10 Pesos Plata Boliviana

Banco Argentino operated out of Paraná, capital of Entre Ríos province, during a period when Argentine provincial banking was effectively unregulated. The 1863 National Bank Law had failed to impose order, and private banks of issue proliferated through the 1860s and 1870s, many backed by questionable reserves. Banco Argentino was among them — chartered under provincial authority rather than federal oversight, which gave it latitude to issue currency denominated in pesos plata boliviana, the silver-based unit then common in the Río de la Plata region.

The American Bank Note Company contract places this squarely within a wave of Latin American provincial issuers who turned to New York engravers for credibility their own balance sheets couldn't provide.