30 Coppers

The Jing Yuan City Official Money Bureau was one of dozens of locally administered currency offices operating in Republican-era China, issuing copper-unit notes to address the chronic shortage of small-denomination coinage in provincial markets. By 1923, the national banking system was fragmented enough that municipal and prefectural bureaus routinely printed their own fractional notes with no coordination from Peking — and frequently no meaningful redemption backing either.

The "city official money bureau" designation placed this issuer below the provincial level, meaning its notes circulated within a narrow geographic radius and enjoyed trust only insofar as local commerce enforced it. Many such issues collapsed within a few years of printing.