The Ming Dynasty did not revolutionize

Chapter 106 US Capital Reservoir

On the morning of the second day after the banquet, representatives from all over the United States gathered again and went to Zhu Jianxuan's bedroom to bid farewell to him.

They had to go back quickly to eliminate dissidents, identify those who opposed the monarchy, and drive them out of the parliaments and government agencies in the colonies.

After Zhu Jianxuan sent off the representatives from various parts of the United States, the duty squad leader of his guard came in to report:

"Your Majesty, Captain Cook requests an audience."

Zhu Jianxuan was a little surprised, but he didn't say anything and let him in.

Seeing that there were no outsiders around, Captain Cook directly explained the conversation between several British prisoners at the banquet yesterday:

"...In short, General Clinton can probably accept the idea of ​​friendship between Ming and Britain.

“Macartney’s resentment towards the Ming seemed deep, and he did raise a solid point.

"Britain needs wood to repair and continue to build their fleet, which may lead to conflicts with Ming again."

Zhu Jianxuan couldn't help but smile after hearing this:
“I have already extended an invitation to the Hanoverian royal family through the British Prime Minister.

“We will trade Canadian land north of Quebec and Montreal for a piece of land off the coast of Hanover to build a port.

“The British would not have been very happy to accept it, but with the actual demand for timber, the feasibility of the deal has increased again.

“If the deal goes through, Ming will get a window to sell goods directly to Europe.

“Hannover will get a huge and sustainable business opportunity, which will generate abundant cash flow and business connections for Hanover.

“Britain will also receive timber to repair its warships without having to come into direct conflict with Ming.

“This is a deal that benefits all three parties.

“After the transaction is completed, the friendship between the three parties will be more solid.”

Captain Cook was somewhat surprised:

"The Ming Dynasty's willingness to trade in this way can indeed avoid direct conflict.

“But Your Highness, your idea in Europe is just to find a trading window.

“Or do you intend to use it as a base to gradually expand your territory in Europe?”

Although Cook had decided to be loyal to the King of Wu of the Ming Dynasty, he had been a British citizen for the first half of his life, so he was still subconsciously worried about the safety of Britain.

Zhu Jianxuan could understand his mentality, so he explained it seriously to comfort him:
"I just want a trading window. Ming has no interest in European lands right now.

“Perhaps, after all the land in the world has been divided up and basically developed, conflicts will arise between Ming Dynasty and European countries again.

"But like you said, that was too long ago, and it's not something our generation can see.

“The future strategic direction of the United States is to integrate North America, and the strategic direction of the Ming Dynasty is to obtain a transit point on the coast of Africa.

“The purpose of establishing a base in Africa is also to maintain routes to North America.

“Then, as you said, it will be a long period of development and construction in America, and we won’t be considering other things in the short term.

"Unless there is a chance to quickly destroy the Qing Dynasty, which is actually independent..."

After listening to this, Captain Cook bowed his hands seriously:
"Thank you for your honesty, Your Highness. I don't need to worry about this."

Captain Cook was still a prisoner, and in order to avoid being considered abnormal by other British prisoners, he left quickly after reporting and discussing.

Zhu Jianxuan also took his guards out and went to the residential area to settle the new immigrants from Central America.

Zhu Jianxuan didn't need to do anything special. He just wore the prince's uniform and walked around the streets of the residential area with two teams of guards.

Occasionally stop to look at the surrounding scenery and see the immigrants who are packing up their new home.

When I met a veteran of the Expeditionary Force who was leading immigrant families here and arranging houses for the new immigrants, I casually asked about the progress of the resettlement.

Zhu Jianxuan's inspections in the immigrant residential areas can let new immigrants know that the king attaches great importance to their affairs and can directly avoid and quickly resolve many problems.

It is very easy to govern a small country with a small population.

As long as the ruler is not a complete idiot or villain, it is relatively easy to maintain a stable state.

Because there were only so many people in the entire kingdom, most of them had the opportunity to meet the king directly, leaving officials with little room to manipulate the situation.

There is no need for multiple layers of administrative structure, and the monarch can see directly to the bottom layer most of the time.

At noon, Zhu Jianxuan returned to the palace to have lunch. In the afternoon, he took the craftsmen led by Song Wendao, Li Rui and his disciples to the dock.

There are no large machines on the dock now, and the immigrants can move by themselves, so disembarkation is relatively fast.

The unloading speed of the supplies coming on board the ship is much slower.

These things include agricultural tools such as shovels and plows for clearing land, and tools and equipment used by ordinary craftsmen such as axes, saws and planers.

