1 Boliviano

The Banco Nacional de Bolivia was established in 1871 under a government concession, operating as a private commercial bank with note-issuing privileges rather than a true central bank. Its early note series were contracted to the American Bank Note Company, the dominant supplier to Latin American issuers throughout the 1870s — a period when few South American states had access to domestic security printing of comparable quality.

Bolivia's monetary system in 1877 still operated in the shadow of Spanish colonial denominations. The boliviano had been introduced as the national unit only in 1864, replacing the peso, and public trust in paper currency remained fragile in a country where silver coin — minted at Potosí — was the default medium of exchange for most transactions.