500 Leke

Albania's 1996 banknote series was issued during a period of acute institutional stress. Within months of this note entering circulation, the collapse of pyramid investment schemes in early 1997 triggered a near-total breakdown of civil order — the government fell, weapons depots were looted, and a significant portion of circulating currency was destroyed or lost. Notes from this series that survived in any reasonable condition did so largely by accident.

The pyramid crisis wiped out the savings of roughly two-thirds of the Albanian population, and the political fallout required a UN peacekeeping intervention. P#60 predates the chaos by less than a year.