Ecuador's sucre spent most of the 1990s under siege from chronic inflation, and the 20,000-sucre denomination reflects just how far things had deteriorated — the note required issuing at a face value that would have been unthinkable a decade earlier. The Central Bank printed just over twelve million pieces across the four-year run, a relatively constrained quantity that suggests the denomination was superseded by even higher-value notes rather than retired through normal attrition.
The sucre itself was abolished in January 2000 when Ecuador dollarized, making this one of the last high-denomination notes in the currency's history before the entire series became obsolete overnight.
Ecuador's sucre spent most of the 1990s under siege from chronic inflation, and the 20,000-sucre denomination reflects just how far things had deteriorated — the note required issuing at a face value that would have been unthinkable a decade earlier. The Central Bank printed just over twelve million pieces across the four-year run, a relatively constrained quantity that suggests the denomination was superseded by even higher-value notes rather than retired through normal attrition.
The sucre itself was abolished in January 2000 when Ecuador dollarized, making this one of the last high-denomination notes in the currency's history before the entire series became obsolete overnight.