Zheng Chenggong's fleet departed from the port of Banda Aceh and continued westward, and the next voyage will be led by the British and Dutch envoys, because the Ming sailors are still stepping into this water area for the first time, so they need to have a familiar guide. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

Zheng Chenggong ordered the ship's technicians to use compasses, weather vanes and other measuring instruments to start surveying and mapping navigation charts, and on the other hand, ordered all crew members to strengthen vigilance and respond to emergencies at any time.

.............

The fleet that sent to Europe was still moving forward in the endless ocean, but in the territory of the Ming Dynasty, a major event happened again.

Since Huaxia Bank and the Daming government formally signed the loan contract, Huaxia Bank's influence in Daming has been increasing day by day, and even with a promissory note of Huaxia Bank, it has become a hard currency comparable to real money.

It's not that there are no speculative people, trying to make fake promissory notes to fish in troubled waters, but Huaxia Bank promissory notes, using the latest engraving printing technology, as well as watermark anti-counterfeiting identification marks, unless the top scientists in the Ming Royal Academy of Sciences jointly imitate, otherwise ordinary people, there is really no way to counterfeit.

It is even more difficult for fake promissory notes to appear on the market than fake silver and fake copper coins, so compared with the two, merchants are more willing to use Huaxia Bank's promissory notes as the transaction principal for daily trading.

It's a pity that the amount of Huaxia Bank's cashier's check is too large (only a promissory note of more than 100 taels of silver) is not suitable for ordinary people's daily transactions.

Fortunately, this situation has finally been improved with the opening of branches in major coastal ports and inland provinces.

Just a month after the Nanyang Navy went to Europe, Huaxia Bank suddenly launched a new product, the Dragon Coin.

"Dragon" is a symbol of imperial power, the palace utensils are also decorated with dragons, Huaxia Bank can launch dragon coins, to a large extent, is to obtain the support of the Ming court.

No matter how powerful a bank is, a country's monetary system is not capable of being issued by a private force.

Huaxia Bank's promissory note adopts the nature of substitution, that is, for every 100 taels of silver deposited by a merchant in the bank, Huaxia Bank can issue a promissory note of 100 taels of silver, and it does not dare to print more at all.

But currency is different, as long as there is a certain reserve to prevent a run, it is possible to print five or even ten times as much banknotes.

For example, if a bank has a reserve of 10 million taels of silver, then it dares to print banknotes worth 50 million to 100 million taels of silver.

With such a huge profit, even if Huaxia Bank is powerful, it is impossible to enjoy it exclusively, and even if the Ming Dynasty does not want to use the influence of Huaxia Bank, it will leave Huaxia Bank and do it alone.

Therefore, the final dragon coin minting, the Ming Dynasty did not spend a penny, but accounted for 49% of the future net profit, while the shareholders of Huaxia Bank combined could only account for 51%.

He was worried that the imperial court would taste the sweetness of printing dragon coins and would not be able to control its greed, especially when wars broke out in the future and natural disasters broke out, the imperial court printed dragon coins in order to raise money.

Just like copper coins and silver in the past, those speculative merchants will hoard a lot of money and then throw them out to make the difference in price.

And the issuance of too much, and will cause a flood of currency, the Ming Dynasty issued the treasure banknotes, is not in accordance with the market demand, the result of indiscriminate issuance.

How to ensure market balance, this requires a professional organization to grasp the market trend at all times, so as to regulate the market at any time.

The imperial court is not suitable for this kind of thing, because the primary task of the imperial court is to ensure domestic stability, and there are too many obstacles.

In another time and space, in response to war, paper money was issued on a large scale, resulting in a flood of paper money and depreciation.

On the contrary, Huaxia Bank, which is only dedicated to profit-seeking, is more competent, although in essence, they just want to ensure the maximization of the interests of the dragon coin, but also to ensure the stability of the market economy from the side, and there will be no embarrassing situation of tearing down the east wall and making up the west wall.

Therefore, the best way to deal with it is to let the shareholders of Huaxia Bank jointly occupy 51% of the shares and at the same time control the dominance of the dragon coin minting.

Maybe after a few years, the dragon coin will stabilize in the territory of the Ming Dynasty, and the imperial court will eventually take back this power, but that will be for later.........

The types of dragon coins issued by Huaxia Bank are divided into: one dime, five jiao, one yuan, five yuan, ten yuan, twenty yuan, fifty yuan, and one hundred yuan, a total of eight currencies.

