Beiyang reactionaries

The statement came out that on the afternoon of August 1925, 8, the Japanese army began to attack Hyesan County.

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"3000."

"Hey--"

Wang Yongjiang sighed.

As soon as the cannon rang, the gold was ten thousand taels.

Money is what fights.The war on the Korean Peninsula also greatly affected China's finances.Because the North Korean Independence Army’s food and drink, weapons and ammunition used in the war are all provided by China, and those are all money.

Fortunately, the casualties of the Korean Independence Army do not require compensation from China.

But even so, after the war in North Korea, China spent a lot of money on behalf of it.The North Korean Independence Army opened fire, so many bullets are money.

Not only the Korean Independence Army, but also the Chinese army on the banks of the Yalu River. Although they did not participate in the war, they were all preparing for the war at the first level.As long as the army is preparing to fight, it will consume a lot of supplies and increase expenditure regardless of whether it is fighting or not.

Let China's military spending suddenly increase a lot.

"Prime Minister, if the money is spent like this, it will definitely have a great impact on our country's prices."

"I looked at the price list. In the past two years, the price of our country has indeed increased a lot. But in my opinion, it is still within the control range."

"Prime Minister, after we took back the gold and silver from the people, we produced the equivalent banknotes. This is the result. Many people just hoarded gold and silver and didn't use them as currency. But because the people banned gold and silver trading , That’s why some people exchange paper money in large quantities. The end result is that many currencies that should not be in circulation have increased.”

The Chinese like to hoard gold and silver.

Especially rich people.

However, since a large amount of paper money was exchanged for gold and silver, although some people hoarded these paper money.But banknotes are no longer gold and silver, and it is very troublesome to hoard them.

It also caused many rich people to deposit banknotes instead of hoarding banknotes.Money enters the bank, and the bank must do everything possible to spend the money out.

Banks can make money only when money is in circulation.

It just so happens that China's large-scale construction needs a lot of money.It is absolutely impossible to have such a large-scale construction just relying on government financial appropriations.Therefore, many projects need financing.

Where can I get financing?

bank.Most of these banks opened in China are directly controlled by the government.They attract a lot of deposits in the country, and then lend these deposits to those projects.

However, once the money is circulated, it will increase the circulating currency and raise prices.Over the past two years, the annual inflation rate has been around [-]%.

Inflation of this scale is actually very serious.Fortunately, the price of some daily necessities is controlled by the government, and the price increase is limited.If the price of daily necessities rises on this scale, it will definitely have a direct impact on the national economy.

"Can 3000 million solve it?"

"It can only be the issuance of national debt."

"it is good."

Duan Xun nodded.

There are two ways to issue treasury bonds.One is to borrow money from the private sector and let the private sector purchase the issued treasury bonds.Another option is for the government to print its own money and then use the money to buy national debt itself.

"Prime Minister Wang, I have read the reports of the Ministry of Finance and the Bank of China. We have indeed accumulated a lot of gold and silver reserves in the past two years, but I think this is far from the current total wealth of our people."

Does China have money?

The government has no money, and the budget deficit is serious.But China is really rich, mainly because there is a lot of wealth deposited by the people.In a word, it is sufficient accumulation of wealth.

Since the beginning of the Opium War, China’s various indemnities, coupled with huge loan interest, and the annual import and export deficit, added up to more than one billion taels of silver flowing out of China, about 14 billion taels or more.This time the government exchanged banknotes for silver, and the amount of silver recovered by the government so far is nearly 20 billion taels.

In other words, the amount of silver in China itself can reach about 35 billion taels.And this is definitely not all the wealth in the country. At present, there must be some silver hoarded by the people, which has not been exchanged with the government.

From these data, we can see the wealth of Chinese folks.

Not just silver, but a lot of gold.Since the issuance of banknotes, China has exchanged more than 130 tons of gold from the private sector.

"Prime Minister, I have done some calculations with the Ministry of Finance and the Bank of China. At present, the amount of silver we have should account for 80.00% of the country. Because our country has always been a silver standard, and silver is the main currency in circulation. When our legal currency is issued , the main exchange is silver. So at present, our country’s silver is under the control of the government. According to our calculations, at the peak of our country, there should have been about 50 billion taels of silver reserves. Up to now, the private sector should have There are about five or six billion taels of silver. But gold is hard to say.”

"Tell me."

