50 Yuan Bank of Shansi, Chahar, & Hopei

The Bank of Shansi, Chahar & Hopei — commonly abbreviated as the Ch'a-Ha-Er bank in period Chinese sources — was a communist-backed regional institution operating in the Jin-Cha-Ji border region, one of the principal base areas established by the Eighth Route Army behind Japanese lines. Notes issued here functioned as a parallel currency within liberated zones, deliberately kept separate from both Nationalist fiat and the Japanese-sponsored Federal Reserve Bank currency that occupied the same geography.

By 1944 the border region economy was under sustained pressure from Japanese mop-up campaigns and a Nationalist economic blockade, both of which pushed the bank toward higher denominations to manage inflation internally. The 50 Yuan value sits in that inflationary acceleration. Survival rates for these notes are low — wartime paper quality was poor, and many were withdrawn or simply disintegrated in field conditions.