Chongzhen revived the Ming Dynasty

The third year of Chongzhen was the Gengwu year.

The eighth day of the first lunar month in the Datong calendar, which is the sixteenth day of the first lunar month in the Gregorian calendar, is a good time to open the market, issue bonds, and conduct transactions.

The stock exchange reopened for trading after a New Year's break.

Unlike the deserted scene before the New Year, the opening of the stock exchange this time attracted dignitaries and wealthy businessmen from the capital.

To the extent that the metal exchange next door seemed a bit deserted, the prosperity of the two exchanges became completely opposite.

Tu Wenfu looked at this scene and nodded with great satisfaction, knowing that the task assigned to him by the emperor was basically successful.

As long as there are no subsequent mistakes, it can be completed successfully.

Under the guidance of the MC, Tu Wenfu walked to a piece of red cloth and said loudly:

"According to the Imperial decree, a clock is granted to the Stock Exchange."

"From now on, trading hours will be based on this clock."

He suddenly pulled off the red cloth, revealing a huge clock to everyone.

This clock was copied by craftsmen in the inner court, but it was not a complete copy, as the dial was improved.

After the emperor proposed the time of the tropical year in terms of hours, minutes and seconds and decided to use the 24-hour system, officials from the Imperial Observatory instructed craftsmen to use the sundial face to replace the dial of a Western clock.

The hour wheel in the clock was also modified to indicate the twenty-four hours and the time of the zodiac on the dial.

(Picture of a sundial, 24 hours and earthly branch time correspond. The difference is that this book did not change ke a day to ke, so the outer circle scale in the picture should be changed)

(The dial is probably like this, with hours, minutes and seconds displayed separately, and the hundredth and minute points on the outer edge of the earthly branch time)

It perfectly adapts to the 24-hour system promoted by Zhu Youjian, so that the potentially ambiguous times such as 12:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. will not appear in the Ming Dynasty.

When Zhu Youjian first promoted the hour system, he did not propose the twelve-hour system. He directly matched the twenty-four-hour system with the earthly branches such as Zi, Chou, Yin, and Mao.

Therefore, there is no such thing as 1pm or 2pm in the Ming Dynasty today. The official time is 1pm or 14pm.

However, because the clock uses the twelve-hour system, some people have already called it one o'clock or two o'clock in the afternoon.

Zhu Youjian was very unhappy about this because it would easily cause confusion.

Therefore, he welcomed this 24-hour Earthly Branches dial, especially since he had no idea about it at all and it was a work of art developed by officials and craftsmen from the Imperial Observatory.

Delighted, Zhu Youjian awarded honors to these people, and asked the Imperial Household Department to register patents so that they could share the dividends.

Today, the Imperial Household Department has established a watch workshop to produce this new watch.

Today, we will take advantage of the opening of the stock exchange to advertise in front of the wealthy people in the capital, letting them know that a new type of clock has been born, which is more in line with the usage habits of the people of the Ming Dynasty.

The dignitaries and wealthy businessmen in the capital all became interested after seeing such a novel clock.

After the emperor promoted the 24-hour system and clocks, some wealthy families began to use self-ringing clocks at home.

It is naturally more convenient to display time than the traditional sundial and clepsydra, but the conversion between it and the scales and points is very troublesome for people.

Especially now that the curfew in Daming is still based on the watch, in order to prevent mistakes, they still have to use the clepsydra to time at night. Buying a self-ringing clock costs a lot of money, but the convenience cannot be fully reflected.

In addition, people are used to saying Zi, Chou, Yin, and Mao, and are not used to digital time. The Roman numerals on the dial require them to use their brains to recognize them.

This made some people feel very painful, and some even felt that the emperor was looking for trouble and that clocks should not be used for timekeeping.

Now that this new clock has appeared, they don't have to worry about this anymore.

The new 24-hour Earthly Branches dial perfectly solves the problem of time conversion.

Even the hundred quarters of a day are engraved on the outer ring and can be seen by the position of the hour hand.

Anyone who knows the characters Zi, Chou, Yin, and Mao can easily understand the time.

Duke of England Zhang Weixian looked at the clock and exclaimed to the people around him:
“This clock is great!”

"Even an old man like me with blurry eyes can easily tell the time."

"This is the clock of our Ming Dynasty, not something made by Westerners!"

He immediately expressed his intention to order twelve clocks to be placed in various houses and rooms.

Under his leadership, Duke Chengguo, Marquis Funing and others also placed orders.

The emperor easily recouped the cost of advertising by giving away watches.

