Wu Sangui was in a very good mood, "We will definitely make a lot of money this time." He laughed and announced to the crew. The Edo shogunate banned the export of silver and copper, which was self-defeating, and I estimate that it will not be long before the imperial court will send troops to fight for it. Taking advantage of this time, we hurried to make two more trips. ”

Wu Xiang took the account from his son's hand and looked at it carefully, the numbers on it were recorded in great detail, and the pen was clear.

"More than 76,000 catties of copper and more than 10 million Japanese scrap copper coins, not bad."

Zu Dashou twisted his beard, "Add up to more than 100,000 catties, and then load tens of thousands of catties of dried Japanese fish and seafood." If this batch of copper goods can be successfully transported to Nam Ha, Vietnam, the profit will be at least ten times. ”

Japan has a lot of silver and a lot of copper.

Because the Han Dynasty opened the door of Japan with artillery, Japan could no longer close itself off. Moreover, the Han Dynasty signed an exclusive trade right with Japan, so it monopolized trade with Japan, and the original Netherlands could no longer trade with Japan. Japanese merchants no longer even went to sea, and they could only trade with Han merchants who had come to Japan's open ports.

Under this exclusive monopoly trade, Japan's foreign trade, which has always been surpassed, has become more and more widespread. According to the agreement signed between the Han and the Edo shogunate of Japan, the trade between the Han and Japan was paid in silver, except for the goods exported from Japan.

The huge trade deficit caused a large outflow of silver from Japan. Some Japanese even made a suggestion to the Dekang family, saying that if this continues, Japan's gold will be halved in a hundred years, and in less than a hundred years, Japan will have no silver available.

Under these circumstances, the Japanese Edo shogunate eventually began to reduce the trade quota with the Great Han, prohibiting Japanese merchant ships from going to sea, and at the same time prohibiting the export of silver and copper.

However, on the one hand, Japan has reduced its trade quota and banned the export of silver and copper, but on the other hand, it is now the time for the development of silver and copper mines in Japan.

Iwami Ginzan in Japan. Due to the use of soot blowing for silver smelting, silver production has increased greatly, and Japan now has more than 20 large copper mines with an annual output of hundreds of thousands of catties of copper, with an annual output of millions of catties of copper.

The Japanese are not really short of silver and copper, but a huge trade deficit, coupled with the exclusive trade rights of the Han Dynasty, which makes them very unhappy, and the Japanese know that the Han has a huge demand for Japanese silver and copper, so they have this action of playing with fire. The purpose is to get the Han to revise the harsh treaty. Changed to more favorable terms.

At present, the export volume of silver and copper in official trade has been greatly reduced, and even the volume of trade has been greatly reduced, but China still has a huge demand for silver and copper, and many copper merchants in Japan actually want to sell copper to Chinese merchants in exchange for various raw silk, sugar and other commodities shipped by Chinese maritime merchants.

It was in this situation that Wu Sangui's father and son, who had already emigrated to Taiwan, and their uncle and grandfather, the Dashou clan, began to engage in the Japanese smuggling trade.

They secretly colluded with the Japanese copper miners, and Wu and Zu purchased various Chinese merchant goods from Taiwan to Nagasaki, Japan, and then exchanged copper materials from Japanese copper merchants from Nagasaki.

Everyone takes what they need.

"A hundred pounds of copper is only twenty silver dollars. The price is really fair. ”

Zu Dashou now does not lead troops or fight, after they were moved to Taiwan, they found that the imperial court was really trustworthy, and did not come to cut the grass and eradicate the roots.

With the property brought from the Central Plains. They bought mountains, forests and plains from the natives of Taiwan, built manors, and even bought a lot of Kunlun slaves from the South Seas.

After gaining a foothold in Taiwan, the Wu Zu family, which had a lot of funds. He simply ordered a merchant ship from the shipyard and started buying and selling at sea.

These actions of theirs have all been reported by the government. Therefore, local officials in Taiwan have also allowed this. Nowadays, there are many people in Taiwan who go to the sea to do trade, and they all know that they can make money by running the sea. Those who are bold borrow money from banks, or even from wealthy people, or simply collect only shares, and everyone pools money to buy ships and goods, and then the captain recruits the crew to run the ship, and then pays dividends to the shareholders after making profits.

