Catalog
100 Bolívares
| Issuer | Banco Caracas |
|---|---|
| Year | 1926-1928 |
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| Value | 100 Bolívares |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Dark blue-black intaglio print on cream paper. At left, a classical allegorical vignette of a seated female figure with a dog, rendered in fine line engraving within an ornate frame. At upper centre, the bank title reads 'BANCO CARACAS' in bold lettering with 'COMPAÑIA ANONIMA' below, flanked by guilloche ornaments. At right, a circular portrait vignette of a woman in classical dress enclosed by lathe-work border. The promise-to-pay text in Spanish is centred, with denomination 'CIEN BOLIVARES' in large gothic script. Serial number and date appear at lower left, with manuscript signatures of bank officials below. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | BANCO CARACAS COMPAÑIA ANONIMA CAPITAL Bs 6.000.000 El Banco Caracas pagará al portador en dinero efectivo CIEN BOLIVARES A LA PRESENTACION DE ESTE BILLETE EN LAS OFICINAS DEL BANCO. Caracas 100 |
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| Comments |
Banco Caracas was a private commercial bank, not a central bank, and its authority to issue notes stemmed from a Venezuelan banking law that permitted chartered institutions to circulate currency well into the twentieth century. By the mid-1920s, that system was already under pressure — the Banco Central de Venezuela would eventually consolidate and terminate private note issue, though that came later, in 1940.
The American Bank Note Company imprint on a Venezuelan private bank note of this period is unsurprising; ABNC held a near-monopoly on South American commercial printing work throughout the 1920s. What makes this denomination worth noting is that 100 bolívares represented serious purchasing power in 1926–28 Venezuela, a country then being rapidly transformed by oil revenues from the Maracaibo fields — meaning notes like this circulated among a very specific commercial class, not the general population.