1 000 000 000 Mark Schwelm

Schwelm's local newspaper printing house, the Schwelmer Tageblatt G.m.b.H., produced this milliard-Mark note during the absolute peak of German hyperinflation — by the time notes at this denomination were circulating in late 1923, the value had already been effectively overtaken before the ink was dry. Municipal authorities across the Ruhr and Westphalia were issuing emergency Notgeld at this scale simply to keep local commerce functioning, Schwelm among hundreds of Städte doing the same.

The printer's role here is worth noting: newspaper presses were pressed into emergency currency production precisely because they were fast and locally available, not because they offered security printing.