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50 000 000 Mark Reichsbanknote
| Issuer | Reichsbank |
|---|---|
| Year | 1923 |
| Type | Standard circulation banknote |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Printed in brown-red and grey on white paper, the obverse is set entirely in Gothic (Fraktur) blackletter typeface. The denomination 'Fünfzig Millionen Mark' is rendered in large bold letterpress across the upper portion, with a large underprint numeral '50' in brown-red at upper right and an oversized decorative 'MILLIONEN' underprint spanning the lower half of the note. Two circular Reichsbank directorate dry-stamp seals flank the block of payment text at centre, beneath which appear multiple manuscript signatures of Reichsbankdirektorium members. A vertical anti-counterfeiting warning legend runs along the left margin in small type. |
|---|---|
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| Protection description | Watermark visible in the paper, showing through on the reverse as a lighter area consistent with a simple patterned or numeral watermark. |
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| Comments |
By the time this note entered circulation in late 1923, Germany's hyperinflation had already consumed any practical meaning the denomination might have carried. The Reichsbank was printing on one side only to accelerate output — the presses simply could not keep pace with the rate at which purchasing power was dissolving. Fifty million marks, a sum that would have represented extraordinary wealth a decade earlier, was by autumn 1923 insufficient to buy a loaf of bread in many German cities.
The watermark remained, almost absurdly, as if forgery were still a meaningful concern at this stage of monetary collapse.