100 Yuan

This is the inaugural 100 Yuan denomination of the First Series Renminbi, issued in December 1948 — within weeks of the People's Bank of China's own founding on December 1st of that year. The note entered circulation during the final, chaotic phase of the Civil War, when Nationalist hyperinflation had so thoroughly destroyed public confidence in paper currency that the new Communist administration faced the immediate task of establishing credibility from nothing.

Printing quality and paper stock vary noticeably across surviving examples, a direct consequence of the decentralized wartime print facilities the PBC inherited rather than purpose-built infrastructure.