The economic and trade war between China and China is not going to be fought sooner or later, but has been fought since the signing of the "Sino-Japanese Trade Treaty" in 1872, starting in Yantai, Shandong, expanding to Qingdao, Shanghai, Nagasaki, Kobe, Osaka, and the most fierce area is in Incheon, Korea.

…… Song Biao inspected the development of the coal mining industry in Fushun for two days, and although the Far East consortium had laid the determination to develop the coal mining industry first from the very beginning, after the annual meeting in 1907, the direction of investment gradually shifted to other mining and textile industries, which were extremely scarce, and regarded international trade, finance, minerals, textiles, grain and animal husbandry processing, metallurgy, port shipping, real estate, military industry, and chemical industry as the main ten pillar industries in the long-term stage.

As for the machinery, electrical, shipbuilding and other industries, the Far Eastern consortium basically has no strength to get involved at present, and they are all using their local advantages to operate in joint ventures with foreign small and medium-sized enterprises, waiting for new opportunities.

In fact, in Song Biao's psychology, the textile industry is as important as the coal industry, but the former has been more urgent in the past ten years.

After inspecting Fushun, Song Biao continued to take the railway to Liaoyang to inspect metallurgy, machinery, chemical industry, cement and other industries, and then took the newly opened Haijin Railway to Jinzhou, along the way to inspect the cotton planting area of Liaodong Bay, Jinzhou, Haicheng, Panjin is currently an important area for the promotion of new cotton, and the new deal agricultural bureaus in various places have set up cotton art institutes to promote the introduction of long-staple cotton from abroad.

The new Jinzhou Mansion is actually located near Gaoqiao Town on the east side of the later Jinzhou Port, between Jinxian and Huludao, when Yuan Shikai served as the governor of Zhili, Song Biao has negotiated with the governor of Zhili Yamen to deal with the problem of Jinzhou zoning, the original Jinxian County continues to be a county, and the entire Jinzhou Mansion consists of six counties, all of which are the main cotton promotion areas, in order to promote cotton planting, Jinzhou Mansion cooperated with the Far East Consortium to adopt the method of three acres for one acre of land, and large-scale relocation of local residents to Mudanjiang Mansion in Jilin Province, In Jinzhou Prefecture, the land area of local farmers was expanded, and the Jinzhou Official Reclamation Bureau and Military Reclamation Bureau were set up for large-scale planting.

Due to the cheap land price, the Far Eastern consortium purchased a large number of land in Gaoqiao and Jinzhou Port to apply for industrial and commercial land, invested in the port here, hired German architects to plan and invest in the construction of the new Jinzhou City, and used it as a base to build Jinfu, Jinhai, Chijin, Fengjin, Jinjing five railways, due to the excellent port conditions, the local from the initial design of the south and north two large port areas, two port areas at the same time, the north port is a business area port, the south port is an industrial concentration area.

Because of the cold weather, Song Biao did not see patches of cotton fields in the process of taking the train all the way to Jinzhou Mansion, but there is still a significant difference with the Guannai area, and the land here is obviously much larger in the opening of the ridges, and each Longdi is at least about one.

Most of the land in the eastern part of the country is like this, a piece of land is a long land, the military reclamation area, the official reclamation area from the foundation to absorb experience from the United States to invest in the construction of agricultural machinery to take the road of large-scale agricultural planting, the military reclamation official reclamation equipped with horse breeds are also mostly the Sidon River horse, large size, strong pulling force, cold resistance and roughage.

At present, the main thing is to use the Belgian horse and the Sidon River to improve the local Mongolian horse breeds, and breed medium and heavy horses that are more suitable for the local characteristics and requirements of the Northeast.

Horses are indeed so important to China, not only will the military need horses in large quantities in the next 50 years, but agricultural production will still need horses in large quantities in the next 50 years.

At present, the three eastern provinces mainly import a large number of stallions from Europe and Russia through the Far Eastern Railway, mainly European medium and heavy horses, and the number of stallions introduced every month is about 3,000, which are allocated to each breeding station to roughly match five to ten local mares.

