500 Pesos Oro

The Banco de la República was established in July 1923, making this 500 Pesos Oro among the earliest notes issued by Colombia's newly created central bank. The republic had endured decades of monetary chaos under a fragmented system of private and departmental banks — the 1923 reform, guided in large part by the Kemmerer Mission, a U.S. financial advisory team, consolidated that mess into a single note-issuing authority.

The American Bank Note Company contract was a deliberate choice for credibility. At that denomination, counterfeiting risk was serious, and ABNC's intaglio work was considered among the hardest to replicate in Latin America at the time.