Good son-in-law of the Ming Dynasty

"How did you come up with the idea of ​​raising cash by linking salt with bills..." Mr. Wu, like the scholars who had just entered official positions in this era, knew nothing about economic affairs, and couldn't figure out the reason behind it.

The so-called currency first appeared because everyone felt that bartering was too troublesome, so they first exchanged their items for an intermediate medium that everyone recognized, and then used the medium to exchange for the items they needed.

Currency itself still has its value.For example, the earliest shells were also the copper coins of this era.

However, their value cannot exceed itself.For example, a penny copper coin is only worth the value of the copper and lead contained in it.To buy expensive objects, you need a lot of money.

For example, a Volkswagen Passat is worth 20 yuan, which is equivalent to 2000 million copper coins in the Ming Dynasty.If a person from the Ming Dynasty wanted to buy a car, he would need to use so much currency, which would be inconvenient to carry, not to mention troublesome for transactions, and would lose the value of currency as a medium of circulation.

All of this led to the birth of paper money and electronic money in later generations.

This is going too far.

Or when it comes to currency issuance itself, the currency itself has no value. To put it bluntly, the common people recognize a kind of money, and what they value is the credit system behind this kind of money.

That is to say, there must be a certain amount of material security behind any currency.

For example, before World War II, when countries issued currencies, they needed to have their own gold and silver reserves as a guarantee. This was the gold and silver standard.

Another example is the civil war in China. The Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia border region government did not have gold and silver, but the currency issued was equivalent to the grain it produced.That is to say, after ordinary people get the border area currency, they can go to the bank to exchange for equivalent grain at any time. This is called the grain standard.

With food as a guarantee, the border currency can be issued smoothly and accepted by the people.

The reason why the treasure banknote system in the Ming Dynasty collapsed was because there was no equivalent material as a guarantee.Of course, national credit is also a kind of guarantee. The problem is that when the Ming Dynasty government ran out of money, it issued money indiscriminately and did not take it back.In the end, there are more and more banknotes in the market, and the depreciation is getting worse and worse, and in the end there is no value for existence.In the final analysis, the Ming Dynasty's treasure banknotes are a kind of naked robbery.

Su Mu was also inspired by the currency of the border area, so he came up with such a method.

He patiently explained to Mr. Wu: "This city of Cangzhou is an important city of salt industry, and it has the benefits of the Grand Canal water conservancy. Fanji. I know all these people. They have spare money on hand, but they have nowhere to put it to earn interest. If you are brave, you may even put some loan sharks out. However, this kind of business is too small after all, not everyone can do it Yes. Those who are timid and afraid of losing their money can only keep their money at home."

Speaking of this, he smiled: "I heard that there was a salt merchant who had too much silver at home, and he was afraid of being stolen. He simply melted the silver and poured it into the cellar. Even if a thief came to the house, there was nothing he could do if he wanted to steal it." .”

"This method is really good!" Mr. Wu also laughed.

Su Mu continued: "Because there is too much spare money among the people, there is no way out. It is not safe to store it at home, and it will be worn out due to the long storage time. If we get a bank, we will make it with the official salt of the Salt Division. Guaranteed, to absorb private funds, and to give a certain amount of profits, presumably many people are willing to deposit their money in the bank."

Su Mu counted with his fingers: "For private merchants to do business, take 1 taels of silver as capital, hire manpower, and rent shops. After a year, if they make a profit of [-] to [-]%, it is not bad. Take a lot of risks. Because you don’t know whether you can make money after investing so much capital. There is a saying in the folks: In the business field, [-]% of the losses are [-]% of the capital is guaranteed, and only [-]% of the capital can be paid at the end of the year. See the silver. Of course, the salt merchants are not among them."

"If the bank we run can guarantee [-]% of the merchant's profit every year, I think, not to mention Cangzhou, even the wealthy households in the entire Hejian Prefecture, and even the entire Hebei Province in the future, will be happy to deposit their idle money in the bank. We have it on hand. After all, it’s hard to find a business like this that is sure to make a profit.”

Wu Shiqi nodded again and again: "Money and silk are popular, and this can be done. However, as Ziqiao you said just now, the issuance of salt tickets needs to be guaranteed by official salt, but the salt produced in Yanshan is all underwritten by salt merchants. Yes. If the common people want to raise salt with salt coupons, where do we get the salt for them? If the salt merchants’ share of salt is used, it will disrupt the salt administration, and no one will be able to afford to pursue it.”

Su Mu laughed: "I've already thought about this. The salt tickets we issue are big tickets, 100 taels each. At the previous salt price, 100 taels can buy [-] catties of official salt. Ordinary one The family only eats so much salt a month, and they don’t have that much spare money to buy salt tickets. As for the big families, they don’t lack that little money.”

Yes, it is to issue large salt tickets.

In fact, Su Mu's plan is to use the salt ticket as a kind of thing similar to the bank note of later generations, and use it in commercial circulation as a transaction.

Next year will be the year of Zhengde. In this era, American silver has not yet been imported into China in large quantities, and Zhang Juzheng's one whip method has not yet been implemented.Private commercial activities also use a large amount of copper coins. When encountering huge commodity transactions, even if silver is used, it is a huge amount.

For example, to buy a commodity worth 1000 taels, you have to carry 1000 taels of silver with you, and you have to hire two porters, which is very inconvenient and not safe.It is comparable to banknotes, and no one can see it when you put it on your body.

If the soon-to-be-issued salt ticket has equivalent material as a guarantee, Su Mu can be sure to be popular in Hebei in a very short period of time.

However, as Mr. Wu said, after the issuance of salt tickets, some people will definitely wait and see for a period of time, and there may even be a wave of runs.In order to prevent this, Su Mu deliberately set the cotton value of the banknote at 100 taels.

Ordinary people certainly cannot afford such a large salt ticket, and as for the big families, it is impossible for them to be short of such a small amount of money.Even if someone wants to run on it, the people in Cangzhou City will be fine.As for merchants from other prefectures and counties who want to come to exchange for salt, traveling across the state and counties, the labor cost and road loss are also a large expense.Businessmen value profit very much, so naturally they will not do such things that harm others and benefit themselves.

After listening to Su Mu's explanation, Mr. Wu still couldn't figure out the reason behind it.

You sat for a long time stroking his beard, and then his eyes lit up: "Good idea, Zi Qiao, you are really a master of financial management! However, I still have a question. If you issue a large amount of salt tickets from the beginning, for example, Even if I raise enough 200 million taels of silver for His Majesty the Emperor and the court, but the interest alone will cost 20 taels in a year, where can I find this money?"

Su Mu rolled his eyes: He is really a pedantic fool who doesn't know how to understand, and he can't be too honest when playing finance.If the bankers of later generations were like you, would Wall Street businessmen still be called vampires?