20 Fen

The Federal Reserve Bank of China was established in March 1938 under Japanese occupation authorities in Beijing, explicitly designed to replace the Nationalist government's fabi currency in the occupied territories of North China. These small-denomination fen notes were the workhorse instruments of that displacement policy — practically forcing the fabi out of daily transactions by flooding the market with competing paper at the street level.

P#J49 is part of the "J" prefix series in the Pick catalogue, denoting Japanese puppet-state issues. Genuine examples occasionally turn up with ink adhesion problems along fold lines, a known weakness in the paper stock used for this wartime series.