100 000 Dollars Emergency Bearer Cheque

Zimbabwe's 2005 bearer cheques were a bureaucratic workaround — the Reserve Bank lacked legal authority to issue banknotes above certain denominations without parliamentary approval, so these instruments were classified as cheques rather than currency. The distinction was entirely nominal; they circulated as cash and were accepted as such.

The 100,000 dollar face value, which would have been substantial a year earlier, was already losing ground to inflation that the government's own statistics significantly understated. The relatively high print run of over twelve million reflects how quickly demand for high-denomination paper outpaced supply during this period.