Due to China's ancient monetary system, unlike other countries, there was no standard system (only after the middle of the Ming Dynasty, in order to obtain a large amount of copper to make firearms, this began to be adopted, the immature silver standard monetary system), and there was no main currency and vice currency, often gold, silver, copper, grain, silk and later paper money, all at the same time to varying degrees of monetary function, but in different historical periods have their own emphasis.

The monetary system of various dynasties was also very inconsistent, and even at different times of a dynasty, there were various changes and differences in different regions.

Therefore, after many consultations between Huaxia Bank and court officials, and even alarmed the members of Congress, a conversion ratio was finally determined.

Both: The purchasing power of a horned dragon coin is equivalent to a copper coin, and a hundred yuan dragon coin is equal to a tael of silver.

Before the Ming Dynasty used silver as the standard currency, one tael of silver was equivalent to a thousand copper coins, that is, a consistent or a hanging coin, which happened to be equivalent to the proportion of today's dragon coins.

Although the price of copper fell after the use of the silver standard, and even for a while, one tael of silver could be exchanged for 1,300 to 1,500 copper coins, but with the Ordnance Bureau purchasing a large amount of copper to make artillery, the price of copper has rebounded again (now it remains at a ratio of 1,200 to 1).

What's more, although the Ming Dynasty has implemented the silver standard, the currency market is very chaotic, and the people in many areas can only use copper coins for daily consumption, and the instability of copper coins often causes the currency in the hands of the people, invisible losses.

So much so that in order to avoid this kind of loss, some people do not even dare to consume easily, which seriously hinders the economic development of the Ming Dynasty.

Nowadays, the implementation of dragon coins still uses the silver standard, that is to say, although a dime can indeed be used as a copper coin, but the common people can completely exchange the unstable price of copper coins into relatively stable dragon coins, which has accelerated the implementation of dragon coins.

When all the common people are accustomed to using dragon coins, the copper coins with large tails can officially withdraw from the currency market.

"Master Li, I don't understand, why do you have to accept copper coins for dragon coins, do you know how many copper coins can be exchanged for one or two silver now? That's 1200 texts! That is to say, people can spend one or two taels of silver to exchange 1,200 copper coins in the hands of ordinary people, and then use the 1,200 Wen to exchange 120 yuan at Huaxia Bank. In this way, he earned twenty yuan of dragon coins for no reason, and Huaxia Bank lost a lot of money! Wu Hao was very dissatisfied with this exchange method.

According to his thoughts, this kind of opening can not be opened, once the dragon coin is not accepted by the world, then there will be a large number of people, take this kind of copper money to exchange for dragon coins, and then exchange the exchanged dragon coins for silver.

After a while, one tael of silver in the hands of the common people became 1.2 taels of silver, a direct increase of 20 percent.

"You! Just see the surface. Let me ask you, the common people have exchanged all the copper coins into silver, what do they usually do when they buy firewood, rice, oil and salt? Li Hongfei asked rhetorically.

Indeed, one tael of silver is equivalent to the purchasing power of a hundred dragon coins, but who goes out to buy a box of needlework and thread, and also carries a hundred yuan bills?

And even if you have a hundred-dollar bill, the merchant always has to give change, right?

Although there are also broken silver, the weight of the broken silver is extremely non-standard, and it is difficult to cut it on the spot.

If you find too much broken silver, the merchant will lose money, and if you find less, the people will not be cost-effective.

This is also the fundamental reason why the copper coin has been tailing big, the standard measurement of the official silver is in two units, those few coins of broken silver, all of which are cut out by the people privately, and the real difference in the transaction is mainly copper coins, for no other reason, the copper coins are standard enough, and no one suffers.

If it was really like Wu Hao's fear, the common people all exchanged copper coins for silver, Li Hongfei should laugh instead.

Because Huaxia Bank has a rule for exchanging copper coins, that is, only in and out, I will accept all the copper coins you take to exchange, but if you want to exchange copper coins from me, there is no door.

As a result, as long as the previous run storm is survived, there will only be two currencies in the market, one is the hard metal currency - silver.

The other is paper money - dragon coins.

"What do you mean by your lordship, do you want to cut off this copper coin market? But do you know how many of these folk copper coins there are? Wu Hao was still a little worried.

More than 280 years after the founding of the Ming Dynasty, during which the copper coins minted do not know how geometric, if all of them gushed out at once, it would not be long before Huaxia Bank would fall into a run on the bank because of insufficient reserves, and the dragon coin plan would also go bankrupt.

