10 Mark Forum-Scheck

Forum Außenhandelsgesellschaft was the GDR's state-owned hard currency retail operation — a mechanism for extracting Western money from East Germans who received it from relatives abroad. Holders of Deutschmarks or other convertible currencies were strongly encouraged, in practice coerced, to exchange them at Forum shops for these Schecks, which could then only be spent at Intershop stores on imported goods unavailable in the regular socialist economy. The system effectively taxed the West German family ties of millions of East Germans while keeping hard currency out of private hands.

The 12-million-plus print run reflects how heavily the scheme was used through the late Brezhnev period. These circulated heavily and survivors in clean condition are rarer than the numbers suggest.