He was betting that Daming could survive this test, so that the grain in his hands would be sold at a sky-high price, and the Huang family would become richer and more powerful because of what he did.
In history, Huang Yuliang did this, but he lost the bet.
The intruder entered the city smoothly, but when he saw the Dashun army began to burn, kill, and loot in Beijing, he had no choice but to throw away all his property and leave in tears.
In this life, Zhu Changwu's sudden appearance actually made him win the bet. After seeing that the capital began to become more stable, he immediately began to restore food prices. Not only that, in order to make a big profit, after seeing some changes in the policies for merchants in the New Deal, he directly raised the price by three times the price.
He not only needs to be fed, but also stuffed.
He wanted everyone to know that this seemingly risky move was worth it. He, the Huang family, will also be able to make more money because of Huang Yuliang's actions. Among the eight great families in Shanxi, he, the Huang family, will use this incident to get rid of his position as the youngest.
Huang Yuliang is ambitious, and the food in his hands is enough to support this ambition.
According to the book "Research on Grain Yield per Mu in Chinese Dynasties", one stone in the Ming Dynasty weighed 153.5 kilograms and one kilogram weighed 594.6 grams. The total grain output in the Ming Dynasty should be about 150 billion kilograms.
At its peak, the Ming Dynasty had a population of more than 200 million. Assuming that one person ate 300 kilograms of grain a year, it can be imagined that the people of the Ming Dynasty consumed more than 60 billion kilograms of grain a year.
Generally speaking, there was no shortage of food in the Ming Dynasty. In particular, relatively high-yield crops such as corn, potatoes, and sweet potatoes have been introduced from the West, so the Ming Dynasty should not be short of food. It was just that at the end of the Ming Dynasty, in order to provide high military expenditures to support the war with the Qing army in the north, the imperial court continued to increase agricultural taxes, which made the people miserable, so that peasant army rebellions occurred frequently, and eventually a large number of fields were abandoned. With no one planting it, food became in short supply.
But no matter what time it is, the poor are always the ones who really don’t have enough to eat. Look at the rich, no matter how high the price of food is, have you ever seen anyone among them starve to death?
Back to Huang Yuliang, this time he received all the grain from the seven families and some of the grain merchants who wanted to escape in advance. According to the provisions of the New Deal, from now on, the amount of one pound will be 500 grams, and one stone will be one thousand. In terms of jin, he had enough grain in his hand to be 500,000 shi, or 50,000,000 jin.
At one pound of grain per person per day, it would be enough to feed the nearly two million people in the capital for most of the year.
With so many resources in his hands, Huang Yuliang couldn't help but feel very good, especially after the price of food increased more than three times. He was confident enough that he could make a big profit this time, not to mention earning another Huang family, but It shouldn't be a big problem to increase the Huang family's strength to at least surpass the Zhai family.
Thinking that he would make such a great contribution to the Huang family, Huang Yuliang felt better and hummed a ditty involuntarily.
"Master, Master." Outside the door, the housekeeper Huang Ran trotted over and ran to Huang Yuliang's side.
"You're back?" Huang Yuliang, who was sitting on the recliner, glanced sideways at Huang Ran and asked calmly, "How is it? Has the news spread?"
"If I tell the master, they have all dispersed. In fact, it is not just us, other grain stores are also spreading the news. Presumably the new business policies have already been made known to everyone. The Ming army just wants to take it back. It's impossible." Huang Ran said with a smile on his face and a dog-legged look.
"Okay, just disperse. This time, sir, I want to see what the Ming court is going to do this time? Huh! You can't just take back the new policy that was just issued. If so, how can you win the trust of the world?" Where are the people?”
Huang Yuliang had a proud look on his face. If it weren't for the New Deal, he would still increase the price of food this time, but it would definitely not increase by that much.
Speaking of which, he has the courage to do this, and thanks to the emergence of the New Deal, he is now taking advantage of the east wind. Unless the imperial court is willing to slap itself in the face and withdraw its policy, it will have no choice but to swallow this bitter taste.
Seeing that Huang Yuliang seemed to be in a good mood, the housekeeper came forward and said, "Master, the price of food has increased, but so far, we haven't seen many people buying food. They all seem to be waiting and watching."
"Why are you in a hurry? If they don't buy it now, it's because there's still a shortage. When there's no more rice to put in the pot, you'll see if they can still calm down. Huh! Besides, if they don't buy it now, the master will still be there in the past two days. If they continue to raise prices, they will only be the ones to regret it in the end.”
Huang Yuliang is obviously not worried about the fact that no one is buying food.