Wu Sangui doesn't need a loan or borrow money, what they have is money.

They can no longer gain a foothold in the Central Plains, although the property outside the customs is sufficient, but a lot of the Central Plains have been left, and after paying the deed tax arrears, the two clans can still be rich in Taiwan.

With this money, the two clans bought several ships, both new and old, and then recruited a lot of experienced sailors and crews, registered with the government, obtained licenses, and paid taxes and fees.

At the beginning, Wu Sangui went to Taiwan from Fujian, purchased various commodities from Fujian, such as cloth, iron tools, etc., and shipped them to Taiwan for sale, and then purchased Taiwan's special grain, sugarcane, deer skin, sulfur, cane sugar and other materials to be shipped back to Fujian or Zhejiang.

However, after running for a period of shipping, he found that although there was a lot of profit in the Taiwan Strait, it was far worse than running in the South China Sea or the East Ocean.

Especially to Japan, the road is closer than to Nanyang, but the Han has an exclusive monopoly on trade, Japan's silver and copper is exactly what the Central Plains needs most, and Chinese goods are also in high demand in Japan, and this kind of trade is the most profitable.

Although the trade with Japan was dominated by the Han East India Company, they ate meat and others could still drink soup.

Wu Sangui changed to Japan, and after a few trips, he found the famous hall again.

After the last toss, the bold Wu Sangui simply engaged in smuggling. However, his smuggling is only relative to the Japanese shogunate, and he does not dare to smuggle on the side of the Han Dynasty.

When the fleet departs from Keelung, Taiwan, it is all declared to have passed the customs, and when it comes to the time when Japan secretly trades and transports copper materials, it also has to declare customs once and pay taxes as usual.

But even so, at the moment when silver and copper are in tension, smuggling copper materials is still extremely profitable.

"It's a pity that our ship can only go back to Taiwan, and these copper materials can only be sold to the Han." Wu Sangui's brother Sanfu sighed.

Twenty silver dollars and one hundred catties of copper, this price is not high. There is a huge demand for copper in the South Seas, especially the Nguyen family in Vietnam, which does not produce copper themselves, but they need a large copper cannon to fight against the Trung family in the north, so the price of copper is high.

Even they didn't even have enough copper to mint money, and Wu Sangui and his old copper coins purchased from Japan were transported to the territory of the Nguyen clan in Vietnam, which could be directly used as currency.

After the Tokugawa family unified Edo, Japan also unified the chaotic currency since the Warring States period, implemented the circulation of gold, silver and copper, and minted gold and silver judgments and Kanei Tongbao copper coins. After the new money was minted, the shogunate abolished the old money. Circulation is prohibited. These old coins are so large that they cannot be circulated, so their value is greatly reduced.

The shrewd Wu Sangui was not the first businessman to buy Japanese copper scrap. In the past, when many Japanese merchant ships went to the South Seas, they would bring with them a lot of old copper coins. However, Japanese merchant ships were now forbidden to go to sea, and these old copper coins were purchased by Chinese merchants. Naturally, the purchased copper coins could not be shipped back to China for use, and if they were cast, they could not be transferred, so they were still shipped to the Nanyang region and continued to circulate as currency.

If the copper nuggets and copper coins purchased by Wu Sangui can be shipped directly to Nanyang, the profit will be extremely high, and if they can be shipped to southern Vietnam. There are even ten times the gross profit.

However, their ship was registered with the Taiwan government, and their fleet could only run the route between Japan and Taiwan, and without applying for approval, they could not run the South China Sea at will.

Not to mention, now silver and copper belong to the urgent needs of the imperial court, and these silver, copper and other things purchased from Japan will be directly purchased by the government when they arrive in Taiwan. Although it will not let them suffer, there is still a lot of profit margin. But after all, it is not as profitable as directly shipping to Vietnam.

It's great to have five times the gross profit.

