2 Pesos – State of Guerrero

In 1915, the State of Guerrero, like much of revolutionary Mexico, was plunged into monetary chaos and severe inflation. The collapse of the federal government under President Victoriano Huerta in 1914 had destroyed the credibility and supply of the official peso fuerte. In the resulting power vacuum, multiple revolutionary factions—most notably the Constitutionalists under Venustiano Carranza and the Zapatistas, who held strong influence in Guerrero—vied for control. Each group, including various state-level authorities and military commanders, began issuing their own paper currency to fund their operations, leading to a proliferation of unsupported banknotes.

This period saw the circulation of a confusing array of bilimbiques (a derogatory term for revolutionary paper money), including notes issued by the Guerrero state government itself, as well as currency from neighboring regions and competing factions. The value of this paper money was highly unstable and largely depended on the military fortunes and perceived legitimacy of the issuing authority. In Zapatista-held areas, their currency held some local sway but was worthless elsewhere, while Carrancista notes might be imposed but not trusted. This fragmentation meant that a merchant in Chilpancingo or Tixtla faced immense difficulty in determining what money was genuine or would retain value from one week to the next.

The result was a rapid return to barter and the hoarding of silver coins, which retained their intrinsic value. The paper money, issued in excess and without proper guarantees, depreciated swiftly, causing prices for basic goods like corn and beans to skyrocket and inflicting severe hardship on the civilian population. By late 1915, the monetary anarchy in Guerrero was a microcosm of the wider revolutionary struggle, where economic survival often depended on local allegiances and the precarious stability of the nearest armed force, rather than on a unified or trustworthy financial system.