Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
5 Pesos
| Issuer | Banco Internacional de Guatemala |
|---|---|
| Year | 1885 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Size | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | P#S154 |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | EL BANCO INTERNACIONAL DE GUATEMALA PAGARÁ AL PORTADOR EN MONEDA EFECTIVA CINCO PESOS GUATEMALA DIRECTOR INTERINO GERENTE |
| Reverse description | The reverse is printed in a very light, largely unadorned style, with faint guilloche underprint patterns visible across the surface and a central oval vignette impression showing the bank seal in pale ink. The overall design is extremely plain relative to the obverse, with no prominent text legends, consistent with the American Bank Note Company's practice for this series. |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Signature(s) | Log in to see details |
| Protection type | Log in to see details |
| Protection description | Log in to see details |
| Variants | Log in to see details |
| Comments |
The Banco Internacional de Guatemala was one of several private commercial banks authorized to issue currency under Guatemala's 1874 banking law, which deliberately fragmented note issuance among competing institutions rather than establishing a single central bank. This arrangement lasted until the Guatemalan government consolidated and eventually nationalized note issue in the early twentieth century. Private bank notes from this period are consequently short-lived issues — the window between a bank's founding and the end of its issuing privilege was often less than two decades.
The American Bank Note Company imprint places this squarely in the era when virtually every Latin American private bank of any ambition contracted with the major New York security printers. ABNC plates were often shared or adapted across multiple clients, worth checking against related Guatemalan issues of the same period.