It always takes time to spread the news about the temporary stability of the capital. After the grain merchants outside know about this matter, it will take about three to five months at the fastest to prepare grain. With these Time is enough for him to make a lot of money this time.
Even if all the food cannot be sold by then, as long as half is sold, it will be a huge profit.
I believe that by that time, Huang Yuliang's name will be resounding throughout the country, and he will also be called a business wizard. It is difficult not to become famous.
Seeing Huang Yuliang's confidence, Huang Ran quickly flattered him and said, "Master is wise, let's just wait to make a lot of money this time, hahaha."
Huang Yuliang wanted to take advantage of the east wind this time, and it was the wind created by Zhu Changwu himself. It can be said that the timing was just right.
After Zhu Changwu listened to Zhang Wei's explanation of what happened at Huang's grain store, he was not too anxious. It was just using commercial means to deal with commercial means. Although he has no experience in business, one of his retired comrades is a good businessman and has been quite successful. During gatherings, he often listens to him talk about business matters.
These are all successful cases, and they were nothing in the past. But at the moment, no one has tried it, and no one has even heard of it.
In fact, when dealing with just a shopkeeper of the Huang family, Zhu Changwu didn't even think about using his brain too much. A casual move was enough to deal with the opponent.
"Old Zhang, you don't have to blame yourself. I said before that we can improve the status of merchants and allow them to buy and sell freely. Now they have taken measures to increase the price of food. What we have to do is to find ways to suppress it."
I see Zhang Yi always saying that this time the rise in food prices was caused by him. If only he had priced some specific goods in advance during the New Deal, then such a thing would not happen. Zhu Changwu comforted the other party with words.
When it comes to a major issue that is closely related to the people, such as food prices, it is said that there should be a unified price, otherwise it will be very detrimental to the stability of the country. It's just that the Ming Dynasty is rotten to the core. It's hard to tell what influence they still have and what kind of control they can do.
At least Zhu Changwu had no intention of doing the so-called central control of prices before the general trend was completely stabilized. It was destined to be fruitless, so he would waste so much energy on it.
"Sir, in the end, I was not thoughtful enough and allowed those profiteers to take advantage of me. I..."
"Okay, let's not mention this matter. Let me ask you, how much food do we have available now?" Zhu Changwu interrupted the other party directly. He finally figured it out. If Zhang Yi was allowed to continue talking, he would just repeat those words. If the other party was not annoyed, he would be tired of it.
"Sir, we have about 50,000 shi of grain in our hands now, part of which is leftover from the treasury, and a large part is what was left when the intruders fled in a hurry." Zhang Huan answered very honestly.
"Oh, fifty thousand stones, haha, that's a lot. Come here." Zhu Changwu smiled and bit his ears at Zhang Xi. After a while, Zhang Xi, who was still frowning, quickly became He smiled brightly.
"Young master, high, high." He extended his thumb, and Zhang Xi truly admired Zhu Changwu at this moment.
"Okay, this trick must have been used by someone before. It's not surprising. The most important thing is to keep it secret. Do you understand?" Zhu Changwu smiled. Huang Yuliang actually had the idea on his head. Then He deserves to die.
In the capital market, the price of grain has risen from the original two liang to one stone (in the late Ming Dynasty, one tael was equivalent to about 700 yuan, or 1.4 yuan per catty of grain) to eight liang and one stone, or about 5.6 yuan per catty.
Naturally, ordinary people cannot afford this price.
As food prices rise, all the people can do is to eat as little as possible and survive without starving to death.
After all the major grain stores raised their prices uniformly, they hardly sold much grain, but no one was in a hurry. They also knew that because of the war, many people had hoarded some food, but how much was it?
I believe that once they finish eating, they will have no choice but to buy food, and then it will be time to make a lot of money.
Even as food prices rise, many people are still waiting to see if the court will take any measures. Suddenly, a rumor came that the first auction of the Ming Dynasty Capital would be held tomorrow.
The leaflets have been distributed, and almost many dignitaries and big businessmen in the city have received the invitations and the contents of the meeting. Generally speaking, perfume and glass art will be sold publicly tomorrow. Two hundred pieces of each are sold on a first-come-first-served basis.
The flyer made it very clear that after this auction, there would be no second sale on the market in the next month. In other words, these 400 pieces are equal to the sales volume in one month.
Many people are already aware of the perfume. I heard that the nobles in the palace, including the Queen, are using it, and they are still full of praise for it.
As for what glass art is, everyone is not very clear. But it doesn't matter, you can see it at the auction tomorrow.
Zhang Xi was busy until very late that day, and even went to the auction three times in person. He was the first to know the significance of the auction from Zhu Changwu, and he was shocked when he heard it.
