5 Dollars - George V

The Straits Settlements — Penang, Malacca, and Singapore — operated as a Crown Colony under direct British rule, and currency authority rested with the colonial government rather than any local banking institution. Bradbury Wilkinson, based in New Malden, held the printing contract through much of the interwar period and produced this series to a high intaglio standard consistent with their colonial work across multiple territories.

The 1931 start date places this issue squarely within the Depression years, when Malayan commodity exports — rubber and tin above all — collapsed in value. Demand for high-denomination notes fell accordingly, and surviving examples from the early dates of this range are noticeably scarcer than later ones.