At the same time, Ma Qianzhuo looked at the newly received message in his hand, and just after reading the first line, he also gasped, and the word "Great Leap Forward" jumped into his mind. () Deposits, are they going to open a bank in Guangzhou? The affairs of Leizhou have not been taken care of, and there is going to be a financial storm in Guangzhou again?

If you look closely, it has nothing to do with the bank, and you can't even talk about the bank. This idea was not come up with by the people of Guangzhou Station, but by Shen Fan, the big shopkeeper of Zizhen Zhai, and the reason why he put forward this suggestion was not because he had any advanced financial awareness, but because it was a traditional form of financing for business at that time.

Put your spare money in a shop that runs a relatively good business, and then withdraw interest on an annual basis. The shops get liquidity, and the depositors get a certain amount of income from the spare money. This form of this form continued to exist in China for a long time, even after the emergence of money banks and even banks, until the complete bankruptcy of fiat currency credit in the 20th century, not only large commercial banks absorbed deposits, but even small cloth shops and oil and salt shops also absorbed deposits from nearby residents on varying scales. Some stores with a long history and good reputation can even absorb deposits several times or dozens of times their own capital. For example, the Shanxi Da Dried Fruit Shop in Beijing even had a huge deposit of hundreds of thousands of taels before the Gengzi Rebellion.

As a wealthy industry, jewelry stores have a great demand for capital, and it has been a long-standing thing to absorb deposits from customers. Seeing that the owner's business name was doing well, it was thriving, and its credit was good among peers and customers, so Shen Fan put forward this method.

The interest rate on this kind of deposit is much lower than that of lending, with a monthly interest rate of only one and a half percent, and an annual interest rate of 18%, which is not too high by modern standards. Guo Yi still remembers that when he was a child, the interest rate on one-year deposits in the bank used to reach 12%. For stores with a large turnover and often need to borrow, it is equivalent to an interest-free loan.

"Who's going to make a deposit?" I opened a jewelry store, although Zicheng Ji is a comprehensive commercial bank, it does not operate in the financial industry, and it is said that it absorbs deposits for no reason, who will be a customer?

"That's the beauty of our jewelry business." Shen Fan said, "If you can get in touch with the dependents of the inner house, it will be easier to absorb their savings." The wives, young ladies, aunts, and even the slightly favored girls in the house, have some private silver in their hands, and they all want to take it out to earn interest, as little as forty or fifty taels, and as many as tens of thousands. He smiled, "If you are bold and have shili at home, you will lend money; But money lending has to be handled by people who are very good kao, and it is inevitable that they will be exploited by the middle, and things are easy to leak, so most of them like to save in the cabinets of various large fonts. ”

After listening to Shen Fan's suggestion, Guo Yi was a little undecided-it was naturally a good thing to have more silver in his hand, but the money in Guangzhou Station was not nervous, and now that he had absorbed the deposit for no reason, he would have to pay an extra amount of interest.

"Proprietor, the benefits of this deposit absorption are not for our own use." Shen Fan continued, "The silver in the city of Guangzhou is sometimes tight and sometimes loose, and when it is tight, short-term lending is several times the interest!" ”

"This kind of lending, a merchant like us who has no roots and no bottom, I'm afraid it's easy to lend it out, but it's difficult to get it back." Guo Yi has been in Guangzhou for a few months, and he knows a little bit about this.

"There is a second benefit here, it is absorbed by the families of those big officials and gentry," Shen Fan reminded, "Women's private money may be limited," Shen Fan said, "but as soon as it spreads, others will look at Zizhenzhai's hand and shili differently." ”

Speaking of which, Guo Yi has already understood that the absorption of this deposit is not only beneficial to his own turnover, but also can improve the status of Zichengji in Guangzhou City! Even if you don't use these deposits to turn around and lend money, you can still set up a protective umbrella for yourself. From this point of view, the interest of one cent and eight cents a year is really not expensive.

Shen Fan took out a small fold from his side and handed it to Guo Yi, Guo Yi took it and looked at it, only with an ink pen Gong Kai wrote some household names on the fold: "Su Ji", "Jin Yan Zhai", "Runji" and so on. A little, almost twenty more.

"These are the excerpts that the little guys who have recently received from the guys who are planning to open an account and deposit in Zizhenzhai," Shen Fan said, "Because I haven't got your permission from the proprietor, I haven't come down yet, but the account excerpt has been opened." ”

"Who are they?" Guo Yi looked at it for a long time and couldn't find anyone's name.

Shen Fan took out a small notebook again, on which there were many symbols that only he knew, Guo Yi knew that this was a commercial code, similar to Suzhou yards. It's all written about things that can't be "sunny". The accounts of the exchanges, the names of the people who interacted, and the birthdays of the big officials and his old lady, too big, aunt, son, and young lady, opened it and looked at it at this time. said: "Most of them are the treasures of the official gentry's family, and a list will be copied out later, but this list must be kept secret-"

"I know that." Guo Yi thought that since it was private money, privacy was very important. I can't imagine that my country has anonymous deposits in the Ming Dynasty, and it is really at the forefront of shijie.

