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Value of rare error, worth 3,000 times its $20 face value. Colorful banana sticker (“Ecuador Del Monte Quality” #4011) still affixed for almost 20 years
Officially, it is classified as “an obstructed printing error with retained obstruction”. In reality, it appears to be a simple slip-up. A $20 banknote which had a sticker from a bunch of bananas attached to it before it was overprinted with security numbering is now up for auction at a Texas dealer, the rare error elevating its worth to $57,500, almost 3,000 times its face value.
The so-called Del Monte banknote is unusual, and so valuable, because the sticker is still affixed and clearly shows a serial number and US Department of the Treasury seal printed over it, according to Heritage Auctions of Dallas.
“Most obstructions fall off shortly after printing, leaving behind a blank area of paper lacking the design, but errors with objects that ‘stick’ to the note and enter circulation are very rare,” a description of the lot on the seller’s website said.
“When this note was printed at the Fort Worth western currency facility, it went through the first and second printings normally before the Del Monte sticker found its way on to the surface,” the seller continued, describing the misprint as “one of the greatest paper money errors in history”.