"Compared to silver, we don't have very accurate figures for gold. Prime Minister, look at this, this is our previous gold production statistics. Before the Song Dynasty, there was no very reliable data, only a few words in some historical books. According to these According to historical records, my country’s annual gold production in the Western Han Dynasty was about [-] to [-] kilograms. According to our calculations, the country’s gold reserves from ancient times to the Han Dynasty may have reached about [-] tons. However, according to some archaeological analysis in recent years, the Nobles like to be buried with gold. So a lot of gold should be buried underground."

Duan Xun took what Wang Yongjiang handed over and looked at it carefully.

China has a long history.

Some records that are too far away are very vague.Therefore, there are very few records before the Song Dynasty, especially for gold.But Wang Yongjiang still did a detailed investigation and wrote some data they calculated.

"During the Northern Song Dynasty, there were some records about gold production. However, the annual production in the Northern Song and Southern Song Dynasties has been around several hundred kilograms, and the gold production in the entire Song Dynasty should be around 1.25 tons. In the Yuan Dynasty, China's annual gold production peaked It was the first time to exceed one ton. As for the peak of the Ming Dynasty, the annual output reached 14 tons. At that time, the main gold producing areas were Lijiang, Yunnan, and northern Sichuan. After entering the Qing Dynasty, gold production did not increase. It has been very sluggish. After the Opium War, China's gold production began to increase rapidly again. In the 1888th year of Guangxu (14), China's annual gold production reached 16 tons, and the annual output exceeded ten tons for the first time. Guangxu 1900 In 13 (4.5), China's annual gold output was also around 15 tons. At this time, China's main gold producing areas were in Shandong, Northeast China, and Mongolia. However, the Eight-Power Allied Forces and the Russo-Japanese War seriously affected the Manchurian and Mongolian regions. China's gold production has plummeted, once only about 14 tons. However, China's gold production has increased year by year, and it even exceeded 23 tons in the year of 200, which is the year with the highest annual gold production in China's history. Counting from the 70th year of Guangxu to the year of Xinhai, China produced more than 300 tons of gold in 340 years. If counting from the beginning of the Opium War, then until the year of Xinhai, during the entire [-] years, China produced more than [-] tons of gold. Around [-] tons of gold. The entire Qing dynasty produced an estimated [-] tons of gold.”

Duan Xun listened carefully to the report on China's gold production.

China has always been on the silver standard, and the currency in domestic circulation is also silver.In the previous exchanges with the great powers, the main outflow of currency was also silver.

Gold is rarely circulated in the form of currency, but is used as a store of value.

Therefore, from the gold production in these years, we can roughly estimate the amount of gold hoarded by Chinese folks.China is not a country with high gold production, but after so many years, there is definitely a lot of gold in China.

"continue."

"After the outbreak of the Revolution of 1912, due to the turbulent situation, my country's gold production has been declining year by year. From the first year of the Republic of China (12) to the 1923th year of the Republic of China (7), the average annual gold production in my country was 1921 tons Around. Northeast China, Shandong, Sichuan, and Mongolia have relatively high output. Since the tenth year of the Republic of China (1924), my country’s gold production has begun to rise again. Last year (9.7) my country’s gold production reached 10 tons. It can exceed [-] tons. From the outbreak of the Revolution of [-] until this year, my country should have produced more than [-] tons of gold.”

"In this way, my country's gold production in 2000 should exceed a thousand tons."

"Yes. It should be more than a thousand tons. Anyway, it is definitely not less than a thousand tons."

Wang Yongjiang nodded.

He continued: "However, since ancient times, when many nobles in our country were buried, they were buried with many important items, and gold was also the most important funeral item. Therefore, there were a lot of gold underground. But during the Ming Dynasty in our country, in addition to flowing into the big In addition to a large amount of silver, a lot of gold also flowed in. Before the Opium War, our country had always had a surplus in foreign trade, and a large amount of silver and gold flowed into our country. Therefore, we estimate that the gold reserves of our country’s folks should be at least no less than one thousand Tons, even two thousand tons should be normal."

"Gold, gold."

Duan Xun nodded.

Said: "So much gold, where is it?"

At present, the gold reserves controlled by the Bank of China are only about 130 tons.However, according to Wang Yongjiang's meaning, the gold reserves of Chinese people must exceed [-] tons, or even [-] tons is normal.

So where is all this gold?

"A big family."