50 Yuan Bank of Pei Hai

The Bank of Pei Hai was a Communist Party-controlled regional bank operating in the Shandong-Bohai base area, issuing currency that competed directly with Japanese military yen and puppet Manchukuo notes for acceptance among rural populations. By 1945 the bank had been functioning for several years under wartime guerrilla conditions, meaning printing quality and paper stock varied considerably depending on which local facility handled a given run — the suffix letters distinguishing S3587b from S3587c almost certainly reflect exactly that kind of production variation rather than any policy change.

Notes from Shandong base area banks were frequently counterfeited by Japanese occupation authorities as an economic warfare measure, complicating authentication of surviving examples today.