Seeds of various grains, vegetables, trees, and forage grasses, as well as a batch of cold-resistant bamboo seedlings.

In the era of reinforced concrete technology, if there is a serious shortage of steel bars, bamboo bars can be used instead of steel bars to construct buildings that do not require high strength.

Then came general steam engines and accessories as well as maintenance tools, concrete production equipment and some samples, and a batch of melted high-quality steel ingots and steel bar materials.

There are also advanced machine tools, experimental equipment, special materials and experimental products made on the ship that belong to the King Wu Laboratory and are used exclusively by master craftsmen.

These things may be more valuable than the real gold and silver on the ship.

But many of them looked crude. The early motors looked like toys made by children. It would be troublesome if they were damaged by ordinary soldiers.

So Zhu Jianxuan personally brought the craftsmen and disciples over to personally direct and supervise the unloading of items from the laboratory.

Then he personally supervised and escorted them back to Daming New City, New York.

To the east of Zhu Jianxuan’s bedroom, a group of courtyards closest to the palace were specially cordoned off by Zhu Jianxuan.

Part of it was used as his laboratory in America, and part of it was given to master craftsmen and his disciples to live in, ensuring that he could guide them at any time.

Next to them was the yard where other ordinary apprentices lived, and the classroom where they had group classes.

Zhu Jianxuan has instructed Li Anbang to arrange a group of skilled craftsmen to start building separate walls for these courtyards.

Most of these apprentices will return to Australia with Zhu Jianxuan, but a small number will stay to serve as trainees and teachers, teaching the children of ordinary immigrants.

This is the future American laboratory and the future American Institute of Science and Technology.

All of Zhu Jianxuan's disciples and apprentices were organized into a thousand-household institute, which was directly named "Science and Technology Institute".

When the laboratory equipment was transferred and all the apprentices were settled in.

Inside the large courtyard of Zhu Jianxuan's American Laboratory, he once again received worship from all his disciples and apprentices.

Starting from tomorrow morning, the American Institute of Science and Technology will officially start classes, and Zhu Jianxuan's disciples will begin teaching ordinary apprentices.

Master Zhu Jianxuan will not be here every day, but he has specially dispatched two soldiers from the Hundred Households Office to stand guard and patrol this American laboratory.

On the morning of the third day, Zhu Jianxuan went to the immigrant residential area again to inspect and confirm that all immigrants had disembarked and been assigned accommodation.

In the afternoon, I went to the dock again to supervise the unloading of specialties from the Ming Dynasty.

Local New York leaders such as George Clinton, well-known North American businessmen such as Hancock, and tea channel merchants such as Samuel also came.

Eliminating dissidents is certainly important, but making money is more important.

In addition to traditional silk, tea, porcelain, and spices, the specialties brought by the Ming Dynasty this time also included bicycles and reinforced rubber products in the list of goods.

The latter two could also be considered luxury items outside the Ming Dynasty.

In fact, these things are not only commodities, but also the key factors for the current ruling group in America and the merchants to really turn to the Ming Dynasty. Before Zhu Jianxuan's own power completely controls North America, he must take this matter seriously.

And for the time being, we cannot interfere too much with their business methods.

So Zhu Jianxuan brought his own guard corps, and Samuel and Clinton led the militia from Boston and New York respectively, and they all came to the dock together.

With great fanfare, both sides escorted a batch of goods off the ship and sent them to a new warehouse between the old and new cities of New York.

There were still representatives from the Ming Expeditionary Force and the Honglu Temple who supervised the operations of North American merchants such as Hancock and Samuel and disposed of these goods in North America.

Allowing them to continue hoarding and engaging in futures bill trading only restricts them from falsifying and exaggerating the bills.

When the warehouse was closed, Hancock reported to Zhu Jianxuan with a flattering smile on his face and a bit of complacency:
"Your Majesty, I recently thought of a new trade plan that should be able to continue to reduce costs and risks and obtain higher profits. I hope you can allow it."

Zhu Jianxuan immediately asked curiously:

"Tell me what you think. As long as it's not harmful to the world, you can bring it up for discussion. Only by pooling our wisdom can we better develop industry and commerce."

Hancock immediately began his introduction:
“Your Majesty, our main consideration is to allow customers who have Ming commodity receipts to obtain a method to properly handle the commodities corresponding to the receipts.

“After all, most customers don’t actually redeem the notes, but just treat these products as investments.

“Our products are commodities after all. They cannot be stored in warehouses forever. They must eventually be sold to end users.

“The best way, of course, is to sell them in Europe, which will yield considerable profits.

“However, most ordinary customers only have a small amount of goods, and the key is that they do not have the ability to complete the trade from America to Europe.

