5 000 000 000 Mark

Baden-Baden's five billion Mark note was issued during the hyperinflationary peak of late 1923, when municipal and regional authorities across Germany were forced to print their own emergency currency — Notgeld — simply to meet payroll and enable daily commerce. The Reichsbank could not supply denominations fast enough to keep pace with the collapse, so localities like Baden-Baden commissioned local printers. Johannes Pfeiffer was a Baden-Baden trade printer, not a security press, which shows in the relatively modest production values typical of provincial Notgeld at these denominations.

By November 1923, five billion Marks would buy roughly a loaf of bread.