100 Kuruş

The Banque Impériale Ottomane — jointly owned by French and British capital — occupied an unusual position as both a private commercial bank and the de facto central bank of the Ottoman state, holding the exclusive right to issue banknotes. The 1876 date places this note in one of the most financially strained periods in Ottoman history: the Porte had suspended external debt payments that year, an event that would eventually lead to the establishment of the Ottoman Public Debt Administration in 1881 and foreign creditor oversight of imperial finances.

The kuruş-denominated issues circulated alongside Kaime treasury notes, which had badly damaged public confidence in paper currency over the preceding decades. Low-denomination BIO notes were treated with particular skepticism in provincial markets.