Catalog
500 Dollars HSBC
| Issuer | The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited |
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| Year | 2018-2023 |
| Type | Standard circulation banknote |
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| Obverse description | At centre, a large intaglio vignette of a bronze lion's head dominates the face in rich brown tones, set against a warm gold guilloche underprint interlaced with diagonal bands in copper and blue. The issuer's name in English and Chinese runs across the top, with the ornate numeral '500' at upper left, and the promise-to-pay clause, denomination in both scripts, and the Chief Executive's signature with date arranged at lower left. A vertical holographic security stripe with shifting green oval elements is positioned at centre-right, while a green octagonal hologram patch bearing the denomination occupies the upper-right corner. |
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| Reverse description | The reverse carries a panoramic intaglio vignette of the Hexagonal Rock Columns of the Hong Kong Global Geopark in warm brown tones, with two figures standing at the base of the dramatic geological formation and two birds in flight against a pale sky. The large ornate numeral '500' appears at upper right, with a latent-image '500' in pale blue-grey at upper left. A broad terracotta-toned band along the base bears the HSBC logotype, the denomination, and the issuer's full name in both English and Chinese. |
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HSBC's 500-dollar note occupies the top of the three-issuer system unique to Hong Kong, where three commercial banks — HSBC, Standard Chartered, and Bank of China (Hong Kong) — retain the legal authority to issue currency, with each note backed by US dollar reserves held through the Exchange Fund at a fixed rate of HK$7.80. That arrangement, unchanged since the 1983 peg, means these are genuine legal tender issued by a private bank, not a central bank — a distinction increasingly rare in the world.
De La Rue's involvement with HSBC's Hong Kong notes stretches back decades. The 2018 series introduced updated security architecture, including an upgraded security thread, in direct response to pressure from the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to modernize against improved counterfeiting technology circulating elsewhere in the region.