Without further ado, the Nanyang Company is ready for development. Logically speaking, I should go to Guangzhou immediately. However, the plague epidemic in Guangzhou has not yet been lifted, so it is impossible to go to Guangzhou to raise shares.
After much thought, he decided to send a telegram to several elders in Guangzhou to inform them of the establishment of Nanyang Company and its intention to come to Guangzhou to raise shares. Let them also be prepared. He knew nothing about Guangzhou, so he had to ask these people to guide him.
Of course, the first person to send a telegram was Ai Zhixin. He is now the director of the Guangzhou Finance and Taxation Bureau and a top financial figure. If you want to withdraw money from Guangzhou, you must say hello to him. The second telegram was sent to Meng Xian, asking for a stock offering. , the support and cooperation of banks are indispensable. As for the third share, it was sent to Liu Xiang in Guangzhou - even if he pays for one-third of an acre of land, he has to say hello.
After drafting the telegram and handing it to the confidential officer, they walked around in an office on the third floor of the Customs Building.
This office was the original headquarters of the Southeast Asian company. Ever since he received the key from the office, he has been sitting here looking through the business files of Southeast Asian companies.
The entire third floor of the Customs Building belongs to the headquarters of Southeast Asia Company. The area is not small, but the third floor is actually an attic. The highest point of the roof is only 2.2 meters, and the lowest point of the eaves is only 1.8 meters. Judging from the size of the people around him, staying in there was a bit frustrating. Not to mention the temperature on the top floor in summer.
The company headquarters must be moved before next summer. Thinking around. This place will turn into a large steamer in summer.
The headquarters of Southeast Asia Company is located here. One can imagine the company's status in the minds of the Senate.
It also has very few staff, with less than 20 naturalized civilian cadres working at the headquarters, and the nominal chairman is Liu Xiang. Of course, in fact, Liu Xiang and his entire family are living a small life in Sanya, collecting dividends from their estates. They only receive a few "carriage fees" here. The specific person in charge is the general manager who is a naturalized citizen.
It sounds shabby. Although Southeast Asian companies have a long history, their status in national policy enterprises is not high. According to the level, it is only a second-level national policy company. Although the Planning Institute holds 51% of the shares, it has invested very little in Southeast Asian companies over the years. Its main assets are ships that originally surrendered to pirates.
When I was working in Caijinkou, I had seen the financial reports of Southeast Asian companies. To comment on their performance, I could only describe it as "mediocre." Although Southeast Asia Company is theoretically a large shipping and trading company, most of its business adopts the "affiliation model."
After the leaders of all walks of life surrendered, they "invested" in the ships, anchored them under the Southeast Asia Company, flew the merchant ship flag and the "nine-dan flag" of the Senate, and then operated their own shipping and trading business based on the routes they were familiar with. Of course, the size of their fleet has been greatly reduced, and the crews are uniformly deployed by Southeast Asian companies, instead of being composed entirely of their own family members, relatives and compatriots in the past.
Naturally, this extensive business model cannot bring much profit. Although the affiliation fee for Southeast Asian companies is not low, all affiliates can share the Southeast Asian trade and mainland coastal trade licenses, which is much cheaper than the price of 2,000 taels of silver per flag in Zheng Zhilong's era. Moreover, after the company collects the anchorage fee, it has sufficient force and consular protection capabilities for its subordinate ships. The risk borne by the ship owner is greatly reduced.
Even if the ship owner is too lazy to use his brain in management, just undertaking the shipping business can guarantee sufficient profits every year. This shipping business came not only from the Senate, but also from domestic and foreign merchants who came to purchase from the areas ruled by the Senate.
Generally speaking, the profits of Southeast Asian companies are limited, but their foundation is not bad. At least it's not a mess. This somewhat reassured the people around him - because he had not been able to see the detailed financial statements of Southeast Asian companies for several years.
No wonder the company's headquarters is only of such a small size. Let’s look at the assets. Contrary to what he expected, there were not many ships from Southeast Asian companies. This was quite beyond his expectation. Because when the pirate gang surrenders, each shopkeeper has at least three or four ships, and as many as large ones like Liu Xiang, the ships can reach as many as three to five hundred. He roughly estimated that the number of ships owned by Southeast Asia Company must be at least six to seven hundred.
However, when he checked the asset list today, he found that there were far fewer ships than he imagined.
There are currently 225 ships "calling" under the name of Southeast Asian companies, of which 182 are employed by "China Merchants" to operate mainland coastal freight and trade freight with Japan and North Korea. There are only 43 ships actually operating on Southeast Asian routes.
Where are all the ships that defected here now? There was some confusion around. He called the general manager over.