“So we can set up a company to take over the business of shipping the goods to Europe for sale.

“On this basis, we have come up with two specific implementation plans.

“The first option.

“It is acknowledged that the goods themselves belong to the principal, that is, all customers who have the goods receipt, so the risk of damage to the goods should also be borne by the owner.

“We are just a transportation and sales agency company, and we directly charge the freight and agency fees when we accept the business.

“By operating this way, we basically don’t need to bear any risks, but the total return is also relatively low.

“The second option.

“We share the risk of cargo damage with cargo owners, and also participate in sharing the final sales profit dividends.

“The risk is certainly higher, but after receiving the dividends, the final return will also be higher.”

Hancock was worried that Zhu Jianxuan might not understand, so his explanation was a bit long-winded.

But Zhu Jianxuan is a 21st century politician and has a basic understanding of various strange business plans.

This time I basically understood it before I finished listening to it. This completes the last link of futures trading.

This provides a final solution for futures, and there is even a chance to exchange them for gold and silver reserves from Europe.

Rather than simply a virtual transaction at the level of bills and numbers.

If we understand it at a higher level, we can even begin to see the embryonic form of a capital reservoir.

Through the Daming Futures Project, a large amount of money from small American businessmen was pooled to participate in large-scale European re-export trade.

Real monopoly giants will actually choose the first option.

It's like selling tools and water in a gold rush town instead of joining in the gold rush.

But the second option is more beneficial to national development.

Share risks and profits.

If a company is involved in enough projects at the same time, it will no longer worry about the profit or loss of a single project.

As long as the overall profits of all projects are always higher than the losses, a company can continue to make money steadily.

However, most ordinary companies do not have sufficient capabilities to operate too many projects at the same time.

You can only attract enough people to participate in enough projects at the same time.

The United States does not have sufficient capital accumulation at present, and only such a plan can directly operate large-scale commercial projects.

The speed of accumulating capital by directly undertaking large projects will be much faster than if everyone does small things on their own.

Modern shipping actually has a similar solution.

There may be countless shell companies on a ship, and a large shipping company may be involved in the trade of countless ships at the same time.

The purpose is to attract more companies to share the risk.

After listening to Hancock's explanation, Zhu Jianxuan immediately expressed his opinion:

“I think the second plan is better, which is equivalent to all American people contributing money to businessmen with business capabilities to do business, and finally sharing the profits together.

“The first option is also feasible, but the prerequisite is that you must have a large and stable fleet and sales network that can generate sufficient profits through lower profit margins.

“The key is that such a scheme is less attractive to ordinary investors, as they worry that the operator will not do his best or even deliberately damage or steal the goods.

"Besides, since we already have a stable fleet and sales network, why don't we participate in a business model that allows us to share profits? Wouldn't the profit margin be higher that way?"

When Hancock heard Zhu Jianxuan's first words, he was so excited that he couldn't help but clap his hands hard.

But he waited patiently until Zhu Jianxuan finished speaking before he could no longer control his emotions and praised the king:

“Your Majesty is truly the embodiment of wisdom and an absolute genius in business.

“We thought of the business plan, but we didn’t figure out the essence and logic of it.

"Your Majesty has made it clear in one sentence. We can develop more similar business plans based on this principle."

This plan is indeed good, but if you want it to grow quickly, it must be attractive enough.

In this era, apart from the European trade of Ming Dynasty goods, it is difficult to find other projects with similar appeal.

If it is really found, it is likely to be on Zhu Jianxuan's list of new inventions.

Zhu Jianxuan smiled and nodded and said:
“Yes, we can indeed consider this idea and see which other industries can do the same.

“By pooling the funds of more people, or even the power of our entire country, everyone can share the risks and profits.

“Of course, capable businessmen who are responsible for management and have integrity and reliability are entitled to use their wisdom and hard work in exchange for slightly higher dividends.

“A plan conceived by an intelligent brain that can generate stable returns should itself be considered part of the investment.

“Under such a framework, everyone can boldly undertake similar commercial projects.

“However, all projects should be reported to the kingdom, because this kind of national industry needs the support and protection of the king and the government.

“It is also necessary to enable the king and the government to reap the benefits so that they can continue to provide protection and support.

“Let all people and all organizations contribute their own strength, and eventually they will all get reasonable benefits.”

Hancock immediately bowed and said loudly with great excitement:
"Your will, Your Majesty!

“No one has ever explained the principles of business so clearly.

“You will become a great king in business!”

Zhu Jianxuan immediately smiled and reminded:
"Just the King."

(End of this chapter)