5 Yuan Bank of China

The Bank of China's 1919 issues occupy an awkward moment in Chinese banking history — the institution had been reorganized just years earlier, in 1912, from the old Qing dynasty's Ta-Ching Government Bank, and was still negotiating its identity between a government policy bank and a commercial one. By 1919, it operated a sprawling network of branches, and notes of this series frequently carry overprints identifying the issuing branch, which directly affects scarcity. A Shanghai-overprinted example is common; some provincial branches issued in quantities so small that survivors are genuinely rare.

The L.H. Chen and K. Feng signature combination helps narrow the dating within the series. Worth confirming whether the specific branch overprint — if present — aligns with known signature pairings, as mismatched combinations can indicate later reissues from old stock.