kingdom re-established the gold franc Napoleon had created and made it the foundation of a stable, convertible currency.

The investor argument is comparative and direct. Gold coins of the era were working money, and the 40 franc denomination was too valuable for daily commerce — so it was struck sparingly. Total Louis XVIII 40 franc production came to 907,109 pieces, against approximately 18.4 million of his own 20 franc coins minted over the same reign — roughly one-twentieth the supply, in a coin carrying twice the gold. Later French series only widen the gap: single years of 20 franc production under Napoleon III exceeded the entire Louis XVIII 40 franc mintage twenty times over. For investors whose priorities are a highly coveted large gold coin steeped in the history of the Restoration, notable scarcity at the scale of under a million pieces fixed forever in the 1820s, and a standardized and widely recognized gold content, the Louis XVIII 40 franc offers a production base few coins in the French series can match.

Design & Specifications

The obverse bears the portrait of Louis XVIII facing right, engraved by Auguste-François Michaut — an unidealized, human likeness of the aging king, his long hair curling to a queue at the neck, encircled by LOUIS XVIII ROI DE FRANCE. The reverse returns the ancient symbol of the French monarchy to gold after a quarter-century of revolutionary and imperial imagery: the crowned shield of the Bourbons bearing three fleurs-de-lis, flanked by laurel branches, with the denomination 40 F beside the shield and the date and mint mark below.

At approximately 26mm in diameter and 12.90 grams total weight, each coin is struck from .900 fine gold and contains 0.3734 troy ounces of actual gold content — twice the 20 franc standard later adopted across Europe by the Latin Monetary Union. Grade range: VF/XF. Minted 1816–1824.

Louis XVIII: The Monarch of the Restoration

Louis XVIII spent twenty-three years in exile — through the Revolution that executed his brother Louis XVI, through the entire arc of Napoleon’s rise and fall — before returning to the throne in 1814, and again, definitively, after Waterloo in 1815. He proved a more pragmatic ruler than his family’s history might have suggested. Rather than attempt to undo the Revolution, he accepted a constitutional Charter, retained Napoleon’s civil code and administrative structure, and kept the gold franc exactly as the Emperor had defined it — a tacit acknowledgment that whatever else had failed in France, the money had worked.

His reign gave France something it had not known in a generation: peace, a functioning parliament, and a currency good as gold. The 40 franc pieces struck under his name financed the indemnities, reconstruction, and revived commerce of a country rejoining Europe — and they document the only period in French history when the restored ancien régime and Napoleon’s monetary system worked side by side.

Scarcity: Under a Million Pieces, Concentrated in Three Years

The mintage record shows how thin this series truly is. More than 97% of all Louis XVIII 40 franc production came in just three years — 1816, 1817, and 1818 — as the restored monarchy recoined the currency. Thereafter the denomination nearly disappeared: 4,598 pieces in 1819, 5,474 in 1820, 972 in 1822, and 155 in 1823. The series total of 907,109 stands against 18.4 million 20 francs from the same reign, 232.9 million 20 francs under Napoleon III, and hundreds of millions across the later French gold series. These coins then circulated as working money for decades and passed through two centuries of melts and attrition. The scarcity argument is structural: a small original supply, produced in a narrow window, that no demand event can ever enlarge.

International Recognizability and Liquidity

The Louis XVIII 40 franc trades within the French gold family — the most widely traded historic gold coinage in Europe, recognized on sight by dealers across Europe and North America, with specifications documented in every standard reference. Its gold content is exactly double the 20 franc standard that dealers price daily, which makes valuation immediate anywhere French gold changes hands. The Restoration issues add a further channel of demand: collectors of French royal coinage compete for the fleur-de-lis types alongside gold investors, a demand layer the common later issues do not enjoy.

The Pre-1933 Advantage: Legal Distinction and Portfolio Differentiation

In 1933, FDR issued Executive Order 6102, requiring Americans to surrender their gold coin and bullion to the Treasury — but the order and the regulations that followed it exempted gold coins of recognized special value to collectors of rare and unusual coins. Subsequent clarifications by the Treasury identified pre-1933 gold coins — a classification that includes the Louis XVIII 40 franc, struck between 1816 and 1824 — as falling within that collector classification as historical items.

Under current constitutional law, a government intervention in the gold market would be executed through the power of eminent domain — the government’s right to take private property for public use provided it pays the owner just compensation. Historic coins complicate the government’s ability to broadly establish “just compensation” or “fair value,” which was precisely the reasoning behind the original “recognized special value” exemption in 1933. That complexity, and the precedent surrounding pre-1933 gold coins, creates a notable impediment to the government’s ability to restrict them broadly — particularly compared to modern bullion, which can be valued easily and consistently at a single price. In essence, it is a bureaucratic question of whether the government would undertake the enormous task of valuing the diversity and complexity of the historic-coin genre — every coin, every date, every condition, every personal holding — and that difficulty is what insulates the owner’s legal liquidity rights in the event of capital controls.

Whether a future government intervention in private gold markets is a risk an investor assigns significant weight to is a personal judgment. The factual point is narrower: the pre-1933 status represents a layer of portfolio differentiation that this coin carries along with a measure of insulation for the legal liquidity rights of its owner.

For a more in-depth study, we invite you to read our comprehensive memorandum on this subject: Preparing for a Potential Gold Confiscation

Final Thought

The French 40 Franc Louis XVIII is the large gold coin of France’s restoration — struck in the first years after Waterloo, bearing the returned Bourbon king and the fleur-de-lis, from a production base of under a million pieces concentrated in a three-year window two centuries ago. It pairs comparative scarcity that the common French issues cannot approach with a standardized and widely recognized gold content — an issue that surfaces irregularly and is seldom available in quantity. Few gold coins available to investors combine this degree of scarcity and historical consequence at twice the gold content of the familiar 20 franc.

Mintage by Date