However, this amount of income was far from enough for what the emperor was going to do. Tu Wenfu said loudly to everyone:
"The emperor said that in the future, a new bell tower will be built next to the bell and drum tower to house this four-sided clock."

"In the future, everyone will be able to adjust the time by looking at the clock tower instead of the clepsydra."

"If you want to buy a watch, go ahead and buy it. Don't worry about it not keeping accurate time."

Once this news came out, many people's doubts were dispelled.

Today’s clocks are admittedly not precise enough, but clepsydras that require human supervision actually have greater errors.

Sundials are more intuitive, but they also have errors. Especially, they are difficult to place and can be easily misplaced.

Now the emperor wants to build a new clock tower and put four clocks on it for the whole city to check the time. People praise the emperor for his thoughtfulness and buy clocks with more confidence.

Since the emperor built a clock tower, he could naturally send special people to use sundials and clepsydras to determine the time. They didn't have to worry about their clocks being inaccurate, they only had to calibrate the time according to the clocks on the four sides of the clock tower.

After this advertisement, the reputation of the Neifujian clock spread throughout the capital.

Western clocks and watches, which had been selling well after the emperor promoted clocks and watches, suddenly lost their market.

This kind of clock with earthly branch time and Ming Dynasty characteristics of 100 marks is obviously more suitable for the usage habits of the people of the Ming Dynasty.

Craftsmen like Huang Fuchu, who had previously only known how to imitate Western clocks and watches, were also inspired by seeing this kind of clock and watch. They used their brains to create various new dials. From then on, the clock and watch of the Ming Dynasty took a different path from that of the West. The earthly branch timekeeping method and the 24-hour system were also spread to all parts of the world along with the clock and watch of the Ming Dynasty.
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As the time on the clock reached nine o'clock, the stock exchange finally officially opened.

Tu Wenfu, Zhang Weixian and others walked into the exchange first, and others followed suit.

Most of the people who came here today have heard about the hot sales of Daming Shipping Group shares, and many people want to see if there is any opportunity to buy shares on the exchange.

In order to heat up the exchange and collect more stamp duty from the imperial court, even though the shares of the Ming Shipping Group had been traded privately with the feudal nobles, the emperor required that the shares be issued on the stock exchange and circulated on the exchange.

Before the stock issuance, a bell-ringing ceremony was held. Tu Wenfu pointed to a set of six chimes hanging on the exchange and said:
"Please invite Minister Yu of the Navy, Duke Yingguo, Duke Chengguo, and representatives of King Han and Duke Jiangling to hold a bell-ringing ceremony with our family to celebrate the listing of Daming Shipping Group."

"After today, the shares of Ming Shipping Group can be freely traded on the stock exchange."

“Anyone who meets the requirements can buy shares on the exchange.”

Although the shares of the Ming Shipping Group are subject to the condition that nobility are given priority, ordinary businessmen still have the opportunity to purchase them.

If the 10% of shares released are not completely bought by the nobles, or if some nobles buy and then sell them, ordinary people can invest and buy shares of Daming Shipping Group.

Most of the merchants who come to the stock exchange today come for this stock, especially the wealthy sea merchants, who come for this reason.

After Tu Wenfu and six others rang the chimes and Yu Anxing introduced the total share capital and stock price of Daming Shipping Group, a staff member of the stock exchange immediately wrote this on a piece of white paper with a brush.

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The six-digit code 600001, as well as its current share capital and stock price, were pasted by staff on a high whiteboard for everyone to see.

Seeing the total share capital of Daming Shipping Group as high as 10 million and the issue price of 1 yuan per share, everyone exclaimed, shocked to witness a giant enterprise with assets of 10 million taels.

Even Zhang Weixian, Zhu Chunchen, Zhu Guobi and other dukes were looking at this scene in amazement. I wonder if the total assets of Daming Shipping Group are worth 10 million?

When the annual revenue of the Ming Dynasty was only about 20 million silver dollars, it was not an exaggeration to say that the Ming Shipping Group, with its total assets of 10 million yuan, was as rich as a country.

The assets accumulated by these families over generations are mostly no more than a few million, and most of them are fixed and difficult to cash out for the time being.

If the shares of Daming Shipping Group can really be sold at a price of 10 million, they will have to study hard in the future to figure out how to make themselves richer.

If this was the case for dukes and marquises, let alone others. Even Zheng Hongkui, who came from a wealthy family, was somewhat surprised when he actually saw the figure of 10 million taels.

However, he reacted quickly and immediately said loudly:
"At one yuan and one cent per share, the Zheng family will buy unlimited shares of the Ming Shipping Group."