"These twenty or so folds can probably receive 10,000 taels of silver." Shen Fan said, "This deal is excellent, if there is no major change, it is generally just a matter of interest." ”

But after all, this matter is too big a move, and it also involves the financial business. The three people at the Guangzhou station thought about it for a long time and decided that it would be better to wait for the quarterly report to Lingao to explain in person that this jihua was approved. However, if the money sent to the door was not accepted, it seemed that he could not continue, and he was suspected of offending the customer, so he agreed that Shen Fan would absorb all the deposits first, and said that the annual interest rate would be fixed at one cent and eight percent, and the interest would not be changed on a monthly basis.

The matter was originally put on hold. Until recently, the squeeze on the Leizhou sugar industry made the originally loose money nervous, and this project, which was originally just the icing on the cake, suddenly had the meaning of sending charcoal in the snow. Guo Yi felt that there was no need to wait, and immediately mentioned it on the meeting table of the executive committee.

After reading the entire report, Wu De was finally relieved, and originally thought that the Guangzhou station was preparing to engage in some kind of financial industry -- Wu De had a natural fear of such things -- but now it seems that it is nothing more than a matter of "illegal fund-raising" prepared by the Guangzhou station, and the interest rate seems to be higher, but it is a good way to alleviate the shortage of money and the ineffective turnover of the foreign trade department. Although he inevitably thought of the risk of a "run" on banks that he often saw in business war novels. After repeated considerations, he decided to support the Guangzhou station on this issue.

After sending a telegram on Deng Yingzhou, there was no word all the way, and the ship finally arrived at Hai'an Port smoothly on the morning of the fifth day after departure. As soon as the ship entered the port, Wu De sent people to the South China Sugar Factory at once to see what the situation was—there was no immediate communication between them, and if the jade was already burned here, it would not be a sheep's mouth to transport silver to the past.

The few people sent out turned around, saying that the gate of South China was still crowded with black pressure, but it seemed that the matter of selling sugar was still going on, and nothing unusual was seen. Wu De knew that the capital chain in South China had not yet been broken, so he was a little relieved, and while instructing the people on the ship to loosen the outside and tighten the inside, in case someone came to make trouble or sabotage, he changed his clothes and prepared to go to South China in person to discuss the matter of receiving and transporting silver.

Wu De's estimate is right, the funds of the South China Sugar Factory have not yet dried up, but it is not far from exhaustion. The night before Deng Yingzhou arrived, the amount of silver had been reduced to less than 1,000 taels. According to this number, it is questionable whether it can survive the next day. A group of people in southern China have become ants on a hot pot, and several people have been discussing and discussing over and over again, but they still can't come up with a charter.

Wen Tong bitterly hoped that Chang Shide, who went to Zhancheng to sell rice, could come back as soon as possible, and if he brought back a boatload of rice, he could get tens of thousands of silver to save the emergency, but the big whale was like a kite with a string, and there was no news as soon as he went. After waiting for several days, the Executive Committee sent people, but they did not bring the much-needed silver, but only brought a radio station. This made Wen Tong desperate, what can the radio do? Fortunately, it didn't take long for the news to come: a ship had been sent to Guangzhou Station to pick up the silver.

Fifty thousand taels is still a distance from the safety level, but for Wen Tong and them, what they are doing now is one day at a time, and if they can transfer fifty thousand, at least they will be given a buffer of more than ten days.

But when the money will arrive is unknown. Seeing that the deposit of silver is decreasing day by day. For the sake of insurance, they also thought of various ways during the period: Liao Dahua and Liao Daxing both tried to go out to the market and wanted to transfer some positions to use, but the squeezing season in Leizhou has always been a very tight season for silver, and all shops can't transfer a large amount of silver, and the only one who has a large amount of cash is the sugar store under Haiyitang, which has accumulated hundreds of thousands of silver early in order to buy sugar. Asking them to borrow money is tantamount to seeking the skin of a tiger.

But they went out to call the position, but they couldn't hide it from anyone, and for a while, there were rumors everywhere that the newly opened South China Bank was tight, and I was afraid that it would be about to fail. As soon as the news spread, the sugar farmers who had settled down a little began to stir again, and even in the middle of the night, there were people rushing to sell sugar. The loss of silver has accelerated even more.

Wen Tong was remorseful in his heart, he knew that he wouldn't let the Liao brothers go out to adjust their positions, and the meat was not eaten, but he was a commotion for nothing. This is tantamount to showing all your hole cards. If Dengyingzhou is not yet, I am afraid that the situation in South China will not be easy to clean up!

As for Xiao Gui and Mei Lin, who are foreign business travelers, they are even more helpless. Seeing that the situation was about to erode, Chen Tianxiong said: "Today's things, if they are not broken or established, I am afraid that if we don't use some extraordinary means, we will be squeezed out of here alive!" ”(！ )