The rapid economic development of the three eastern provinces must first ensure a large number of labor force, even if the population increases rapidly, considering the commercialization and urbanization of industry, the three eastern provinces will be in a sparse situation for a long time in the next 50 years, the labor force of industry and agriculture is relatively scarce, whether it is agricultural planting and township transportation need a large number of horses, plus the agricultural characteristics of the three eastern provinces are more similar to Europe, and the demand for military horses, which further forces the three eastern provinces to comprehensively strengthen the breeding and breeding of horses, and the promotion work.

For example, in Heilongjiang Province, half of the land belongs to the official reclamation and military reclamation areas, and the planting of these lands basically has to rely on a large number of horses, even if it is a forest farm of military reclamation and official reclamation, it also needs a huge number of horses to engage in transportation work, and the construction of railways alone to improve transportation is too high, and the construction is too difficult.

Due to the large demand for horse breeds, the three eastern provinces are currently unable to talk about which kind of stallion to introduce, Belgium, Germany, and Russia are the most important stallion introduction places, which is also related to railway transportation.

Jinzhou's official reclamation, military reclamation area is relatively few, there are more than 20 horse breeding stations, 60 kilometers away from Jinzhou Fuzhou has the largest horse breeding base and military reclamation pastoral area in Asia, before the Qing Dynasty axe in the eastern Liaoning region has three traditional military horse pastures, respectively located in the large and small Ling River and Panjin Yingkou, with the large number of horses, with the size of the Ling River, Panjin, Yingkou and other places of reclamation, after Song Biao took over, these three horse farms were canceled, unified concentrated in the northern area of Fuzhou, set up the unified jurisdiction of the Western Liaoning Military and Animal Husbandry BureauCovering an area of about 7 million hectares of semi-mountainous land and grassland, it is located in the north of Fuxin and the eastern part of the Horqin steppe, and initially half of the land was beyond the jurisdiction of the three eastern provinces, and at the request of the three eastern provinces, it has now been placed under the jurisdiction of Fengtian Province.

The expansion of land jurisdiction in the three eastern provinces is relatively obvious, and the central court of the Qing government axe has always been very tolerant of this, including the fact that Chifeng was included in the military and pastoral bureau of Liaoxi in the three eastern provinces, and the Qing government axe did not object, and the reason why Song Biao insisted on including the Chifeng area into the three eastern provinces was actually to value the local mineral resources.

In the past three years, nearly one-quarter of the area under the jurisdiction of Fengtian Province has expanded, and the new land has been assigned to the Liaoxi Military and Pastoral Bureau.

With the establishment of the Western Liaoning Military and Animal Husbandry Bureau, the cancellation of the two major official pastures in Jinzhou's jurisdiction, and the release of more than 3 million acres of land, Jinzhou's cotton planting industry began to prosper rapidly, and Jinzhou's special geographical location and port conditions have also become a key investment and development area for the Far East consortium.

Song Biao's first stop in Jinzhou was not the First Cavalry Brigade of the Northeast New Army, which was being reorganized here, but Zhang Bishi's Jinzhou Yuchang Textile General Factory, which was a large-scale factory set up by Zhang Bishi in Jinzhou, and the Far East Textile Factory invested 20 million yuan in joint shares, and borrowed 14 million silver yuan from various banks, Zhang Bishi accounted for 7 percent of the shares, and the Far East Textile Factory accounted for 3 percent, and it is currently the largest textile factory in the three eastern provinces, and will have a production capacity of 800,000 spindles and 200,000 bundles of cotton yarn after it is fully put into operation.

Don't look at the number of new industrial enterprises in the three eastern provinces, there are very few enterprises with huge investment, and even if there are, most of them are the leading enterprises under the Far Eastern consortium that support the industrial and commercial development of the entire three eastern provinces.

