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1 000 000 Yuan
| Issuer | Central Bank of China |
|---|---|
| Year | 1949 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 1 000 000 Yuan (1 000 000) |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Printer | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Portrait of Chiang Kai-shek in military uniform occupies the right portion of the note within an oval vignette, set against an intricate guilloche underprint. The denomination 壹佰萬圓 is rendered in large characters at centre-left, with the issuer name 中央銀行 across the top and the currency designation 金圓券 above the central panel. The overall colour is brown, with red serial numbers flanking the upper portion of the design. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | A central vignette presents a steel truss railway bridge over a river busy with sailing vessels and small craft, rendered in fine intaglio line work in brown. The denomination 1000000 appears in large numerals in each corner, and the legend ONE MILLION GOLD YUAN is set in bold letterpress at the bottom centre below the bridge scene. The printer's imprint CHUNG HWA BOOK CO. LTD. appears at the foot of the note. |
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| Comments |
By mid-1949, the Nationalist government's gold yuan reform had already collapsed, and the Central Bank of China was printing denominations that would have been unthinkable two years earlier. This one-million yuan note was part of the final hyperinflationary cascade — the gold yuan itself, introduced in August 1948 as a supposed stabilizing currency, lost virtually all value within months, forcing the issuance of ever-larger denominations before the Nationalist retreat to Taiwan effectively ended mainland operations.
Chung Hwa Book Co. had been printing currency and official documents in Shanghai for decades, but by this point the presses were racing against economic collapse rather than serving any functional monetary purpose.