The general manager of the Southeast Asia company is Wang You, who worked under Zhu Cai's staff and later mixed with Zheng Bao. After Zheng Bao's fall, he "abandoned darkness and turned to light" in time. After purification, he was assigned to work in a Southeast Asian company.
He has been among pirate gangs for many years and has a very good understanding of pirate habits and thoughts. He has been among pirate groups for many years and can speak most of the dialects of the pirate group. The key is that he has only been a "master" for a long time. To put it bluntly, he just makes a living. He doesn't have many common interests with the real pirate leader. Therefore, it has been included in the "key training targets" from the beginning. Wang You is also a person who is knowledgeable about current affairs, so he naturally "actively demands progress." So he quickly gained the trust of the elders. Over the past few years, I have been promoted continuously. After the Senate had almost digested the pirates of the Southeast Asia Company, and the Senate no longer served as the general manager of the company, Wang You took the position of general manager.
Wang You was a little uneasy around him when he took office. It's not that he took bribes or anything like that - although Wang You hasn't been perfect in recent years, he hasn't done anything extraordinary. He just resold some non-regulated goods with free shipping.
He was more worried about what it meant to suddenly reappoint a senator. Wang You knows that the Senate does not trust pirates to surrender, especially pirates who came to invest in stocks in the past. It is also the target of special attention and differentiation. In the first few years after the establishment of the company, he served under the Senate, and he had already witnessed the various methods used by the Senate to divide and dismantle the forces that surrendered. Now, suddenly, a veteran has been re-appointed as general manager, and a "Nanyang Company" has been established. What does it mean?
Could it be that some of the former members of the Southeast Asia Company are "up to something evil", and some unscrupulous person is plotting secretly?
Thinking of this, the hair on the back of Wang You's neck stood up. If this were true, wouldn't it mean that a big prison would suddenly arise! He has been the general manager of this Southeast Asian company for several years. At the very least, he has to be charged with "neglect of duty." If he might be labeled as "complicit" or "tacitly conniving," his life would be in danger. …
Wang You was relieved when he asked about the number of ships. Said: "Chief Zhou——"
"Call me general manager."
"General Manager." Wang You quickly corrected, "This is what happened..."
It turns out that the number of pirate ships that surrendered to the Senate was indeed large. According to the company's receipt account book, pirates from all walks of life have surrendered ships ranging from hundreds to one or two over the years. Taken together, the total is more than a thousand ships.
However, among the more than a thousand ships, small ships accounted for the vast majority. More than 60% were single-masted or double-masted ships, with a carrying capacity of no more than thirty or forty tons. Such a ship can also sail, but can basically only be used on offshore coastal routes. Unable to go out to sea. Even engaging in near-shore shipping and trading is uneconomical.
So these boats were quickly phased out. The rest are all large and medium-sized ships.
"...The general manager probably doesn't know that the quality of most of these ships is not good, and many of them are material ships..."
"What is a timber ship?"
"We maritime merchants in Fujian all cut down wood and built ships a year before going overseas. The ships are not sophisticated. No matter the materials used, they are careless. Even the wood is wet wood..."
"Aren't you afraid of death when you go to Nanyang to do business and use inferior ships? Even if he doesn't go out to sea to take risks, it will be a loss if the goods float away." The surroundings are very strange.
"What the general manager doesn't know is that this kind of ship is a one-way trip. No matter where it goes, the goods will be sold at the local place. The ship will also be dismantled locally and sold as lumber. After everything is sold, it will come back on other sea ships. .”
The people around me were very confused about this. Shipbuilding is a high-intensity investment. A good seagoing ship can cost thousands of taels of silver, but once completed, it can be used for fifty to hundreds of years. Why build such a "disposable ship"? It’s not that maritime merchants can’t afford this money, and since they have to go to Southeast Asia for trade every year, why bother to spend time building new ships every year?
This is really weird! Thinking around. But since maritime merchants do this, there must be some reasons behind it.
Wang You explained that this type of ship was originally of poor quality and had been drifting at sea for several years. Most of the ships were in poor condition, so they were quickly eliminated.
The rest are all ships with larger tonnage and better condition. In fact, some of the ships were new ships purchased by the shareholders of Southeast Asia Company at the Hong Kong shipyard and some of the "special agent warships" that were eliminated from the navy. There were not many ships actually brought by Jiangren.
"In other words, the fleet conditions of Southeast Asian companies are now relatively good."
"Yes." Wang You nodded quickly, "The flight rate is over 80%."
He thought to himself that most of the ships hired by the China Merchants Bureau were small and medium-sized ships, which were of little use to him. His main capital is the 63 ships traveling to Southeast Asia.
"How many days will it take you to make a report on the owners of the 63 ships currently running the Nanyang route and their ship conditions and operations?"
"Three or four days."
"I'll give you five days." Looking around at the calendar, "The information must be as detailed as possible!"