A big Nanyang businessman of the scale of Zhang Bishi must have something extraordinary, and it was not the Far East consortium or Song Biao who first proposed the development of Jinzhou, but he was the one who first proposed the development of Jinzhou. Before investing in the three eastern provinces, Zhang Bishi specially sent people to communicate with Song Biao, and then visited Song Biao in person, and was very enthusiastic about investing and setting up factories with Far Eastern Commercial Bank. Rong Xingqiao and Pan Sichi originally planned to invest in a textile factory in Jinzhou, but Zhang Bishi decided to set up a factory in Jinzhou after his own investigation.

There are three reasons why Zhang Bishi set up a factory in Jinzhou, one is that hundreds of miles around Jinzhou are good places suitable for growing cotton; Second, the port of Jinzhou is in excellent condition; Third, Jinzhou is located at the throat of the Jingfeng Railway, and if a factory is set up here, it can buy cotton from Zhili and the three eastern provinces at the same time, and can also sell it to Zhili, the three eastern provinces, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Nanyang and North Korea at the same time.

In addition, Zhang Bishi also calculated a lot of accounts, even taking into account the cost of climate, and finally purchased a large amount of real estate in Jinzhou to build a new factory, and also invested in the construction of a port together with the Far East consortium, and ran his own steamship company and real estate company.

In 1907, the Far East Consortium decided to further invest in textile factories on a large scale, and in addition to the Shenyang New Area, the second choice was also transferred from Jinzhou to Jinzhou.

Hearing that Song Biao's special train was about to arrive at Jinzhou Railway Station, Zhang Bishi waited at the train station with his family and the main employees of the factory very early, and waited for the dark blue train to stop on the platform.

After waiting for a few minutes, Song Biao walked out of the special train, and saw Zhang Bishi and others outside the wall of the soldiers in front of him at a glance, he had seen it twice before, Song Biao's impression of Zhang Bishi has always been very deep, not to mention that Zhang Bishi has been wearing the official uniform of the Qing Imperial Court Sanpin Rank and the poinsettia top in China, and Song Biao can recognize the richest man in Nanyang in the crowd when he walks out of the train dozens of steps away.

After the guard battalion and the local garrison were released, Zhang Bishi led a group of dozens of people to hurriedly step forward, and said to Song Biao: "The Ministry of Commerce and Commerce inspected foreign cities, and the Minister of Commerce Zhang Bishi has seen the Governor. ”

Song Biao looked at Zhang Bishi succinctly, laughed because of his official uniform, and said to Zhang Bishi: "Zhang Shangshi, I came to Jinzhou this time to talk to you about something important, let's go to the textile factory to have a look." ”

Zhang Bishi immediately replied: "The lower officials have already been arranged, and the adults are invited to get on the sedan chair, the sedan chair and the carriage are ready, but I don't know what the adults like to do?" ”

Song Biao said: "Take the carriage, there are animals available, why do you have to work hard for others?" ”

After saying this, he pointed to the blue-gray carriages prepared by the military headquarters in front of him, and motioned to leave the platform with Zhang Bishi.

After leaving the railway station, Song Biao took the carriage prepared by Zhang Bishi in advance and rode all the way to Yuchang Textile Factory, 20 million silver yuan to set up a factory, how can the scale of this factory be small, not to mention that this factory is in Jinzhou, a few years ago when the factory was set up in the port, there were only fishing villages everywhere, and the land price was low.

The whole factory covers an area of more than 400 acres, with six factories, cotton processing, spinning, weaving, printing and dyeing, hanging pulp are all available, in order to solve the problem of high prices of imported dyes, Zhang Bishi not only entrusts the Far East Textile Corporation to purchase directly to Germany and the United States through the Far East Commercial Bank like other textile factories, but also invests in the Far East Dye Factory founded by the Far East Chemical Corporation, and participates in the development of the dye industry in the three eastern provinces.

Most of the personnel technicians are hired by him from Nanyang and the Netherlands, there are also many newly hired technicians, apprentices are local training, in recent years slowly developed, but also gradually started, relying on low prices and moderate quality in Zhili, the three provinces occupy a very good market.

