5000 Drachmai Italian Occupation

The Cassa Mediterranea di Credito per la Grecia was a parallel currency mechanism created by Italian occupation authorities in 1941 specifically to extract resources from Greece without drawing on Italian lire reserves. It was not a bank in any functional sense — it issued occupation currency that Greeks were compelled to accept, while the occupiers used it to pay requisitions at rates they set themselves.

Greece suffered one of the worst hyperinflationary collapses of the war years as a direct consequence of this arrangement. By late 1944, the drachma had become functionally worthless. The 5000 denomination, enormous by 1941 standards, was already insufficient before the series had finished circulating.