1988: Back to the human world for a few years

Chapter 591 Pry Point
Perhaps because of the high degree of connection, Dezhou Urban Development Fund Company expanded 6 new departments at one time. After obtaining the consent of the headquarters, Dahua Company also adjusted its organizational framework and expanded three new departments.

Among them, there are two very interesting departments, namely External Comprehensive Department One and External Comprehensive Department Two.

From the names, we can tell that these are two departments established respectively for the springboard market and the overseas business of independent brands. Considering Dahua's actual current business layout, the establishment of these two new departments is what everyone expects.

Especially those independent brands going overseas, which were originally the interactive cooperation business between Dahua Company and those social organizations under the name of "Import and Export Trade Promotion Association". After negotiation between the two parties, they are now officially integrated into Dahua Company for unified management, which has increased a lot of influence for the company out of thin air. It is really encouraging... Although this business was actually dominated by Dahua Company, it has officially surfaced from underwater. After all, the meanings of the two are different, and the constraints they are subject to are also different.

So it was not surprising that Comrade Mu Liya, who was originally in charge of the Risk Management Department, naturally took on the position of Director of the External Comprehensive Department 2 as the company's deputy general manager after the board of directors voted.

After the establishment of the Second Comprehensive Department, Miss Mu, who had just finished negotiations with the Nanase Chamber of Commerce, immediately entered an extremely busy work rhythm.

However, what many people do not understand is that although everyone can see that the first and second comprehensive departments are both powerful core departments, since the day when the second comprehensive external department was officially established, those who have come to ask to visit Miss Mu in an endless stream, in addition to those business leaders and foreign businessmen involved in the brand's overseas expansion plan, there are also many unexpected faces...

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"Minister Mu, it's not easy for us to carry out the work of the Foreign Cooperation Management Department. In addition to the Bohai No. 1 project, CNOOC is also planning to build several new offshore operating platforms and drilling platforms for exploration purposes... Although China has been working hard on scientific and technological breakthroughs in the past two years, our foundation in offshore drilling is weak after all. Some equipment will eventually have to be imported from abroad, but imported equipment requires foreign exchange..."

At this point, the middle-aged man sighed, without the strong expression that a superior leader should have on his face. Instead, he spoke in a negotiating tone, "We are all in the oil industry. As Shengli Oilfield is the second brother, the organization has always told us that we should take care of CNOOC. Right now, their foreign exchange quota is really insufficient, and the ministry can't make any room for it. So... can you please lend a hand to Minister Mu and help fill the foreign exchange gap?"

At the end, the middle-aged man laughed and said, "We, the Shengli Group, have always had a very good relationship with CNOOC. The reason why the Tianjin-Dezhou oil and gas pipeline project was finalized so quickly was that CNOOC gave us a lot of face... Just for the sake of this relationship between the two companies, we will help in any way we can."

Miss Mu looked at the middle-aged man in front of her with a smile, but did not give an immediate answer.

The middle-aged man in front of him was named Huang, and he was the head of the command’s External Cooperation Management Department.

Although this department sounds complicated and is indeed an important department, in fact, the Department of External Cooperation Management is not a direct subordinate unit of the headquarters, but one of the 12 institutions that share offices with a direct subordinate unit of a relevant agency.

This was an important reason why the other party, whose rank was three levels higher than his, a section-level cadre, and the same as his father's, never adopted his usual commanding tone... Although Dahua Company was only a second-level institution, half a level lower than others in terms of organizational structure, Dahua Company was not only a core second-level unit with independent management rights, but also a joint venture institution with part of the shares of the drilling company. From any perspective, this guy had no qualifications to give orders to him directly.

The reason why the other party was willing to travel hundreds of miles from Dongying to visit was very simple... foreign exchange!
Anyone who knows something about the history before the millennium knows that since the 1s and 10s, foreign exchange has always been the most scarce thing in China. Even in some unofficial channels, the exchange rate of the world's major industrial countries represented by the US dollar can reach 1:12 or even :... There is no way. Whether you want to go abroad or want to buy good things abroad, if you take out the RMB, people will not recognize it.