Song Biao followed Zhang Bishi to visit the textile factory, and turned around between the roaring machinery and equipment, there were many things that he did not understand, because of the large-scale import of machinery and equipment from the United States and France, these equipment are currently the most advanced, some even use AC motor power, the machine speed is extremely high, click click, there is lateral rotation, there are up and down rolling, especially those textile machines, thousands of weaving heads continue to rise and fall rapidly, local workers are busy working in the machinery, as if they are taking a very big risk.

Although the principle of the machinery is very simple, in terms of specific design, the textile machines at this time have been developed after a hundred years of gradual improvement, and the design is highly complex, considering a variety of situations and needs, so that at first glance, even Song Biao feels a headache.

Standing in this big factory, Song Biao had to sigh that the era of manpower and the era of handicraft had passed, and now is the time of big industry, and if he can't keep up with this pace, he will definitely be a backward country.

The textile mills with an investment scale of 20 million silver yuan are medium-sized textile factories even in the United States, but in the United States, there are many factories of this scale, and in China, there are only two, and the other is the Far East Textile General Factory, which is also located in Shenyang New District.

Although the cumulative investment scale of the Shanghai Textile Bureau, considering the rate of gradual depreciation of silver, does not add up to less than the current 20 million silver yuan, but the investment deduction and false reports of the government-run factories add up, it is estimated that only a few million yuan of funds have been implemented at most.

After visiting the factory, Song Biao and Zhang Bishi walked on the boulevard in the factory, talking while walking, and asked about the current situation of Yuchang Textile General Factory.

After talking for a while, Song Biao said with a lot of nostalgia for Zhang Bishi: "It is not easy for the national industry to rise, the equipment is easy to buy, but the workers are difficult to train, I see that most of your workers here are very young, and they have to ask foreign technicians to assist in everything, but it is not easy to run your factory." ”

Zhang Bishi sighed and said: "In the past, most of the people in Nanyang were doing business, opening tin mines, running steamship companies, running reclamation gardens, sugar factories and rubber factories, but this time the textile factory was the most difficult, but I don't know what the situation of the Far East Textile General Factory handled by Pan Sichi in Shenyang New Area?" I've heard that most of his work there is Russian mechanics, and although the cost is high, the progress is going well. ”

Song Biao said: "Pan Sichi recruited some skilled workers and technicians from Shanghai, and set up a branch factory with Russian businessmen, plus he recruited more Russian technicians, so the operation was naturally smoother. Last year, he set up a Shenyang Textile Technology School to train technicians locally, and the results were good. It's going well on his side, and it's certain that he's making money, but he doesn't make much profit. First, the company has always adopted a low-price strategy in China's market, and the prices of some types are even lower than the cost price of the textile factory, and the machinery has already been purchased in them, the workers are skilled, the production efficiency is high, and the tariffs are low, and the cost of purchasing cotton from North Korea is low, and the price is naturally low. Second, our workers are difficult to train, often one or two years to get out of the division, proficient in machinery technicians are too few, all rely on foreigners, foreign technicians grinding foreign workers phenomenon is very common, often for no reason to delay for a few months can not start, dozens of machines parked there. ”

Zhang Bishi can only sigh in the same way, and said: "What the adults said is very true, it is not easy to run an industry in China, it is already good in the three eastern provinces, and the investment in the textile industry is almost half of my worth here, fortunately, many things are purchased by the Far East Commercial Bank and the yamen in the three eastern provinces, such as the establishment of a large number of textile schools, the promotion of new cotton seeds, the construction of railways, and all aspects of power plants have been perfected." I currently feel that as long as we can survive the most difficult three years, the textile industry in the three eastern provinces will have a great future, but unfortunately the harsh taxes and miscellaneous taxes of Zhili are too heavy, so that the cotton price of Zhili is too high, the cotton price is high, the profit is thin, and the farmers are unwilling to plant, otherwise they will sit in the two places to collect cotton, and the textile industry in Jinzhou will definitely be promising. Even so, I still think that the hope of China's textile industry lies in the three eastern provinces, and the textile industry in the three eastern provinces is in Jinzhou. Song Biao nodded in agreement and said, "What you said is extremely right." ”

