The 100-peso note is still Argentina's highest denomination, worth just $22 at the official exchange rate and about $16 in the illegal exchanges that most people have to use to buy dollars amid ever-tighter currency controls. With rampant inflation, that forces people to handle increasingly large wads of cash.

Consumers are more frequently running up against cash limits at automatic teller machines, going from bank to bank to get enough bills to pay the rent and buy food. Highway tolls and subway and train rides also jumped in price this week, and "everybody's asking to raise the limit on their credit cards, which is no small factor, because there are 37 million credit cards in a population of 40 million Argentines," said Enrique Dentice, an economist at the private University of San Martin.

Bills are racing off Argentina's printing presses as the government stimulates consumer spending and job growth, with salaries rising 25 percent or more a year to keep pace. The overall money supply has grown 23 percent and the nominal peso value of the bills and coins in circulation has jumped 36 percent in the last 12 months, to nearly 176 billion pesos.