20 Francs Comptes courants

Pick 83 was issued in the weeks immediately surrounding the German invasion of August 1914, making it one of the last notes authorized under peacetime Belgian banking conditions. The Banque Nationale had been quietly preparing smaller, more portable denominations anticipating the disruption to come — this issue was part of that precautionary expansion of the currency supply.

The "comptes courants" designation reflects the note's origin in the bank's current account liabilities rather than conventional note issue, a legal distinction that mattered considerably to Belgian banking law at the time but became largely academic once occupation currency controls took hold.