Zhang Bishi said: "The domestic market is now narrow, the production capacity of the textile industry is expanding, half of the market demand is exported to China, and the price is very low, which is also a bad thing." Since the opening of the port of the three eastern provinces, most businessmen from various countries have invested and set up factories here, but all the profits are used to borrow or expand factories, and there are not many investors who really cash in the silver bonds. ”

The two had already walked outside Zhang Bishi's office building while talking, so they entered his office together, sat down here, Zhang Bishi took out two boxes of exquisitely packaged wine and sent them, and said: "This is the product of the winery I invested in Yantai, Shandong. ”

Song Biao took it out and looked at it for a while, and felt very good, so he smiled with Zhang Bishi: "Your winery is very good, I heard that there are many wild grapes in the Changbai Mountain area, if you are interested in investing in a winery in the three eastern provinces, I will definitely welcome it." ”

Zhang Bishi laughed, sat down and sighed with Song Biao: "I have more than enough heart but not enough strength, I am old, if I am ten years younger, I will definitely go to the Changbai Mountain area to investigate." What's more, the establishment of this textile factory has consumed almost half of my family fortune, and it has also exhausted my efforts and energy in the past two years...... It should still be possible to make money, but the scale of investment is huge, and if it is impacted with the foreign cloth of the merchants, the price will definitely suffer. ”

After a pause, he said: "A few days ago, I talked with Pan Sichi about the foreign cloth of the book, to talk about it, I am also very good at doing business, the brand of foreign cloth is very good, the color and pattern are close to the preferences of our local people, although the quality is poor, the price is low, and it is the road of small profits and quick turnover." The quality of our spinning fabrics is not as good as that of Britain, France and Germany, so we can only learn my own methods. It's just that there must be a technician to weave the pattern, and the master who can draw and weave the line, we can only ask the technicians of Ben and France at the moment, although it can be emergency, but it is not a long-term solution. ”

Song Biao bowed slightly, and said: "These things, the Far East has been considered, the new political bureau and the research bureau of the governor's palace have also been considered, and we began to deal with it last year, and now we have opened four textile schools in the three eastern provinces to train talents in this area, and it is expected that in five or six years, these problems will not be a big problem." Nowadays, the textile industry occupies half of the share of the imported textile market in China, and exports more than 40 million yuan to China every year. Pan Sichi and Rong Xingqiao have reported to me about this matter, and it is expected that it will take five years to gradually have the ability to compete with this textile for a long time, I can only say that it is slow, in these five years, I will let all bureaus pay attention to the things that need to be solved by the Governor's Palace, and we will try our best to find a way. ”

Zhang Bishi praised: "Just have your words, and I will feel relieved." It's just that I also want to ask the governor, you said that you can raise the tariffs on the export of the three eastern provinces, I have also talked with Yu Qiaqing, the imperial court really can't count on it, everyone is willing to come to the three eastern provinces to invest and set up factories, all of them are watching you sit in the three eastern provinces, and we will definitely not let us suffer. ”

Song Biao replied: "In these years, there is definitely no way to talk about export taxes alone, because the tariffs of the three eastern provinces are still limited by the treaties signed by the Qing Dynasty and other countries, but this matter will not always be unsolvable, I have a spectrum in my heart." For the time being, after all, there are still those pitiful tariffs in the way, as long as our own cost is lower than the cost, and the quality is not worse than theirs, it will not be a big problem. Doing business, there are always a variety of techniques and tricks, you should work harder, think more about new methods, new tricks, more colors, and more publicity. I am now afraid that our enterprises will invest in China, and we cannot directly impose legal restrictions on our enterprises, but can only find ways to provide credit to various banks, and the rest can only rely on enterprises to ponder countermeasures with each other. In a word, there is a limit to what the political axe can do, all we can do is to provide support for the entire industry as much as possible and maintain a fair and competitive market, and the rest can only be done by the industrialists themselves. ”

