Meerkat question

[crashlander]

the Meerkat I bought a year ago at a knife show in Germany has a plain blade with the "normal" shape. I´m curious because the blade says "440C Golden USA" on it. But all informations about this knife I found on the net say its made of AUS-6 (and perhaps manufactured in Japan). Is it possible my Meerkat is kind of a very early model or first production run?

 

[bansidthe]

I also have an early model meerkat made with 440C steel. They moved manufacturing to Japan and changed the steel to AUS6 many months ago. Although the knife is less expensive (I purchased a new one to save the older as a collectors item), the AUS6 is not the edge holder the 440C is.