A large storage center was built at the port of Racha. Huge quantities of grain, cotton, and wool were stored, and, of course, there were large quantities of silver dollars in Paraná pine boxes—to pay for the goods purchased.

Shao Shude, the commissioner of Xiling District, is now inspecting the emerging port city, accompanied by Han Gang, the new director of the Luoqia Bulk Goods Trade Center. Strategically located on the coast, the port of Rocca is a natural deep-water anchorage, where Uruguay was later built to export iron ore to China. After three years of continuous construction by the construction bureau and the students of the Corps Fort, this wharf has now become the second largest port in China after the Oriental Port, which can berth dozens of large-tonnage ships at the same time. The Inner Harbor (anchorage for domestic ships) has 10 steam booms and an annual throughput capacity of nearly 50,000 tons, making it the leading commercial port in the New World.

With the grain trade and the cotton and wool trade, which began to emerge in the second half of last year, more and more merchants from various countries came to Luocha Port to trade. From the few Hanseatic merchants who bought grain at first, to the Floriflorian, Brazilian, and French merchants who sold cotton, and more recently, the Spanish, British, and La Plata merchants who sold wool. With the influx of merchants from all over the world, the tax revenue received by the customs officials stationed in the port of Rocha from the east coast has also increased, and at the same time, various services such as taverns and hotels have sprung up in this commercial port, and the market of the port has greatly prospered.

"At present, more than 6,000 tons of seed cotton have been collected and stored, which is enough for us to produce about 150,000 pieces of cotton cloth." Han Gang said to Shao Shude. "The purchase price of these cotton varies according to the quality and time. It fluctuates between 110 and 145 yuan. The employees of my organization center graded the cotton they purchased. i.e. level one to three. The better quality of the first and second grades of this type of cotton is used for export to maintain the reputation of our East Coast cloth brand, while the inferior third grade cotton is kept for domestic use or transported to the colonies for digestion. By the way, Commissioner Shao, how is the matter of my application to set up a large-scale cotton processing factory in Luoqia Port a while ago? Is the first batch to be approved? ”

In addition to serving as the director of the Luoqia Bulk Trade Center, Han Gang also serves as the mayor of Luoqia Town, so he is still very enthusiastic about developing local industries. After all, Qian Hao, the current magistrate of Ping'an County, and Bo Senke, the magistrate of Zhenhai County, both grew up from the town. He, Han someone, naturally has some progressive thoughts, and he has picked up Luo Qia well, and if a county is set up here in the future, the position of the county magistrate will naturally be his own.

Some time ago, he made a report to Lu Shangtou, requesting the establishment of a cotton processing factory in Luoqia Port to process the purchased seed cotton into lint for textile mills. Shao Shude was generally supportive of his plan, and helped him coordinate the production tasks of the current machine factory, so that the other party could try to free up some shifts to produce some cotton gins. The first machine factory saw that it was a greeting from the outgoing veterans, and it was also very face-saving, and immediately worked overtime to produce 50 cotton gins. And this lint processing factory was finally approved under Shao Shude's activities. After sending personnel to discuss with Shao Shude and Han Gang, the Ministry of Industry and Commerce finally decided on the design plan of the factory. Four hundred of the new immigrants of Italian textile workers were sent to prepare for the construction of the factory.

"It's been approved." Shao Shude said calmly, and after speaking, he turned his head to look at Han Gang with a happy face, and asked, "I heard that you and some people went to São Paulo and Rio in the north to buy cotton plantations?" ”

Han Gang was stunned at first, and then said with a little embarrassment: "There is such a thing. A few friends from the Ministry of Industry and Commerce and the Ministry of Finance were optimistic about the market of cotton plantations and were going to raise funds to go to Brazil to see if there were any suitable plantations to buy. A while ago, Tangyuan also sent someone to San Vicente to inquire about the market, and found that there were indeed several cotton plantations for sale there, all of which were long-cultivated mature fields, with manors and slaves. We totaled all our savings for many years, and then mortgaged the property and borrowed a sum of money from the United Industrial Credit Bank, and prepared to go north to talk to the people there at the right time. ”

Shao Shude hummed and didn't say anything. In fact, he knows very well what kind of tricks these people are playing. Strictly speaking, these people do not plan to run this business for a long time, they just rely on their familiarity with national policies to buy cotton plantations in advance when the price of cotton plantations is still at a low point. When the textile factories of the East coasters and Europeans were fighting for raw materials in search of plantations, they could calmly wait for the price to sell.