If you just want to exchange some foreign currency, it's OK. If you want to exchange a few hundred or a few thousand dollars, you can find a way to do it. And as long as you pay attention, you usually won't be found.

But this is not the case for enterprises.

Any enterprise that uses foreign exchange needs to report it to the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, and can only exchange and use it after their approval... Of course, the superior unit can also help you authorize or coordinate some usage quotas.

However, compared with later generations, China's current export earnings are so low that it is heartbreaking. In addition, some important spare parts, equipment and raw materials require a large amount of foreign exchange. Therefore, the surplus foreign exchange that can be left over each year is so tight that it is not enough to describe it.

This results in even units like the oil system, when making business plans, even if the budget in their own currency can be as high as billions, but when it comes to making budgets related to foreign exchange such as the introduction of equipment, they only dare to make a few tens of millions of dollars... Even so, they still have to make contingency plans, for fear that they will be rejected when submitting to the approval department.

This shows how difficult it is for Chinese companies to obtain foreign exchange indicators at present.

But Dahua is an exception.

You know, in order to encourage exports and earn foreign exchange, the country has introduced many incentive policies... For example, the export tax rebate policy, which is well-known but actually very unpopular at the county level.

But in addition to the well-known export tax rebate policy, there is another policy that is highly valued by enterprises, especially current enterprises and even local authorities... the export amount is linked to the foreign exchange usage quota.

The foreign exchange peg ratio varies depending on local conditions, but is basically between 13% and 18%.

That is to say, if you export goods worth 100 million USD this year, then you can have a foreign exchange quota of 13 to 18 USD... Of course, this is only a theoretical foreign exchange quota. The specific situation depends on the specific situation. If the products you export actually form a clear price inversion, the local exchange control bureaus or sub-bureaus can reduce or even block your foreign exchange quota on suspicion of malicious exchange arbitrage after obtaining evidence from the banking system (this situation rarely occurs in later generations, but it was not uncommon during the period before the millennium when foreign exchange was the most tense).

Therefore, after Dahua's independent brand overseas expansion plan, which was originally regarded by countless people as "adventurous and radical", achieved success, a series of benefits became apparent.

Since it is called an independent brand, what is exported are not raw materials or processed accessories with extremely low added value and extremely low bargaining power... At least most of the related foreign trade business generated is not like this.

With high added value and independent bargaining power, there is no suspicion of price inversion... The average price of domestic products in the same industry is used as a reference price. Even the distribution price of Dahua's own brands is several times higher than the domestic market price.

In addition, another benefit of high added value is that it can create a larger foreign trade order amount with the same number of goods and the same level of resource consumption, and greatly reduce the foreign exchange consumption that needs to be hedged in the international division of labor and cooperation;

Simply put, with the same export quota of 100 million US dollars, the profit margin of these independent brands is several times higher than that of the current mainstream processing on imported materials and electromechanical exports, but the consumption of resources and energy is several times lower than those mainstream businesses... More importantly, in order to maintain business operations, these independent brands may only need to import foreign equipment and raw materials worth 10 US dollars or even 5 US dollars, but other mainstream businesses, especially processing on imported materials businesses, require imported equipment and raw materials as high as 70 US dollars.

After hedging and discounting, the gap between the two sides can be imagined, especially the surplus balance of foreign exchange quota, the gap is simply as big as heaven and earth... The traditional processing-on-commission business may beg the leader every day to give more foreign exchange quota to expand production, but on the Dahua Company's side, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange has a large amount of foreign exchange quota gathering dust in its account.

Yes, that’s right, there is still a large amount of foreign exchange quota lying there gathering dust.

Don't forget that since the end of last year, the foreign trade volume created by Dahua's overseas brands in the international division of labor has reached tens of billions of yen, and with the further expansion of the market, the rate is soaring at a rate of at least 40 to 50 billion yen per month. Even if this is the sales volume, various costs and expenses need to be deducted in the middle, but under the "two-book" accounting model of this cross-border trade, the actual balance of foreign exchange usage is still an extremely large number.

