500 Francs / 100 Ariary

The Institut d'Émission Malgache was established in 1950 as a transitional issuing authority for Madagascar and the Comoros — a French colonial mechanism designed to manage the monetary transition ahead of eventual independence, which Madagascar reached in 1960. This note therefore spans both sides of that political rupture, with the same design circulating under colonial administration and then briefly under a newly sovereign state before the series was retired.

Clément Serveau was one of the Banque de France's most prolific designers of the mid-century colonial note series. Armanelli and Marliat divided the engraving work between obverse and reverse — a standard division of labor at the Chamalières facility, but worth noting here because the quality differential between the two sides is occasionally visible under magnification.