At the same time, there is a more serious problem, that is, the copper coins are invalid, and the so many copper coins exchanged by Huaxia Bank are not a bottomless pit?

Even if it is sold to a weapon manufacturer after smelting, it is a big loss, Huaxia Bank does make money by issuing banknotes, but it can't be lost like this!

"Actually, your previous conversion method is really shrewd." Li Hongfei did not answer directly, but praised Wu Hao's method of exchanging copper coins for silver coins.

"It's nothing, anyone who knows a little bit of arithmetic can understand it." Wu Hao replied.

"Now that everybody understands, what would you do if you wanted to make more of the difference?" Li Hongfei asked again.

"What else can I do, just follow the method just now, buy copper coins with silver, and then go to Huaxia Bank to exchange more silver, and then continue to buy copper coins.......... Such a repetition is definitely a profitable deal. Wu Hao said.

"And then? When everyone understands this, do you think copper coins will still be as cheap as they are now? Li Hongfei said with a smile.

"You mean......... Your Excellency is wise! Wu Hao instantly understood what Li Hongfei meant.

The current copper coins are indeed worthless, one or two silver can replace 1200 copper coins, but everyone is saving copper coins, and when the copper coins are replaced, the copper coins will unconsciously begin to appreciate.

Moreover, with Huaxia Bank's exchange strategy of only entering and not leaving, the price ratio of copper coins to silver coins will also be sharply shortened, becoming 1100:1, and even if 1050:1 becomes the 1000:1 stipulated by Huaxia Bank, it is also possible, maybe with the passage of time, there will be fewer and fewer copper coins on the market, and it is not impossible to eventually become 900:1 or 800:1.

At that time, the copper coins lost their purchasing power and had to be exchanged for dragon coins, and the final result could only be that Huaxia Bank was cheaper in vain.

After all, the rise in copper prices will lead to an increase in the cost of weapon manufacturing, but the copper money exchanged by Huaxia Bank is always exchanged at 1000:1, even if it is sold to weapons manufacturers at the ordinary copper price, even if there will be a loss, but it is not a big loss, it can be described as killing two birds with one stone.

"Therefore, as long as it survives the early run storm, the strength of the Huaxia Dragon Coin in the future will be the same as that of silver! To this end, Huaxia Bank has prepared 80 million taels (2,500 tons) of silver reserves, which are enough to cope with the immediate crisis. Li Hongfei said confidently.

These silver reserves, not counting the assets deposited in the banks by merchants from all over the coast, are purely the principal invested by the first few merchants who have invested in them, plus the profits made from mining ore in the Nanyang region in recent times.

In fact, before preparing to issue dragon coins, Li Hongfei considered how to replace them with copper coins, and the original idea was to directly exchange silver for copper coins of the same value according to market conditions, so as to effectively avoid the difference in the price of copper coins for dragon coins.

However, in order to open the dragon coin market as soon as possible and determine the monetary status of the dragon coin, Li Hongfei asked Huaxia Bank to "bleed" and directly implement the equivalent exchange of dragon coins and copper coins.

At first, even Wu Hao thought this plan was crazy, let alone the people who learned the news.

"But in this way, Huaxia Bank will indeed not lose money, and may even make a lot of money, but in the end, it is the people who suffer!"

Well, Wu Hao is an unprincipled person, at first he was worried that the common people would earn the difference from it, which would make Huaxia Bank lose a lot of money.

Now I am worried that Huaxia Bank has made too many profits from it, which has caused the people to suffer serious losses.

After all, once the copper coin market is banned, the Huaxia Dragon Coin will naturally take the lead, but how low is the cost of the Huaxia Dragon Coins........... To put it bluntly, it's just a piece of paper.

As long as the strong position of the dragon coin is established, this worthless "paper" can be turned into a valuable currency.

"Don't worry, those who really dare to earn the difference are those businessmen who like to speculate, this time we should teach them a lesson, let them understand what money can be made, what crooked ideas can't be beaten!" Li Hongfei said coldly.

Indeed, the savings of an ordinary family and the whole family will not exceed ten copper coins (about 12,000 yuan), how can these people have the courage to carry out a large amount of currency exchange.

Only those families who have been hoarding money to earn the difference in prices dare to use this crooked brain.

If these people can sell in time before the price of copper rises, they may really make money, but if they are not greedy enough, they may lose their wives and soldiers.........