What's more, Dahua also has the China-Japan Economic Promotion Council, which has the support and turnaround of the overseas financial businesses of so many island countries and Southeast Asian member companies. The amount of foreign exchange that Dahua can actually leverage is definitely beyond the imagination of most people today... Whether it is the Japanese yen, US dollar, Australian dollar or Southeast Asian currency, it is not a big problem for them.

Therefore, although Dahua Company is only a second-level unit, in terms of overseas foreign exchange reserves and domestic foreign exchange usage quotas, it is not even lower than the level of Dongying Command, and it is catching up at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Faced with such a God of Wealth with his hand pinching the mouth of the purse, only a fool would act like a leader and point fingers all over the place!

However, although Minister Huang gave Miss Mu enough face in his words and deeds, these official words were not what Miss Mu wanted to hear. Therefore, after listening to the other party's emotional and logical words, Miss Mu just smiled very humbly, and then said slowly:
"Minister Huang, although the headquarters has indeed repeatedly emphasized the need to strengthen business cooperation with a number of brother companies including CNOOC in the past two years, and has provided a certain degree of assistance and reciprocity, the organizational framework has its own operating rules;"

"If I remember correctly, since the reform began the year before last, the headquarters has set up the [Shallow Water Drilling Technology Research Center] under the Science and Technology Management Department, and the [Offshore Drilling Platform Equipment Management Center] under the Equipment Management Department. As well as your department, it is specifically responsible for various business cooperation matters with CNOOC, especially CNOOC Jinmen Branch, in order to truly achieve specialization;"

"Therefore, without the official meeting documents of the headquarters, Minister Huang came to our Dahua Company to borrow foreign exchange quota to complete your work tasks... I'm afraid it's a bit inappropriate, right?"

Miss Mu bluntly pointed out Dahua Company, but she was smiling: "What Minister Huang mentioned before is indeed correct. The laying of the Tianjin-Dezhou oil and gas pipeline will indeed have a very far-reaching positive impact on Dezhou and even Dahua Company. Logically speaking, although this project was coordinated by the headquarters and the CNOOC Tianjin Branch, it is our Dahua Company that should be held responsible for this;"

"But, Minister Huang, have you forgotten that the signing time of the cooperation agreement for the Tianjin-Dezhou oil and gas pipeline project was too close to the time when the country clearly proposed the idea of ​​developing the North China Chemical Industry Belt?"

"Let's take a step back and say that even if the construction of the Tianjin-Dezhou pipeline project has no direct relationship with the country's proposal to develop the North China Chemical Industry Belt, the Dezhou Urban Development Fund Company has already repaid the favor through the Shandong-Henan-Hebei Industrial Manufacturing Cooperation Framework, and even the CNOOC Tianjin Branch will get much more in the future than it has invested now;"

"So, it's a bit unreasonable for Minister Huang to use this human relationship as an excuse!"

At this point, Mu Liya sighed deeply: "In fact, if it is just a foreign exchange quota of tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars, then for your sake, Uncle Huang, I will lend it; but the foreign exchange quota of 140 million US dollars..." Mu Liya shook her head with embarrassment: "This is really embarrassing... Now there are more than one or two units that want to borrow Japanese and US dollar foreign exchange quotas from our Second External Comprehensive Department. If I lend such a large foreign exchange quota to you, Uncle Huang, without any evidence, I am afraid that I will really not be able to carry out my work in the future."

This refusal is well-founded.

Nowadays, all companies of a certain scale are suffering from a severe shortage of foreign exchange quotas. Some are even unable to introduce advanced equipment and raw materials from abroad to improve the quality of their products due to insufficient foreign exchange quotas, and are directly caught in a transformation/survival crisis.

In addition to various enterprises, local competent authorities are also suffering from severe shortage of foreign exchange. As the housekeeper, facing a number of hungry enterprises but not having enough milk, one can imagine how anxious they feel.

