1 000 000 000 Mark

Siegkreis — the administrative district surrounding the Sieg river southeast of Cologne — was one of hundreds of German local authorities forced to print their own emergency currency during the hyperinflation of 1923, when the Reichsbank simply could not produce denominations fast enough to keep pace with collapsing purchasing power. By the time a billion-mark note was necessary, the Reichsmark had lost any practical meaning as a unit of account; workers were being paid twice daily so wages could be spent before the afternoon exchange rate rendered them worthless.

B. Kühlen in Mönchengladbach was a commercial printer, not a specialist security printer — the firm took on notgeld contracts across the Rhineland as a straightforward print job.