"If you're interested in selling, you can always contact the Zheng family to discuss."

Although the Zheng family has acquired one percent of the shares of the Ming Shipping Group, they are not satisfied and hope to get more so as to have more advantages in the future.

Following his lead, other businessmen soon began bidding the price, and the stock price quickly climbed to 1.110, 1.120, and so on, quickly moving towards yuan.

Such a crazy trend made the British public and others dumbfounded. They really didn't expect the stock price to rise so fast, which made them completely confused.

Don’t these people understand that it will take the Ming Shipping Group several years or even more than a decade to catch up with the grain transport industry, which is half the size and worth 10 million?
Why are people buying stocks crazily now and not treating money as money at all?
Tu Wenfu knew a little about this. In order to maintain the value of the Daming Shipping Group, the emperor specifically contacted the Zheng family and asked Dongning Insurance Company to charge normal insurance premiums when encountering ships of the shipping group.

It is the kind of insurance that will pay compensation after an accident, not a disguised bribe.

It was because Zheng Zhilong agreed to this that the emperor granted him the same preferential treatment as high-ranking feudal nobles and allowed him to purchase one percent of the shares.

Those merchants frantically bought shares of Daming Shipping Group in order to become shareholders and register their ships with Daming Shipping Group. In the future, they would pay management fees to Daming Shipping Group and reduce the so-called insurance premiums.

As long as Zheng Zhilong can lower the insurance premium, what does a little premium matter?
Not to mention that after they become shareholders of the Daming Shipping Group, they will enjoy various preferential treatments when they dock at coastal ports in the future.

When you encounter patrolling navy and coast guard, showing this identity card will save you a lot of trouble.

They had hardly come across such a deal with so many discounts before, but now that they saw it, they rushed to buy it like crazy.

Now, their goal is to obtain more than one ten-thousandth of the shares, so that Daming Shipping Group can issue shareholder certificates and enjoy various preferential treatments.

Driven by these maritime merchants, wealthy people in the capital also joined in.

The shares of Daming Shipping Group rose steadily for a while, and only slowed down after reaching 1.3 yuan.

It's not that people stopped bidding, but the exchange temporarily suspended trading after the increase reached 30% to let them cool down.

Ten minutes later, bidding resumed.

This short cooling-off period caused some businessmen who followed the trend to withdraw, as most of them believed that the shipping group's shares were not worth so much money.

Since they do not have any maritime trade business, they do not need the various benefits that come with stocks.

This made the transaction prices begin to return to normal, and some nobles who held shares of the shipping group also began to sell their shares.

Some transactions appeared one after another, and this stock began to be traded.

Tu Wenfu looked at this scene with satisfaction and did not use the prepared plan to release stocks.

The Imperial Assets Commission is unwilling to sell the shares of the Ming Shipping Group held by them. They need to ensure control over the shipping group and use these shares to exchange with vassal states in the future.

The Privy Council, to which the Navy Department belongs, wanted to sell more stocks to spend, but the emperor stipulated that the proceeds from the sale of stocks by the Ming Shipping Group could only be used to expand the shipping group's own ports, docks and other fixed assets. The profits from the annual dividends were the money that the Privy Council and the Navy Department could use.

This made the Privy Council less interested in selling stocks, and instead wanted to hold more shares so that they could get more dividends.

The two major shareholders who still held 45 percent of the shares ultimately did not sell their shares.

Those who are selling stocks now are nobles who are in financial difficulties, such as the King of Han and the Earl of Dongjiang. They want to sell some shares to recover their purchase costs.

Tu Wenfu did not persuade them to do so, telling them that the shares would be more valuable in the future. They just kept holding on to the shares, and their value was not reflected.

He needs to ensure that there is a certain amount of circulation in the shares of Daming Shipping Group to keep it active.

The emperor needed to use shares to attract more people to support maritime transportation and make the Ming Dynasty's maritime trade more prosperous.

Subsequently, the other seven stocks were listed one after another. Driven by the atmosphere of Daming Shipping Group's stocks, their transaction prices generally exceeded the opening price. Shuntianfu Salt Company, which was more popular, even experienced a temporary suspension of trading like the shipping group's stocks.

After selling some of its shares, the Imperial Assets Committee successfully raised 300,000 taels of silver. Together with the 500,000 taels of silver sold at a five-point gain on the shares of the Ming Shipping Group, a total of 800,000 taels of funds were raised.

These are the funds that the emperor prepared for the replacement of the Imperial Camp and the Patrol Camp. No matter how high the cost of a single-shot musket is, at least 20,000 people need to be equipped. (End of this chapter)