In March, the compradors rushed by in their exploration of Suzhou, and in April, the competition between the Chinese compradors in the magic capital began to heat up, and they were all trying their best to get goods in Suzhou, and each showed their magic to take the business orders of foreign businessmen, and the price war was hot from the war of favors.

Zhao Dagui couldn't do anything about it, so he could only lead the shopkeepers of the trading house to fight and compete with other commercial houses, and the price and profits gradually declined, and the original high price of 480 yuan per package of silk naturally could not be maintained.

From March to August in April and 4, it was the time when the compradors of the foreign banks in the magic capital showed their tricks, and each of them was desperately competing for market share, stumbling on their peers, slandering, and grabbing the source of goods.

These businesses gradually became more complex, and merchants were sometimes willing to barter, but sometimes they specified that they would receive cash, and at this time they had to use real money to hold the business and then find a way to cash out.

For example, Suzhou merchants have good raw silk in their hands, but they are unwilling to exchange foreign goods, so they must settle in cash, so they have to spend their own money to buy it, and then exchange it with foreign merchants for foreign cloth, and then sell the foreign cloth for cash.

This is very speculative, and once the foreign cloth is sold slowly, the goods will be smashed in the hands.

Zhao Dagui was still a little rational at first, he just wanted to do business well, but later he couldn't take care of it a lot, and borrowed usury from Qianzhuang many times, first took down the source of goods, and then slowly cashed out through the warehouse.

It is worth mentioning that after doing more business with Suzhou businessmen, Zhao Dagui's credit has slowly been established, and many businessmen are willing to give Zhao Dagui credit, that is, to settle once every three or four months, and Zhao Dagui is naturally happy to accept it.

If Zhao Dagui's previous capital of more than 600,000 yuan was still there and was not sucked up, he would have relied on strong financial strength and did not need to rely on money and credit, and he could have made the business bigger, but now it is not the case at all.

Other compradors have always thought that Dagui Commercial Bank is extremely strong, but Zhao Dagui understands that his capital may be worse than Lin Aqin or Yang Fang, and it all depends on the fact that he has thicker connections among foreigners and is willing to take more risks, so that he can support it.

During this period, opium accounted for about half of the value of imported goods, and the large and noble trading houses did not get involved in this business, which made the trading houses suffer greatly when competing with other comprador trading houses.

Lin Aqin's establishment of the Yisheng Bank, gradually began to emerge, willing to do any business, more flexible in terms of prices, etc., and also took advantage of Zhao Dagui's weakness of not dealing in opium to operate opium on a large scale, accounting for an increasing proportion of the foreign trade of the magic capital, faintly surpassing the trend of Dagui Commercial Firms.

This made some people smash their glasses, and most people originally thought that they could compete with the Dagui Commercial Bank, only Wu Jianzhang, an old rich man, did not expect that it was Lin Aqin, a small businessman, who rose first.

However, if you think about it carefully, it is not difficult to understand that Wu Jianzhang is old after all, relatively conservative, and unwilling to do too risky business, and at the same time, as a shareholder of Qichang Foreign Company, he is regarded as an American businessman, and is faintly ostracized and isolated by British businessmen.

The British bleed their own blood to open up the market, but in the end let the Americans take it away, how can there be such a cheap thing, the British also pay attention to the group.

By August of April and 4, according to the market share of Chinese compradors, Zhao Dagui and Lin Aqin walked side by side, Wu Jianzhang was third, Yang Fang was fourth, and there were more than a dozen large and small compradors under them, but none of them were successful.

At this time, Zhao Dagui's Dagui Commercial Bank and Lin Aqin's Yisheng Bank together accounted for about three-quarters of the foreign trade of the entire magic capital, and other well-known foreign companies such as Jardine Matheson, Qichang Foreign Company, Benhao Foreign Company, Baoshun Foreign Company, and Taichu Foreign Company were just playing tricks.

