According to the usual practice, at the beginning of the year, the two major mining companies will negotiate with the steel companies of various countries in the world, which is different from the usual ore trading, but to negotiate the ore price for the next year, once the price is agreed, it cannot be changed, and the ore price for the next year is locked.

In this year's negotiations, the two mining companies suddenly put forward a request to increase the price of iron ore by 100%, the price of iron ore has been relatively stable, the two world's largest iron ore export companies jointly raised prices, so that the steel companies in various countries are a little caught off guard.

However, then the two companies threw out a proposal to change the rules, and iron ore will be traded at FOB prices in the future, which is undoubtedly adding fuel to the fire, and the price of iron ore, which has been seriously pushed up, will rise sharply again. If it is really bought and sold at FOB prices, it means that the mining company no longer provides transportation services, and the steel company has to bear the freight and price difference on its own.

This requirement undoubtedly makes the cost of steel enterprises in various countries increase indefinitely, if implemented accordingly, the steel prices of various countries will increase significantly in the next year, which will affect all aspects of the country's economic construction, bring unpredictable impact and fluctuations to the entire national economy, and will also make the steel industry of the Boston Empire more competitive, so a chain reflection, the steel industry of the Boston Empire will fight a turnaround, and their situation will be better and better.

However, under the joint action of the two mining companies of Buckerman and Rhodes, steel companies in various countries were helpless, especially the Yaman Empire, the Saar Empire and the Nantes Empire, the largest steel producers in the western continent.

The Western Continent was already short of minerals, and iron ore was even more scarce, but the Yaman Empire, the only producer of iron ore, had high refining costs due to the high sulfur content of its iron ore. Therefore, the iron ore of the iron and steel industry of the entire Western Continent has always relied on the mines of the Boston Empire and the Zhanxi Kingdom, and after the Zhanxi Kingdom was incorporated into the Chinese Empire, almost all the mineral deposits were closed, and only small-scale development and supply were used internally, so the iron ore of the whole world had to rely on the Boston Empire.

The Yaman Empire was better off in this situation, although the domestic iron ore was unusable, but in the colonies of the southern subcontinent, they still found some high-quality iron ore, so they minimized the purchase of iron ore, and at the same time accelerated the development of the colonies, hoping to obtain enough ore from the colonies to change this situation of being controlled by others.

The Saar Empire and the Nantes Empire were not good, and their defeat in the Great War of the World Continent caused them to lose all their colonies, so they could only pinch their noses and let the Bostonians exploit them. This situation has led to a sharp increase in the cost of steel smelting in both countries, a sharp contraction in production, and the closure of a large number of steel companies and related industries, which has also dealt another heavy blow to the economies of the two countries that are just beginning to recover.

After arduous negotiations, the two major companies held on to the price, and the Chinese Empire did not accept the other party's arbitrary price increases, so the Chinese Empire was slow to negotiate a price with the Boston Empire.

The high price of iron ore, coupled with the exorbitant freight rates of the Boston Empire's seller's shipping fleet, is tantamount to taking money directly from the pockets of the Chinese Empire's steel companies, and such a loss-making transaction is completely unacceptable to the Chinese Imperial Iron and Steel Industry Union.

At the same time as the price of iron ore was deliberately raised, the Boston Empire was also engaged in another negotiation with the Confederate bloc, the focus of which was the oil of the Moss Kingdom. Since the Chinese Empire hid most of the oil deposits, even in the Central Continent, it was only mined in small quantities, and it was only for domestic use and not for sale.

Therefore, the oil production in the Kingdom of Moss accounts for eighty percent of the total production of the world, and the other two percent are half of the Baku oil fields in the Istanbul Empire, and one and a half are the several large oil fields discovered in the Boston Empire and several small oil fields in the western continent.

The oil fields in the territory of the Moss Kingdom are occupied by the vassal Southern Special Region of the Chinese Empire for 30%, the other 70% is owned by the Vass Kingdom of Moss of the Boston Empire, and the Coastal Autonomous Region, a vassal of the Central Powers, owns 30%, and the purpose of the negotiations of the Boston Empire is for these oils in the Coastal Autonomous Region.

The representatives of the Boston Empire met with the high-level leaders of the Allied countries, and their main intention was to hope that the Confederate bloc would cede the oil exploitation rights of its puppet countries to the Boston Empire, and the Boston Empire would guarantee that iron ore and oil would always be supplied at a fair price and that the price would never rise, and for this reason they were willing to give away colonies in the southern subcontinent to several major Allied countries.

Such a price is too tempting, and the allies can't help but agree, with affordable iron ore, they can better develop domestic industry, and the acquisition of larger colonies will give them a greater source of raw materials and sales channels, so why not do such a good thing, not to mention that they also know in their hearts that this series of actions of the Boston Empire is specifically to deal with the Chinese Empire.

For the increasingly powerful Chinese Empire, the countries of the Western Continent are also very jealous, they wish that the Boston Empire and the Chinese Empire can bite each other, so that they can provide opportunities for their own development if they lose both, so after the meeting, the high-level leaders of the Allied countries decided to take a risk, so that the Boston Empire has the ability to compete with the Chinese Empire.

After the successful negotiations, the Boston Empire owned seventy percent of the oil reserves of the Moss Kingdom, and with the addition of its domestic oil, the Boston Empire had full pricing power over oil. As a result, the Boston Empire immediately announced that it would pegged the value of the Polish Dollar to the price of oil, and that the Polish Dollar would be the sole settlement currency for its own oil exports.

Since the oil of the Chinese Empire's China Island and the vassal southern special region, plus the Baku oil fields of the East Empire, are all supplied to NATO internally and have no influence on the outside world at all, the Boston Empire can control the price of oil at will.

The Allied bloc soon found itself calculated by the Boston Empire, there were enough oil fields within NATO, and as long as production was increased, it was possible not to buy oil from the outside, but the Allied bloc could not. Originally, neither the Western Continent nor the Southern Subcontinent produced oil, and some of them were only a few small oil fields, which were not used at all.

And now, in order to lead the way to the east, even the oil of the Primorsky Autonomous Region has been ceded to the Boston Empire, although the other side has supplied oil at the same price according to the contract, but the only clause of the settlement of the whole dollar has trapped the Allied bloc.