Therefore, if Muriya dares to open this loophole and lend out the 140 million US dollars foreign exchange quota, before waiting until tomorrow, the door of her office will be squeezed open this afternoon by those business leaders and local authorities whose hair has turned white due to worries about foreign exchange... the kind that cannot be driven away even with a whip.

The middle-aged man couldn't help but frown when he heard this.

This kind of official excuse might fool young people who have just entered society, but it couldn't fool him.

No matter what era, there are countless reasonable and non-compliant operations. If we really want to help you, what are the difficulties and obstacles on the surface?
Besides, people are close to each other and they are distant relatives. The Dongying Command is already a major shareholder of Dahua Company. Who can really say no to it helping other departments?

Therefore, the focus of Miss Mu’s remarks just now was not on these superficial reasons, but on the personal name “Uncle Huang” and the four words “without evidence”.

We are all social beings, and there is no need to point out some things;
But it is precisely because of this that middle-aged people are somewhat troubled.

After thinking for a while, the middle-aged man cautiously tried to test the waters: "Minister Mu, how about this? I'll talk to CNOOC... They won't lend the foreign exchange quota for nothing, so why not just transfer it... 140 million US dollars, converted into 2000 million RMB, in the name of technology transfer, how about transferring it directly to your department's public account?"

The buying and selling of foreign exchange transfers is extremely popular nowadays, and transactions are generally concluded based on the real-time unofficial exchange rate, which may be slightly lower or higher at times, depending on how both parties negotiate.

But even if it is sometimes higher than the unofficial exchange rate, the exchange rate of 140 million US dollars for 2000 million RMB still seems a bit too high... You know, the current official exchange rate between the US dollar and the RMB is 1:5.3, which is purely doubled and a half, and even more than 30% higher than the unofficial exchange rate. It can be said to be full of sincerity.

But the middle-aged people put forward this initiative without any psychological pressure.

Although CNOOC's current size is far smaller than that of the Victory system, as the most beloved younger brother in the system, it is also not short of money... To be precise, what they lack is only foreign exchange, but as for their own currency, they are definitely not short of it.

The reason why he took the initiative to propose such an initiative was that the middle-aged man knew that the capital pool of Dezhou Urban Property Fund Company was now severely dried up. As the designated manager of Dezhou Urban Property Fund Company, if Dahua Company suddenly had a surplus fund of up to 2000 million on its account, it would be possible to leverage many more resources and leverage within Dezhou Urban Property Fund Company. Similarly, as one of the core departments of Dahua Company, if this money was directly transferred to the account of the Second External Comprehensive Department, Miss Mu would be able to leverage many more resources and leverage within Dahua Company.

Unfortunately, after hearing this, Miss Mu just smiled lightly: "Minister Huang, I think you misunderstood. Dezhou Urban Property Fund Company is indeed short of money at the moment, but that is only temporary. The situation will improve soon. "

"Moreover, even if Dezhou Urban Property Fund Company needs to replenish its cash flow right away, that is also the responsibility of General Manager Yang... After all, I am just an ordinary department head of Dahua Company. You want me to transfer a foreign exchange quota of up to 140 million US dollars to you at the risk of being criticized by the department. Do you think this is appropriate?"

"You know, borrowing is borrowing, and transferring is transferring. The nature of the two is completely different, and the organization's attitude towards the two is also completely different."

One is to help and support, which is considered as a family's support, and there is a return after borrowing; while the other is to transfer and sell for profit, which is naturally incomparable. Not to mention that with Miss Mu's current vision and appetite, she already looks down on the mere 2000 million. Even if she really looks down on it, she will never do such a stupid thing that can be easily reported.

When the middle-aged man heard that Miss Mu's way of addressing him changed from Uncle Huang to Minister Huang, he knew that she was unhappy and might serve tea and send her away the next second.

Seeing that although Mu Liya still had a humble smile on her face, her eyes had already drifted slightly towards the landline on the table, the middle-aged man hesitated for a moment, and finally sighed: "Niece, since you call me uncle, I naturally cannot live up to this friendship."