"The imperial court acquisition is also a relatively conscientious price, and it has made several times the profit back and forth. This kind of trade is more profitable than selling illicit salt in the past. That is, now the Japanese are dead, otherwise, under normal circumstances. If we make a trip, the profit from this copper sale can be about 40% at most, and now it will be sold to the government. It's almost tenfold. "Wu Xiang is a relatively sober person.

It is the instinct of businessmen to pursue profits, but they are not ordinary businessmen, they are considered exiles, and they have been driven from the Central Plains to Taiwan. If it weren't for the merits of the battle of Yanbei that year, I am afraid that their Wu and Zu clans would not end well. Now that they have been exiled to Taiwan, the imperial court is very good to them, except that they can't go back to the Central Plains, everything else is very good.

Now there are manors, fields, and workshops on the island of Taiwan, and there is a small fleet of boats on this sea, which he could not have imagined when he was imprisoned in the Beijing Prison.

"Let's hurry up and go back to Taiwan, and take advantage of the current opportunity to make a few more trips. Everyone should not be satisfied, so it is easy to run without the slightest risk, and there are more than 20,000 silver dollars, which is enough. ”

A boat trip can cost more than 20,000 silver dollars, which is indeed a good business. Although it is said that you can earn more money by going to Nanyang, Nanyang is also farther and longer, and it is not as good as the East China Sea, which is the backyard of the Han Navy, and others cannot come. But in the South Seas, there are many pirates, as well as warships and merchant ships from Spain, the Netherlands, England, Portugal and other countries who make guest appearances from time to time.

"That's fine." Wu Sangui said with some interest.

In fact, he didn't care too much about how much money he earned, although they arrived in Taiwan, there was really no shortage of silver. He only felt lonely sometimes, he was still so young, and he used to command thousands of troops. But now, he can only sail on the sea, with a few small sailboats, and less than a hundred sailors.

"Father, do you think the imperial court will really send troops to fight Japan?" Wu Sangui couldn't help but ask.

"Who knows, we are just ordinary people now, running to the sea to make some hard-earned money, what do we do so much." Wu Xiang said seemingly plainly.

Zu Dashou pulled his beard, "I think I will definitely fight, but I just don't know if it's a big fight or a small fight." The Japanese are stuck with silver and copper and refuse to export, can this court endure it? However, I was afraid that when the imperial court sent a fleet over, it would sail directly to Edo Port and bombard it for a while, but I was afraid that the Japanese would have to shrink their eggs and admit it. ”

"I said that you guys are really worried about eating turnips, whether you fight or not, what does it have to do with us, let's rush home early, run again and prepare for the New Year."

"Time flies so fast, it's about to be the New Year." Wu Sangui sighed.

"Yes, it's our first year in Taiwan soon, and we must plan well this year to have a lively year."

"The ancestral grave outside the gate can't go to the incense this year!" Wu Xiang said while looking at his wife, brother and son. If it weren't for these two people blindly not seeing the situation clearly, they wouldn't have been banished to the East China Sea now!

Wu Sangui felt his father's gaze, and secretly ashamed, no matter how high-spirited he was back then, how unwilling he was, in short, he was wrong, he lost!

Coming and going in the East China Sea, he has also heard a lot of Liu Jiye's wise and martial actions, he will ally with the Mongolian tribes, and the tribes have surrendered. Liu Jun destroyed Horqin, forced the Jurchens to move north, Liu Jiye used troops in the southwest, changed the land too much, and every time he heard the news about Liu Jiye, he always made the dragon chair under his ass a little more stable.

Now, Liu Jiye sits firmly on the throne of the Han Emperor, but he can only drive this small boat to rock in the sea, suffering from the wind and sun.

He often can't help but think of the unintentional glimpse of such a graceful beauty. Liu Jiye wakes up to the power of the world, drunk and lying on the knees of beauties, but he can only be banished to the sea, how unfair this world is!

The original good mood suddenly disappeared, standing on the bow of the boat blowing the cold wind, Wu Sangui was silently sad! (To be continued.) )

PS: Thank you for your support in lighting up the lantern and reading the book, thank you!