Zhang Bishi continued to agree: "Your Excellency, the Governor's Office of the Three Eastern Provinces can do this, and those of us who run factories really understand it in our hearts, and we are really very satisfied, and we are very happy. Since the adults came to my Zhang Bishi's factory to inspect today, I Zhang Bishi will make a statement to you, the environment of the three eastern provinces is so good, I plan to invest in the three eastern provinces to set up factories, China has 40,000 people, the textile industry has great prospects, I plan to discuss with the Far East Textile Corporation, Mr. Pan, on the current basis to invest another 20 million silver yuan, in addition to the expansion of the scale of Jinzhou textile school, in Tianjin and Shanghai continue to support the establishment of two textile schools to train talents. Since we have invested half of our net worth in the textile industry, we must set up this industry and fight for face for us Chinese. ”

Song Biao high-fived and praised: "Okay, Mr. Zhang has such courage and determination, which is really the blessing of China's industry and China's textile industry, but when it comes to investment, I just thought of another thing." I heard that Mr. Zhang has invested in many rubber plantations in Nanyang and is very experienced in this field, so I would like to invest in this field. Some time ago, I was introduced by the trustee that I had just had contact with the newly appointed governor of Liangguang, Zhang Renjun, and talked about whether it was suitable for planting rubber trees on Hainan Island, and he was quite interested in my idea and was willing to support it, but you also know that the imperial court has some criticism of me, including the recent quarrel, and there is really no one in the Far East Commercial Bank who understands rubber in this regard, I want to cooperate with you after thinking about it, or ask you to help me do things in front of the stage. Together, the two of us will jointly operate the rubber plantation industry on Hainan Island. ”

Zhang Bishi was quite surprised, and said: "That's naturally better, since there are two governors threading the needle from it, it must be able to do it well, but I don't know how many acres of rubber plantations the governor plans to buy?" ”

Song Biao said: "How many acres of rubber plantations have you planted in Nanyang. ”

Zhang Bishi said: "About 60,000 acres, scattered in more than ten places, the scale of the rubber plantation is too large and easy to have problems, especially once infected, then the whole production capacity is reduced, plus there are too many workers There are also problems, it is not easy to recruit, so a rubber plantation is usually about four or five thousand acres, usually sixty or seventy workers can be, and it is convenient to manage, and it is urgent to recruit hundreds of short-term workers when it is busy." Now the good thing is that the price of rubber has risen slightly every year, and now the market is good, generally speaking, it is better than running a factory to make money, it is to see the specific level of management, the management is not good, there are also losses, if you encounter wind and rain damage and insect diseases, it is also very bad. ”

Song Biao continued to ask him: "How much rubber is produced, how much is the income, and how much demand is there in the global market?" ”

Zhang Bishi said: "My rubber plantations are more than 20 years old forests, the yield of rubber is relatively large, usually an acre of dry rubber harvest is close to 300 pounds, the new rubber plantation is usually only 180 pounds per acre, about ten years later can increase to 300 pounds year by year, after 30 years the harvest is gradually declining, at this time usually have to be cut down and replanted." The 140,000 acres of forest on my side produced 18 million pounds of dry rubber last year, at a price of two shillings per pound, and the income was about 1.7 million pounds, full of calculations, deducting all aspects of expenses and the earliest investment, last year it was almost a million pounds, of course, I really never thought that the business would be so good, six years ago, the annual profit was only a few hundred thousand pounds, I heard that the total price of rubber imported by the United States last year exceeded 10 million pounds, and it is also the highest country in the world to import rubber. More than half of the world's market is in the United States, in other words, the world's total rubber import and export volume is now about 20 million pounds, the United States imports first, Germany and France rank second, and the relative gap between the United Kingdom is relatively large. ”

Song Biao had collected some information related to the rubber industry, but it was purely related to planting technology and botany, and he knew nothing about the market and plantation management.

After hearing what Zhang Bishi, the king of Nanyang rubber, said, Song Biao understood the accounts in his heart.