As he spoke, the middle-aged man showed a doting smile on his face, and then waved his hand generously: "As an uncle, I naturally can't make things difficult for my niece. You just need to follow what the company's articles of association stipulate."

"But let's be clear. Your father's outstanding performance at work over the past two years is obvious to all. Even if the $140 million foreign exchange quota cannot be borrowed, I will definitely vote for your father at the job adjustment voting meeting next month!"

After saying that, the middle-aged man stood up, looking as if he was about to leave.

However, the moment he stood up, he couldn't help but reveal a hint of bitterness on his face.

He knew what this incredibly beautiful junior wanted, but if possible, he would never agree to cast his vote for Mu Siyuan.

The promotion of Mu Siyuan to the position of director is basically a done deal, but whether he will stay or leave is still undecided. If Mu Siyuan is not selected to serve in the ministry, but continues to stay in the command center through a vote at the job adjustment voting meeting, he will become a local giant, which will have a huge suppressive force on the small hill where he is. In the objective situation where everyone has their own job, his path to progress in the next few years will suddenly become obscure and inexplicable.

But there is no way. After two years of reform, almost all middle and senior levels of the current command are in an extremely fierce competition. Whenever you make any obvious mistakes or omissions, a large number of followers will immediately pounce on you and throw you down.

Therefore, as the head of the Foreign Cooperation Management Department, if he fails to get the foreign exchange quota of 140 million US dollars, the shallow-water oil field exploration and development plan jointly carried out by the command and the CNOOC Tianjin Branch will come to a standstill due to the inability to import enough foreign equipment (Shengli once regarded the Bohai Sea and the Yellow Sea as its own private land, and later developed some shallow-water oil fields). Needless to say, facing those competitors who are looking for faults with magnifying glasses, he will be demoted to the grassroots level after the Chinese New Year... With such a serious work mistake, basically no one can save him.

If you can't even get through this hurdle, what's the point of talking about the future?
Only those who are alive are qualified to talk about victory or defeat, and only those who have maintained their current position are qualified to talk about development!

Therefore, at this juncture where he had to choose between the two, he could only make the most rational choice.

Seeing the middle-aged man stand up, Mu Liya also stood up with a smile, and then saw him off like an ordinary junior: "Uncle Huang, look at what you said. Although the External Cooperation Management Department is not a direct department of the headquarters, its importance is not inferior to theirs... At present, the department advocates scale restructuring, and it is the time for the External Cooperation Management Department to start to exert its strength; although Dahua Company has independent management rights, it is also a unit with a big picture perspective. How dare I delay the normal development of your work, Uncle Huang, at this stage?"

"Besides, the future industrial development of Dezhou cannot be separated from the Tianjin-Dezhou oil and gas pipeline, and it cannot be separated from the active cooperation of the CNOOC Tianjin Branch. How could our Dahua Company really ignore the overall situation?"

At this point, Miss Mu paused for a moment on the door handle and said, "Uncle Huang, how about this? I'll ask Mr. Yang for instructions later. No matter what, even if I have to be harassed by other companies every day, I will definitely help you get the 140 million foreign exchange quota!"

Hearing this, the middle-aged man stopped and looked at her deeply, then forced out a smile with a complicated meaning: "Okay, then I'll trouble you, my niece!"

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After seeing the middle-aged man off, Miss Mu returned to her chair, took out a list from the drawer, looked through it carefully, and ticked a name.

Every era has its own lifeline and every era has its own critical valve point.

I have to say that in today’s domestic situation, the extremely precious foreign exchange indicators are so easy to use; it is worth it that I have worked so hard in the island country for so long.

After a long sigh, Mu Liya put the list back and picked up the phone: "What are the plans for the next trip?"

The assistant's respectful voice came from the phone: "Minister Mu, Deputy Chen from the Dezhou Foreign Exchange Administration Branch is still waiting outside. He wants to discuss with you the adjustment of our company's Japanese yen foreign exchange quota ratio... What do you think?"

Hearing this, Mu Liya smiled and said, "Okay, let Deputy Chen come in."

(End of this chapter)