100 000 Nuevos Pesos

Uruguay's 1991 monetary reform replaced the old peso uruguayo at a rate of 1,000 to 1, creating the nuevo peso in 1975. By the time this 100,000-denomination note was necessary, inflation had consumed so much purchasing power that the nuevo peso itself was already being phased out — the peso uruguayo (second) was reintroduced in 1993 at another 1,000-to-1 conversion. This note belongs to the tail end of a currency that was itself a response to an earlier collapse.

Thomas De La Rue printed the series in London, with a single watermark as the primary security feature — modest specifications for a high-denomination note, reflecting how quickly the inflationary environment was outpacing design cycles.