1 Yuan Tung Pei Bank of China

The Tung Pei Bank of China — "Northeast China Bank" — was established by the Chinese Communist Party to serve the Manchurian base areas following the Soviet expulsion of Japanese forces in August 1945. This note appeared almost immediately after liberation, making it among the earliest Communist-issued currency in the northeast. The timing was operationally critical: the CCP needed to displace Japanese puppet currency and competing Nationalist issues before the civil war fully engulfed the region.

The S-prefix in the Pick reference flags it as a regional or specialized issue — appropriate for a bank whose authority extended no further than CCP-controlled Manchuria and whose notes were largely demonetized once the People's Bank of China unified currency after 1948.