20 Quetzales Banco de Guatemala, 2nd. type

Waterlow & Sons printed the bulk of Central American paper currency through the 1950s, and this series shows the firm's characteristic intaglio work at close to its final period of quality output — the company was absorbed by De La Rue in 1961, ending over 150 years of independent production. Guatemala had been issuing through foreign security printers almost continuously since the early twentieth century, partly from necessity and partly from a well-founded distrust of domestic printing infrastructure following repeated currency debasements under earlier regimes.

The P#33 designation covers a span of four years during which Banco de Guatemala maintained a relatively stable monetary policy, unusual for the region at the time.