100 Cash – Szechuan Province

In 1926, the currency situation in Sichuan (then commonly romanized as Szechuan) was one of profound chaos and hyperinflation, a direct result of the province's political fragmentation. Since the collapse of central authority following the 1911 Revolution, Sichuan had been dominated by a shifting network of regional militarists, known as dujun or warlords. Each warlord, controlling a handful of counties, financed his army and administration by forcibly issuing his own paper currency, known as tuchao (local banknotes). By 1926, there were over thirty different such issuers, with notes convertible only within the warlord's own territory and backed by little more than coercive authority.

This proliferation of unbacked paper money led to catastrophic devaluation. Warlords printed currency excessively to cover military campaigns, causing rampant inflation. Merchants and the public faced severe hardship as the value of notes could plummet overnight, and exchanging goods across different warlord territories became a complex and risky endeavor. The most notorious issuer was the Chongqing-based "Sichuan Commercial Bank," controlled by militarist Liu Xiang, which flooded the market with notes that became nearly worthless, eroding public trust in any paper currency to its core.

Consequently, the economy regressed to more primitive forms of exchange. In many areas, particularly rural districts, people reverted to using silver sycees (shoe-shaped ingots), copper cash coins, or even barter for basic transactions to avoid the worthless paper. This monetary anarchy stifled trade, crippled economic development, and placed immense burden on the peasantry, who were often forced to accept tuchao for tax payments and goods. The situation in 1926 thus epitomized the economic consequences of warlordism, creating a fractured and suffering provincial economy years before the Nationalist government would attempt a unified currency reform.