FLOAT

China Red Revenue 'Small One Dollar'

Maker
Imperial Chinese Post (Qing dynasty)
Year
1897
Rank
16 of 100

China Red Revenue 'Small One Dollar'

China Red Revenue 'Small One Dollar' by Imperial Chinese Post (Qing dynasty) (1897) is ranked 16 in the FLOAT 100 for Stamps. It sold for $889,832 on 1 July 2013. The rarest regularly-issued stamp of China and the cornerstone of the world's most aggressively-bid philatelic market.

What is it, and why is it in the FLOAT 100?

The rarest regularly-issued stamp of China and the cornerstone of the world's most aggressively-bid philatelic market.

$1 'small figures' surcharge on the 3-cent Red Revenue fiscal stamp (Waterlow & Sons); only 32 known

What is the best-sourced number for it?

Figure
$889,832
Kind
Realized at auction
Date
1 July 2013

Single example realized HK$6.9M (~$889,832) at InterAsia Auctions, Hong Kong, summer 2013 (estimate HK$6.5M).

This is a realized sale. Somebody paid it. Source.

How this is made

The figure
One reference price, taken from a named public source and shown with its own kind. FLOAT does not average it with anything or adjust it for time.
Realized or not
A realized price is a completed sale. A market asking price and a price-guide value are not sales, and are labeled as such wherever they appear.
Why no grade ladder
Most FLOAT 100 entries are individual objects. There is one of this, so there is no population and no spread across grades to show.
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2026-08-08