This kind of trick is played by people in the 21st century, first buying cotton plantations at low prices, and then waiting for the East Coast government to slowly raise the purchase price of cotton, so as to hit the cotton textile factories of the French, Dutch, and Venetians and increase their production costs; When the price of cotton runs at a high level, the price of a cotton plantation that has been cultivated for many years and has a full set of facilities and slaves will also climb to an unimaginable height, and then they can wait for the price to sell, because there will always be some factory owners or investors who are anxiously looking for raw materials in the world will come to their door.

Because they are familiar with every step of the East Coast government's policy, they have the option of selling their cotton plantations at the peak before the East Coast government takes advantage of the cost advantage to significantly reduce the price of cotton cloth. When the government on the east coast dumped a large amount of cotton cloth at a small profit, so that the whole market was saturated and the price of cotton cloth fell rapidly, the cotton textile factories of the French, Dutch, and Venetian at this time would also be in a state of loss due to cost disadvantage. At this time, the price of cotton in the international market will inevitably experience a sharp fall, and correspondingly, the price of cotton plantations will also fall to the bottom in a short period of time. At this time, they can see if any unlucky people have unfortunately gone bankrupt or have poor capital turnover in this storm, and if so, they can go to the door and put down the price of other people's properties.

Of course, the above process is simple, but in fact, it is quite cumbersome to operate, and it lasts for a long time, and the success depends on luck. To put it bluntly, this is a kind of capital game, which hurts others and hurts oneself. Moreover, when the people on the east coast dumped cotton cloth at ultra-low prices, although the French factories would lose money because they could not sell cotton cloth, it did not mean that people were helpless. To put it mildly, at this time, the French had the option of flipping the table, using administrative means to completely expel the textiles of the East Coast from the French market, and then sell them themselves behind closed doors. The big deal is that the foreign market is not needed, and the large market of 20 million people in France is enough to feed the French textile industry that has just started for a few years.

Therefore, the means of the people on the east coast to the detriment of others and themselves will only make the Dutch and Venetians, who also have a small domestic market, more depressed, and will have little effect on a large country like France. Although the country is certainly flooded with a large amount of cheap East Coast cloth, which seriously affects the selling price of cotton cloth in the domestic market, it is not a problem to preserve the French textile industry as a whole and make it survive.

Moreover, there is a lot to consider politically in launching this kind of dumping tactic, and the timing must also be grasped well. But then again, with the influence of the Eastern Republic in Brazil today, they don't have to worry about the manor they bought being hacked – those Brazilians don't think so. Therefore, in the worst-case scenario, i.e. their plantation does not go smoothly, it will not lose money. As long as they run the business well and sell the cotton produced in the plantations to the Luo Qia ginning factory, it is not a problem to earn a stable long-term income, and it is actually a good business to invest in these cotton plantations.

"Don't spend all day speculating." Shao Shude admonished, "How is the wool purchased? The General Administration of Textile Industry set the tone just last month, and from now on it will gradually increase the production of the wool industry. The profit margin of woolen is far higher than that of cotton, not to mention that Spain and the Ottomans are both wool-rich countries, we must find a way to turn it into our raw material source and product dumping place, in order to earn this scissors income difference. Don't look at me with such eyes, I know that it is very difficult, it is not easy, but it is man-made, with our ultra-low cost and advanced dyeing techniques that others do not have, if we exclude the interference of political factors, we can do this. Spain is hard to say, but the Ottoman empire may not be unsuccessful. In short, you will keep an eye on me next, and you are not allowed to produce any baskets, and you must purchase at least 100,000 bags of wool in the first batch, and more than 300,000 bags in the whole year. ”

300,000 bags of wool is only 1,500 tons, and according to the wholesale size of East Coast textiles (300 square yards per horse, about 250 square meters), there is only enough to produce less than 15,000 horses without losses. However, the woolen thing is better than the high profit margin, the British exported only more than 100,000 woolen wool horses a year in its heyday, and a considerable part of it was bought by the Dutch for reprocessing and sale, with an average price of more than 6 pounds per horse. Over the years, with the sharp decline in the number of British woolen exports, the price of woolen wool in the European market has generally risen by about one-third, and the General Directorate of the East Coast Textile Industry decided to take advantage of this market vacuum to vigorously produce woolen wool and sell it to the Turkish market to make up for the possible loss of East Coast cotton cloth in the French market.

"I understand." Han Gang immediately assured, "There will be no mistakes, 300,000 bags of wool, although it is a little difficult, but it is not impossible." (To be continued......)