Datang: What's wrong with my fief being a billion points larger?

Chapter 113: The increasingly harsh situation in the Tang Dynasty, business changes
Li Yuanji was full of excitement. Pei Xuanyan led the fleet to the Tang Dynasty to conduct trade, and now he was finally back. Li Yuanji was looking forward to the harvest this time.

Then he looked at Xie Shufang.

"Shufang, you go and fetch Xuan Yan back immediately on behalf of the king. Go quickly."

Upon hearing this, Xie Shufang immediately retreated. After a while, he walked in with Pei Xuanyan.

"Your Highness, I, Pei Xuanyan, pay my respects to you, Your Majesty."

Li Yuanji came to Pei Xuanyan and helped him up.

"Hurry up and get up. I've told you that there are no such things as etiquette here. You must have suffered a lot along the way. I'm sorry for your hard work this time."

Pei Xuanyan stood up, smiling.

“Working for the king is not hard, and it is not considered hardship. However, after passing Chaozhou, we entered the waters of Ryukyu and encountered pirates. Fortunately, the navy fought bravely, so we were safe along the way.

I first went to Quanzhou, but the people there had limited purchasing power, so I stayed there for half a month and sold some snow salt. Then I went to Taizhou, Hangzhou, and Suzhou, sold all the goods, and brought back three ships of supplies.

The main thing was food, which accounted for half of the cargo. The rest was money, iron, cloth and other materials. We brought them all back, so we accomplished our mission."

After hearing this, Li Yuanji was also happy. He thought that the harvest this time was very good, so he asked Pei Xuanyan.

"How is the grain price in the Tang Dynasty now? And this snow salt, are there many people interested? As for the pirates, have you found out where they come from?"

After hearing this, Pei Xuanyan also became serious.

"Your Majesty, regarding the pirates, I have already sent a letter to Duke Geng. There is no news yet, but there should be news later.

I have also inquired about the current grain prices in the Tang Dynasty. In places like Hangzhou and Suzhou, the price has now reached thirty coins per dou, and it is said that the grain price will continue to rise.

Floods occurred in many places in Jiangnan Road, and drought occurred in Guanlong area. Many people there prepared to stock up grain to sell in the capital and nearby areas. The price of grain there was said to have risen to forty or fifty coins per dou, and the price of grain was still rising.

This is just the price of corn. If it were rice, it would be even more expensive, having already risen to eighty coins. Now there are too many refugees in the Tang Dynasty, many fields have been abandoned, and there have been many natural disasters. I estimate that the price of food will be even higher next year.

The wealthy businessmen in Taizhou, Hangzhou and Suzhou are very interested in this snow salt. They are already preparing to order two ships of snow salt, but I have not agreed. They may send people here to directly connect with the snow salt business in the future.

There is no problem in selling this snow salt. After seeing and tasting it, these people all wanted to get some. The salt brought over this time was divided up by those people in an instant.

This time, the grain was sold at a price of 25 cents. They said that the king needed it, so they naturally couldn’t trade it at the market price, so they reduced it by 5 cents, saying that this was their cost price.

Li Yuanji listened to this and felt complicated. The price of grain had finally started to rise. The price of grain continued to rise until the first year of Zhenguan, when it peaked and broke through 100 coins. It began to decline in the second year of Zhenguan, and fell to around 30 coins in the fourth year of Zhenguan. The lowest price was around 20 coins. Until the Kaiyuan Period, the price of grain stabilized between 10 coins and 20 coins. From the change in grain prices, Li Yuanji could already tell that next year, that is, the ninth year of Wude, to the first year of Zhenguan, many people would die in the two years. Even now, there were still many people who died of starvation and freezing, but starting next year, there would be even more.

Because the rise in grain prices will inevitably lead to most people being unable to afford grain, let alone rice, which is sold to rich people. Even for corn and wheat, even at the current price of forty or fifty coins near Chang'an, most people can only afford a little, and some people can no longer afford it.

In addition to natural disasters, if Li Yuanji remembers correctly, there have been droughts, floods, earthquakes, and later locust plagues. In the past two years, there has been no harvest in the fields. The real difficulties will begin to emerge next year and will reach their peak the year after, with a sharp decline in population.

As for what Pei Xuanyan said about those wealthy merchants giving him five cents less and selling it to him at twenty-five cents because of his face, Li Yuanji was even more disdainful. He thought that he did not have that much power. Not to mention him, even Li Jiancheng and Li Shimin did not have that much influence.

In the eyes of these people, only money and snobbery are important. These words may be used to deceive Pei Xuanyan, but seeing Pei Xuanyan's sighing expression, Li Yuanji knew that this man was really deceived. As expected, people who are too honest are not suitable to deal with those old foxes.

Did those people make less money for his sake? Was the price of 25 cents really the cost price? If Li Yuanji believed these words, he would be a fool.

Just looking at the grain Pei Xuanyan brought back, there was no telling how much of it was old grain. According to the changes in grain prices, these people made at least twenty cents in tears for his sake!

It was obvious that he was just doing it for his lover, so he made the shameless words sound so great, and even did it for his face. Li Yuanji was convinced that Pei Xuanyan believed such nonsense. Is it because of conscience that those wealthy businessmen can reach this level of wealth?

Li Yuanji stopped thinking about it and immediately looked at Xie Shufang.

"Go and call Yang Cheng."

After saying this, he looked at Pei Xuanyan.

“Xuan Yan, you have done a good job overall. However, when you go out to do business in the future, don’t trust people easily. Although I am the King of Qi, I do not have that much influence on the wealthy merchants in Suzhou, Hangzhou, and Taizhou.

These people are just coveting my favor. They are throwing me an olive branch because they are afraid that I will not continue to cooperate with them in the future, not because of my face.

Do you understand now?
You did a good thing by not agreeing to their request directly. Now there are many more goods here that need to be sold. I also talked to you before about going overseas and doing business with various countries.

Your next task will be to go overseas to do business and strengthen ties with various countries. Just do it as I told you before.

In addition, I will arrange Lin Quan, who is now the second-in-command of the navy, to work with you to be responsible for the safety of the fleet and to guard against pirates and some small countries with ulterior motives.

Going overseas to do business is of great help to our development here and is an indispensable part of Lingnan's development. It can be said that whether Lingnan can develop better depends on whether you can increase your influence and attract people from overseas countries to come here to do business.

You go down and have a good rest for a while, then go out to sea. This matter is very important, don't let me down."

(End of this chapter)