If, as said in history, the price eventually rises to 12 shillings per pound, the United States will have to pay 50 million pounds of foreign exchange per year for only importing rubber, so it seems that this rubber financial turmoil is the main culprit of the collapse of the Qing Dynasty, and it is better to say that the Jewish capitalists are fighting the financial war against the United States, so the American political axe will introduce a law to restrict the import of rubber to end this financial war.

In this era, 50 million pounds is definitely a huge amount of money, and it will eventually turn into gold, no matter how much the United States earns from exports every year, and how much gold flows into it every year, it will eventually not be able to stop the madness of rubber, and the pounds earned in the field of oil and other agricultural products will be spit back to the European plutocracy.

Zhang Bishi said that he invested 20 million silver yuan is half of the net worth, this is absolutely false, no businessman will tell his actual total assets to the political axe, at this time Zhang Bishi is not only one of the rubber kings in Nanyang, but also one of the real sugar kings, and even in Indonesia Java tea import and export also occupies a larger share, compared to another sugar king Huang Zhonghan's strength is stronger.

Some people say that Zhang Bishi's net worth at his peak was about 80 million US dollars, which should not be a lie, because rubber is really a good thing, especially during the First World War, the total transaction volume of the international rubber market was as high as 780 million pounds, and the price of rubber is almost a dream of revisiting the peak of 1910, and it is not something that anyone can buy if they want to, because all ships, cars, submarines, and airplanes need to use rubber, and even artillery needs rubber.

The rubber industry is a very miraculous cause, after the collapse of the rubber bubble in 1910, more than 80% of the world's rubber plantations were bulldozed, in the past few years new investment in rubber plantations are not spared, but in 1914, the price of rubber has magically soared, and even in 1915 to 1916 far exceeded the price of 1910, a pound of rubber can be called a tael of gold.

The intervention of the lowest period actually took only a few million pounds to buy the entire rubber plantation industry, and a few years to sit on a huge fortune of 780 million pounds and sit back and watch the Allies and Central Powers continue to consume rubber in the world war.

Song Biao pondered in his heart for a moment, and said to Zhang Bishi: "I have recently heard some rumors from foreign banks, it is said that some very powerful big capitalists in Europe want to invest in the rubber industry, speculate on the price of rubber, stimulate the growth of stocks, and at the same time use the high price of rubber to hit the US economy. I would suggest that you register your rubber plantation in the Netherlands as a company listed in the UK and cash out a portion of it in due course, which should make a huge fee. Recently, I also wanted to buy a lot of rubber stocks in the London market, wait for the stock price to grow and then sell them to take advantage of the difference. ”

Zhang Bishi pondered for a while, and said: "It should be very possible, the market of rubber is indeed very good now, and rubber is something that cannot be hoarded for a long time, it is best to replace it after a year or two, even if it is unprocessed dry rubber in the hand can only be placed for about a year." Since the Governor is interested in this business, I can help with it, but I don't know how reliable this information is? ”

Song Biao said: "It's very reliable, don't ask too much about it, you can trust my sources." ”

Zhang Bishi pondered for a long time, and said: "Since the Governor is so sure, then I will give it a try, in fact, I recently happened to have the idea of co-operating a Nanyang rubber company with other Indonesian businessmen and Dutch businessmen, just because my rubber plantation is in the high-yield period, I am really reluctant to merge with profits, and now I might as well gamble." ”

Song Biao said: "It is not necessary to register as Nanyang Rubber Company, you might as well see if it can be registered as a Dutch Indonesian Rubber Company, which is more attractive in the international market, a little larger, even if there is a little more working capital, you must have more shares." If possible, I also want to give some money to take the shares, if not, forget it, anyway, there are other rubber stocks in the market that can be pursued. ”

Zhang Bishi said: "I'll try my best to help, theoretically it shouldn't be too much of a problem, but I don't know how much money the governor is expected to be able to take out the shares?" ”

Song Biao thought about it and said: "I have about 10 million pounds in cash, half of which is a long-term loan with foreign banks, I first embezzled this project, 5 million pounds to increase shares in your company, and the other 5 million pounds to buy shares in the London stock market." ”