In August, an incident happened, which poured cold water on Zhao Dagui, who was hot-headed and wanted to compete with Yisheng Bank for the throne of the first comprador, and realized that Dagui Commercial Bank was actually at risk of bankruptcy, and he was shocked and sober.

On this day, Zhao Dagui was busy in the courtyard of the Zhao family, but he heard a report that a guest had come to visit, but when he asked, he was an acquaintance, it was Chen Hao and Chen Zihao, who knew each other when he was refining sugar.

After Chen Hao obtained the secret recipe for refining white sugar from Zhao Dagui, he found a village to secretly set up a sugar factory, and collected local sugar from all over the place and converted it into white snow sugar for sale.

The Chen family was originally a big family in the magic capital, and the foundation and resources were far from being comparable to Zhao Dagui before he became a comprador, and he got the poor quality black soil sugar from the sugar store, and even went to the southern part of Dayuan Island and other sugar producing areas to buy it directly, the cost was much lower than Zhao Dagui's original, and the quantity was also very sufficient, and the production was a first-class good sugar, and some people wanted it.

Since I got this secret recipe in November last year, it has been less than a year now, and thousands of quintals of white snow candy have been produced and sold for sale, with a net profit of more than 3,000 yuan, which makes the Chen family very happy.

The Chen family is considered to be a large family that has been operating in the magic capital for several generations, but all the assets are only about fifty or sixty thousand yuan, and they usually do business, and the annual income is only about two or three thousand yuan, and the income from sugar alone has almost doubled, and with the monopoly products that can be handled, the Chen family's status in the business world has improved a lot, at least more stable, and it is called the white sugar Chen family, and the life is very comfortable.

It's just that looking at what kind of life Zhao Dagui has been living during this time, Chen Hao's good mood can be wiped out.

Before, he was only a small businessman with a net worth of hundreds of taels, and it was mainly the money he gave, and after contacting foreigners, he trembled, and as soon as he made a move, it was a big business of hundreds of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and his single-wheel net worth should have reached several times that of the Chen family, that is, the gentry and merchants in the magic capital, and they were also very in awe of Zhao Dagui's financial resources, and even gave Zhao Dagui a nickname called "Zhao Daguanren".

A small person climbed on his head in a blink of an eye, it is impossible for Chen Hao not to taste it, but as long as he looks at the new comprador business in the magic capital, little people like Lin Aqin and Yang Fang are shaking one by one, comparing old families like the Chen family, Chen Hao can only smile bitterly, at most, he can talk about the real local tyrants in your circle.

Fortunately, Zhao Dagui did not have the idea of arrogance in front of Chen Hao after his career, but stuck to the Chen family's original purchase of the secret recipe, which helped his development to a certain extent, so he has always been polite, and he is willing to take care of Chen Hao if he has a business.

Through this relationship, the Chen family also took advantage of the situation to enter the red and purple foreign goods business in the magic capital today, and was usually provided with tea or raw silk by the noble trading house, and by the way, he also helped sell foreign cloth and the like, making a lot of money.

"Master Chen is a rare guest, and he brought Brother Zihao to the door today, which is really a blessing for Zhao Dagui and his three lives. Zhao Dagui invited the two of them to sit down and said jokingly.

"Brother Zhao loves to joke, you don't have to be lucky in three lives, as long as you are lucky in one life, it is enough. Chen Hao is also funny, and said with a smile.

Chen Hao has had a lot of contact with Zhao Dagui during this time, and the titles of the two people have long been changed to Brother Chen and Brother Zhao, as for Chen Zihao, he should be a generation lower than Chen Hao, but he has a friendship with Zhao Dagui's original owner, and he helped the Zhao family when they were the most depressed, and Zhao Dagui can only be called Brother Chen for a lifetime.

It's just that one of these two is called Chen Hao and the other is Chen Zihao, but they are still a little related, every time Zhao Dagui sees these two people together, he also complains about Chen's father in his heart.

The three of them laughed with each other for a while, and then Chen Hao said what he meant, it turned out that he was going to go to the field to collect local sugar in a few days, and he wanted to prepare a sum of money to go over.