African Entrepreneurship Records 2

Chapter 240 The Big Borrowing
Recently, Prussia has become more friendly to Ernst. Before returning to Hohenzollern Castle, Ernst learned that the Prussian royal family invited him to Berlin as a guest.

Ernst had already anticipated Prussia's plan, so he diverted to Berlin in Bavaria.

Kingdom of Prussia.

"Ernst, how are you doing recently!" William I said with a smile.

"Your Majesty, I am doing well. I have been busy with business recently, so I have been busy." Ernst said.

"You can just call him uncle. Your father is also the king now, and you are also the heir apparent, and you are both a member of the Hohenzollern family. You don't need to be so born." William I said.

"I'm afraid this is not very good!"

"What's wrong, we are all a family, since that's the case, from now on you will call me uncle in private, and your majesty in formal occasions."

Didn't William II become my eldest nephew!Ernst was secretly relieved, but he still said calmly: "Yes, I listened to you, Uncle William."

"now it's right!"

"I called you here today because I actually asked you for something. I'm not afraid of your jokes. Although I, the king, have fought many battles in my life, Prussia's finances have been unsustainable because of this, and I owe a lot of debts. Prussia cannot stop the unification of Germany." William I sighed.

"This, of course I understand that Prussia has indeed made great contributions to the unification of Germany over the years." Ernst complimented.

"Well, now I can tell you something. The French can't stand it anymore, but Prussia has already owed a huge debt in the last war. It is really difficult to raise military expenses this time!"

See the picture poorly.

"Uh, Uncle William, although Hexingen has developed well in recent years, but this year's investment is relatively large, so I am afraid that the funds are not too abundant. I also know the difficulties of the government. In this way, I will subscribe for 50 Taylor's war bonds to show my support to the kingdom. support is good."

50 Taylor is not a small amount, but it is really not enough for a big capitalist like Ernst.

Although Prussia is also preparing for war now, France has not declared war on Prussia, and it is impossible for the North German Federal Government to agree to allocate funds to the Kingdom.

Historically, on July 1870, 7, the North German Confederation Congress led by Prussia approved a war credit of 21 million Taylor.

So now, the Kingdom of Prussia can only think of ways to raise some funds on its own. Ernst estimates that Prussia can only raise a few million at most.

Even at the beginning of the war in the original history, the Berlin stock market was almost panicked, and even high-quality stocks such as the Cologne-Minden Railway fell by 30%.The Prussian government urgently sold 1 million thalers of the first phase of war bonds, trying to get rid of the underwriting channel monopolized by bankers and sell them directly to the market. , was rejected by the government."This is a ludicrous condition in the current market situation," Oppenheimer stressed in a letter to Breitschroder.

The sale was a resounding failure, with only 6000 thalers of bonds sold.In fact, the root of the problem is that bankers cannot earn underwriting fees if the government sells directly, so they have adopted a collective boycott.This once again shows the power of "channel is king" in the financial market. At the end of October 1870, the Prussian government learned the lessons of the last time and appointed Hansmann to form an underwriting syndicate to sell the second installment of 10 million Taylor loans in London and Berlin.With the victory of the Prussian army, the price of these loan contracts rose, and the government was soon able to cancel some of the mortgaged credit lines. Finally, the interest rate on the war bond was finalized at 2000% for a period of 5 years.

On November 11, the bankers continued their efforts and once again successfully issued a 30% off loan of 3400 million Taylors in the UK, with an option to issue a further 92 million Taylors.At the same time, although the British began to sympathize with the hapless France, French bonds could hardly be sold in the UK. On the invisible front of finance, France failed again.

But until the end of the Franco-Prussian War, the total cost of the Prussian war for the entire war was only 2200 million Taylor.

Ernst is not greedy, and has already started saving money to prepare for the Franco-Prussian War. At present, the entire Hechingen consortium can use more than 3000 million Taylors, and Ernst is going to bet at least 2000 million on the victory of Prussia. , The bet won, and finally the French paid the bill.

"50? This..." William I was a little melancholy. 50 is not a small amount, but it is no different from a drop in the bucket for war.

"Ernst, the development of Hechingen Bank over the years should be very good. I heard that you have started business in the Far East... You can rest assured that we, Prussia, are sure to win this war and invest boldly. At the same time We will also set a slightly higher price for the interest than the market, not only that, but the creation of the East African Kingdom may also lack many things, which we, Prussia, can cooperate with in the future..."

What is the certainty of victory, William I said casually, in fact, Prussia was still afraid before fighting France.

But William I knew that the wealth of the Hexingen royal family was absolutely astronomical. Now the Hexingen consortium has taken shape, its business covers the whole of Europe, and it has its business all over the world.So it is right to ask Ernst to borrow money, so William I boldly promised.

At the same time, everyone is from the Hohenzollern family, so they can play the emotional card. If they can borrow more from the royal family of Hechingen, they can be a little tougher when negotiating with other big capitalists later.

Ernst pretended to be embarrassed and said: "In fact, there are many industries under Hexingen, but there are also many workers. The wages of the workers alone are not a small amount..."

"Tell me the truth, Prussia can give you [-]% of the benefits you can give, and at the same time, the army will give priority to purchasing Hexingen's products."

"Uncle William, it's not a matter of money or not. However, you helped me a lot when I started my business. It would be too much for me to be so stingy. I won't hide it from you. This year, the company can only mobilize all the funds of 1500 yuan. About 1500 Taylors, including workers' wages, but for the unification of Germany, I will order [-] million Taylors first! From now on, if Prussia cannot win, the Hexingen Company will also go bankrupt due to a broken capital chain , so please be sure to win!" Ernst said somewhat "heavily".

1500 dollars!William I was a little confused when he heard this number. According to his expectation, or the goal this time, it was 400 million Taylor.After all, I haven't decided whether to fight or not!

Large-scale borrowing requires France to declare war on Prussia. That is to say, Prussia’s finances are too tight now. After all, the last Prussian-Austrian war did not ask for war reparations from Austria, and there are too many debts, so try to borrow some money. Emergency.

Ernst invested 1500 million yuan when he came up, which is enough to fight a big battle, and at the same time can greatly relieve the current financial pressure on Prussia, which also means that the army can prepare in advance!

William I was very moved. Sure enough, his family was still reliable. Ernst really went out of his way to support Prussia this time!After all, there are not many people who are optimistic about Prussia's victory. If this war fails, the royal family of Hechingen may really go bankrupt.

In fact, William I was overthinking it. Ernst was such a cautious person, it was impossible to gamble all his belongings.

Not only that, Ernst planned to continue to buy shares worth 1000 million thalers after Prussia issued the first war bond, and at the same time use the Hechingen Bank to help Prussia issue bonds to earn some extra handling fees, plus the previously promised by William I Privilege, when the time comes, it will be really lucrative.

The two parties, who thought they were making a lot of money, quickly signed the agreement. Professionals from the Prussian government and the Hechingen Consortium carefully checked all the terms dozens of times, and signed their names after confirming that they were correct.

(End of this chapter)