5 000 000 Mark Teppichfabrikzentrale

Teppichfabrikzentrale A.G. was a carpet manufacturing and wholesale central — precisely the kind of mid-sized industrial firm that found itself printing emergency money during the hyperinflationary collapse of 1923. German notgeld at this denomination level was effectively stop-gap wage scrip: companies issued their own notes because the Reichsbank simply could not print fast enough, and by mid-1923 the time delay between printing and distribution was enough to render a note nearly worthless before it reached a worker's hands.

Five million marks sounds extraordinary, but by August 1923 it wouldn't have bought a tram ticket for long. Leipzig's commercial firms were among the more prolific private issuers of high-denomination scrip during this period.