Zhang Bishi said: "I'm afraid that I can't eat more than five million pounds here, at most absorb more than one million pounds as new shares, now the largest rubber companies are the British Colonial Rubber Company, the Anglo-Dutch Rubber Company and the French Colonial Rubber Company, these three companies are all large rubber companies after the merger of the shares of the colonial investors, occupying about 1/3 of the market share in the international rubber supply market, the equity is very dispersed, and the total market value of the three companies is actually only about 40 million pounds. If the news is true, you had better eat and retire quickly, because these stocks are large stocks, and the price of a share is tens of pounds, and ordinary small businessmen simply cannot afford to invest, and once there is a large-scale sell-off, it will be an avalanche of bad market. ”

Song Biao bowed slightly.

Song Biao had carefully discussed this matter with Zhang Kangren, and Zhang Kangren suggested that Song Biao directly buy one-year futures in the London and Chicago futures markets, during which time the London futures market had slowly increased to 2 shillings and 7 pence per pound of rubber, and was slowly increasing to the price of 3 shillings.

If the actual price can rise to 10 shillings, you can earn about 4 times the profit, and investing in securities should be similar, that is, depending on the capacity and speculation range of the two markets, because the scope of securities investment is large, theoretically there is room for greater growth.

Zhang Kangren provided another suggestion to Song Biao, that is, to buy long-term contracts in the futures market and mortgage the contracts to banks in exchange for funds to buy stocks, but considering that the current capital market is a seller's market, and the loan interest rate is high, unless the price soars by more than 15%, this speculation method not only does not have much profit, but also bears a lot of risk.

Song Biao decided to take a gamble, he didn't actually have much liquid capital in his hands, but instead pledged his shares in Petroleos Mexicanos, which had already extracted oil, to foreign banks, and raised about seven million pounds from it, plus some other funds, to make up the cost of ten million pounds.

If Song Biao used the borrowed money to buy futures, and then borrowed money to buy securities, it would be enough to make money, and if he didn't make money, he would lose too much, and the huge interest on the two loans could cut all the profits of the main business of the Far Eastern Commercial Bank.

The Far Eastern Commercial Bank sold 1.12 million tons of soybeans in the international market before December 1907, plus its own 40,000 acres of land to cultivate fine bean seeds and plant soybeans, the overall income was 7.22 million pounds, which was the real main business of the Far Eastern Commercial Bank, but the Far Eastern Commercial Bank itself invested a large amount of money in industry through borrowing banks, and even if it did not count the railway investment that also relied on foreign debt, the cumulative total investment in various industries in 1907 also reached 63.4 million silver yuan.

In other words, even if all kinds of real estate are included, the debt ratio of the Far Eastern Commercial Bank is very high, and its normal operation is due to the adoption of internal debt, and all the debts come from the Far Eastern Bank.

In the past two years, Song Biao has barely taken a penny of profits from the Far Eastern Commercial Bank for military spending, and he has ensured the expansion of the army by means of hidden taxes, issuing administrative axe bonds, borrowing funds from other banks, and other foreign aid.

Song Biao, who seems to be as stable as a mountain, has actually been taking risks.

Although there is an erupting gold mine waiting for him at Petroleos Mexicanos, and there are already six medium- to high-production wells of thousands of tons, the actual eruption is still far from being realized, and even if it were sold now, it would be worth a maximum of 10 million pounds, and this is through Connes. Vanderbilt's introduction was only able to borrow seven million pounds from the Rockefeller consortium.

Development is always unpredictable, maybe others can mine the legendary 10,000-ton oil well in the next few years, but in your hands it is normal to not be able to blossom and bear fruit, no need to complain.

Heaven will also be very fair many times.

Song Biao, who spends a lot of money, must find a way to gamble on the game, and if he fails, then he will sell Petroleos Mexicanos, which could be worth more than 100 million pounds, to Standard Oil of the United States for a low price of 7 million pounds.

If that's the case, Song Biao will definitely find a piece of tofu and kill him.

(To be continued)