C-Note: Definition, History, and Its Role in Current Currency

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A C-note is American slang for a $100 bill. The “C” is the Roman numeral for 100, from the Latin centum, and it appeared as a printed letter on U.S. $100 notes in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The nickname means exactly one hundred U.S. dollars in paper currency. It is not a separate currency, a coin or a financial instrument.

What Is a C-Note?

“C-note” is informal shorthand for a $100 Federal Reserve note. When someone says a watch cost “three C-notes,” they mean $300, and usually that it was paid in $100 bills. The word “note” is an older term for a banknote, so a C-note is simply a “hundred note.”

The term applies only to the U.S. dollar. A Canadian or Australian $100 bill is not normally called a C-note, and the slang has no connection to currency codes or exchange rates.

Why Are Hundred-Dollar Bills Called C-Notes?

The short answer is the Roman numeral. In Roman numerals, I is 1, V is 5, X is 10, L is 50, C is 100, D is 500 and M is 1,000. Because C stands for 100, a C-note is a 100 note.

The Letter C on Early Notes

Knowing the numeral alone may not explain why the name caught on. From 1869 to 1914, the $100 bill carried a visible capital C in its upper-left corner. People saw that letter on the bill for more than four decades, so the printed C, more than knowledge of Latin numerals, is the likely source of the nickname.

In 1914 the federal government began issuing Federal Reserve notes to replace older Treasury notes, and the letter C no longer appeared as it had. The nickname became widely known in the 1920s and 1930s, not long after the lettered design disappeared. Films of that era, especially crime and gangster pictures, carried the term to a broad audience. That is why “C-note” still sounds a little old-fashioned to many American ears.

How the Term Is Used

C-note works like any counting noun for money:

• One C-note is $100.
• Half a C-note is $50 in casual speech, though no bill carries that name.
• Five C-notes is $500, and ten C-notes is $1,000, which is also called “a grand.”

Other common nicknames for the same bill include Benjamin, Benji, Ben, Franklin and hundo. “Benjamin” and “Franklin” refer to Benjamin Franklin, one of the U.S. founding fathers, whose portrait appears on the front of the modern $100 bill. These newer names have largely replaced C-note in everyday speech, but the older term is still understood and still turns up in writing, film and conversation, often for a period or tongue-in-cheek feel.

Example of a C-Note in Use

Hypothetical example: A traveler withdraws $1,200 in cash before a trip and asks the bank teller for large bills. The teller hands over twelve C-notes. Later the traveler pays a $350 deposit with four C-notes and receives $50 in change. In conversation, the traveler might say the deposit “cost three and a half C-notes,” meaning $350.

The example also shows a practical limit of the bill itself. Paying $350 with $100 bills forces the merchant to make change, and some smaller businesses decline or check $100 bills closely because of counterfeit concerns and the cash they must keep on hand.

The $100 Bill Then and Now

Historical Designs

Early $100 notes looked very different from today’s bill. The 1878 and 1880 editions showed Abraham Lincoln on the left side. The 1890 version showed Admiral David Farragut on the right, and its back featured two large zeros with a patterned design that reminded people of watermelons. Collectors still call these “watermelon notes.”

Larger bills also existed. The United States once issued $500, $1,000, $5,000 and $10,000 notes, but those were retired, and the $100 bill has been the largest denomination printed since 1969.

Modern Security Features

The current design, issued from 2013, shows an enlarged portrait of Franklin on the front and the number 100 in each corner. Its main anti-counterfeiting features include:

• Color-shifting 100: the numeral in the bottom right corner changes color as the note is tilted.
• 3-D security ribbon: a blue strip woven into the paper runs down the middle, with images that appear to move when the bill is tilted.
• Watermark: a faint portrait of Franklin becomes visible on the right side when the note is held up to light.

When the redesigned bills were introduced, 28 Federal Reserve cash offices stockpiled 3.5 billion of them and distributed them to about 9,000 banks.

Facts About C-Notes in Circulation

The $100 bill lasts far longer than small denominations. Its estimated lifespan is about 22.9 years, compared with about 6.6 years for a $1 bill, largely because high-value notes change hands less often.

In 2022 there were about 18.5 billion $100 bills in circulation, worth roughly $1.84 trillion, compared with about 14.3 billion $1 bills. Federal Reserve research estimates that around two-thirds of $100 bills circulate outside the United States, where they serve as a store of value and a medium of exchange in many countries.

The number of $100 bills in circulation has roughly doubled since the 2007 to 2008 financial crisis. Analysts have linked that growth to demand for cash held outside the banking system, though that explanation is an interpretation rather than a measured motive. The Federal Reserve supplies the bills as demand shifts, and demand rises around the winter holidays and Lunar New Year, when crisp new notes are popular as gifts.

Limitations and Terms Readers Confuse

C-note is slang, so it carries no legal or technical meaning. Contracts, invoices and bank records state amounts as “$100” or “one hundred dollars,” never as C-notes. Several similar-looking terms mean something else entirely:

• C$: a currency symbol, most often for the Canadian dollar (also used for the Nicaraguan córdoba). It has nothing to do with $100 bills.
• 00/100 on a check: shows the cents portion of a written amount. “One hundred and 00/100 dollars” means exactly $100.00, with zero cents.
• Grand or K: $1,000, or ten C-notes.
• Century: an older slang term that also means $100, from the same Latin root.

FAQs

The Bottom Line

The term matters mostly to people reading older American writing, watching period films or hearing casual talk about cash, where a C-note always means one U.S. $100 bill. It has no legal or technical meaning, so contracts, invoices and bank records use "$100" instead. Readers should also keep it separate from look-alike terms such as C$, the symbol most often used for the Canadian dollar.