5 Escudos

Banco Nacional Ultramarino occupied an unusual position in Portuguese colonial finance — it was a private institution granted exclusive rights to issue currency across multiple overseas territories simultaneously, meaning the same printing contracts often supplied notes destined for Angola, Mozambique, Timor, and elsewhere, differentiated only by overprint or plate variation. This 1945 issue for the 5 Escudos denomination falls within Bradbury Wilkinson's long run of colonial work, a printer that handled currency for dozens of territories throughout the British and Iberian empires.

The P#27 series was printed during a period when Portuguese overseas trade, though nominally neutral in the war, faced significant disruption to shipping routes, affecting how and when new currency stock actually reached circulation in the territories it was destined for.