50 Centavos

The Masbate Consolidated Mining Company operated gold mines on Masbate Island in the central Philippines, and like many large employers in remote provincial areas during the American colonial period, issued its own scrip to pay workers — redeemable at company stores rather than freely exchangeable for pesos. This note dates to 1941, the last year before the Japanese invasion made such arrangements moot.

Philippine emergency and emergency-style company scrip from this period was officially tolerated under Commonwealth regulations, though the legal framework was perpetually ambiguous. Few Masbate Consolidated pieces survived the war intact.