20 Centavos

The Banco Nacional de Bolivia was established in 1871 as the country's first attempt at a nationally chartered commercial bank, and this small-denomination note belongs to its earliest emission. ABNC produced the full series in New York, and the quality of engraving on even the fractional values — like this 20 Centavos — reflects the house standard the company applied regardless of denomination.

Bolivia's monetary system in the 1870s was still anchored to the silver peso, and fractional paper of this type circulated primarily in urban commercial centers where coin shortages made small change impractical. Few survive; low-denomination notes from this period were used hard and discarded.