Chapter 337: Zhang Datou

Wang Lun smiled confidently and replied: "Emperor, don't worry,

the copper content of the Great Gan Tongbao we are minting now is even half a percent lower than the Great Song Tongbao with the lowest copper content.

Being able to have an exquisite appearance and tough characteristics that surpass Great Song Tongbao

is all thanks to the new minting technology you provided.

Other treacherous merchants wanting to melt our Tongbao to cast Great Song Tongbao or copperware to earn the price difference is completely wishful thinking.

On the contrary, we can melt Great Song Tongbao to cast Great Gan Tongbao and earn a price difference.

And according to my estimation, this price difference can not only cover the cost of recasting but also have a large surplus.

That is to say, our minting of new money will not only not lose money but will earn a lot!"

"That's good."

Zhang Jie, having received a satisfactory answer, nodded.

This new dynasty has just been established, the country is waiting to be revived, and money is needed everywhere.

Although he tried hard to develop gold-sucking weapons like glass, glass mirrors, perfume, and cement,

facing the bottomless pit of funding needs in all aspects,

he also felt like a man who had married eight or nine wives at the same time,

feeling powerless (after excessive fatigue, feeling mentally exhausted, feeling like his body was hollowed out~).

Now, thinking that he needed to spend money, he was prepared to dig into his own small treasury,

gritting his teeth to mint the Great Gan Tongbao.

Now, Wang Lun gave him a very satisfactory answer,

not in vain for him to directly promote him to the Left Prime Minister of the Secretariat,

whose status was even higher than Chen Wenyun, his good brother who participated in the township examination and had the same aspirations at the same time.

As for the copper content of Great Gan Tongbao being lower than Great Song Tongbao, and the metal value being lower than Great Song Tongbao,

will it not be accepted by the people, and will it be unfavorable for circulation?

The common people don't care about copper content or the actual value of metal,

in their eyes, exquisite, wear-resistant, and corrosion-resistant copper coins are good copper coins; this is the victory of technological progress!

As for the silver coins and gold coins, if netizens saw their appearance,

they would definitely exclaim "Yuan Datou"?!

That flat, smooth, exquisitely crafted surface with clear patterns and characters,

and the straight-toothed edge with fine and uniform edge teeth, are exactly the same as the silver dollar issued by that Yuan Datou, the President who stole the fruits of the revolution and became the actual supreme leader,

but was blinded by the desire for power, went against the trend of the times, insisted on proclaiming himself emperor,

and ended up being emperor for less than three months, losing all his life's reputation,

becoming the target of public criticism.

Well, of course, the biggest difference between this silver coin, gold coin, and Yuan Datou can also be seen at a glance:

The most obvious sign on the silver dollar, commonly known as Yuan Datou, the right-side five-point portrait of Yuan Shikai, Yuan Gongbao,

has become a heroic, domineering, young imperial portrait wearing a flat crown,

with deep eyes looking straight ahead.

Who else could it be but Zhang Jie's portrait?

To tell the truth, when Wang Lun and others first proposed printing his portrait

on silver coins and gold coins, which were higher-value currencies,

Zhang Jie had the heart to refuse; after all, he didn't want to leave the nickname "Zhang Datou."

He is so handsome and elegant, his head is not big at all.

But the persuasion of Wang Lun and others made him unable to refuse:

Besides him, the founding monarch of Great Gan, who else is qualified to be printed on coins?

To maintain stability, deepen the people's recognition, and make this new dynasty of Great Gan more deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, Zhang Jie gritted his teeth and finally agreed.

Zhang Jie shed manly tears: I have really sacrificed too much for Great Gan, woo woo...

Finally, because if the portrait was printed on copper coins, the cost of clarity would be too high,

and the blurry, low-cost ones would damage the Emperor's prestige and be unfavorable for circulation,

so in the end, Zhang Jie's portrait was only printed on silver coins and gold coins with high value.

"Emperor, our minting plan has a big problem."

While Zhang Jie was playing with a few coins with great satisfaction,

Wang Lun struggled and hesitated for a long time before gritting his teeth and speaking.

"Zhengdao, I know the problem you want to talk about; is it that the reserves of precious metals like copper, silver, and gold are insufficient?"

Before Wang Lun finished speaking, Zhang Jie spoke directly.

"Exactly."

Seeing that Zhang Jie had already anticipated it, Wang Lun, who originally planned to sell this old face,

also spoke up, and he replied:

"Emperor, copper can barely be maintained by purchasing Great Song Tongbao to melt and cast Great Gan Tongbao,

plus the copper produced in the Jiangnan region, Guangnan region, and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River.

But white silver and yellow gold are very difficult. The Great Song's annual silver production is thirty thousand taels,

and the gold production is only around five thousand taels, which cannot maintain the needs of circulation at all.

Even if we looted the treasuries of the Great Song and Great Liao,

we couldn't support your magnificent plan to mint gold and silver coins to circulate throughout the world."

Before the Great Song, did no wise man think of using gold and silver to mint coins,

replacing copper coins and even iron coins that were large in quantity and heavier?

The ancients just received less information, but they were not stupid; of course, someone had this idea,

and it wasn't just one person, almost every dynasty had people proposing it.

Replacing heavy, difficult-to-transport copper coins with gold and silver coins that have higher value and are more portable,

the people can buy and sell items more conveniently, and the government can also collect taxes and store them more simply,

as well as allocate funds during disasters, defense against invasion, and even wartime.

In this way, the people won once, and the government also won once; it was simply Qin Shi Huang touching an electric wire—winning completely.

So why wasn't this seemingly beautiful plan implemented?

The answer is that although the value of gold and silver is very high, the quantity is too small to be used as currency circulating throughout the world.

Now gold and silver mainly exist as a kind of luxury item;

the people all think they are very valuable, but they are not very willing to use them as money.

Without the recognition of the broad masses and a sufficient quantity for circulation,

their Great Gan's gold and silver coins, no matter how exquisitely minted,

would just be a vase with a beautiful appearance but no actual use value.

"This is indeed a problem."

Zhang Jie nodded slightly, expressing his agreement with the problem Wang Lun raised.

Whether it is copper coins with lower value or silver coins and gold coins with high value,

they all serve as a medium of exchange, acting as a general equivalent.

If there is no sufficient quantity, no matter how high the value is, it is just a rare treasure and cannot be a general equivalent.

And coincidentally, although the Chinese land is vast and rich in products,

in the eyes of that group of arrogant old Buddhas, old princesses,

and old princes of "My Great Qing," who think our Great Qing has everything, and is the Heavenly Kingdom, and those foreign devils like the English and

French are just stinky foreigners coming to our Great Qing to beg for food,

but speaking of facts, starting from reality, this land is very scarce in heavy metals like white silver

and yellow gold.

On a land of millions of square kilometers, there are no large gold and silver deposits.

Or rather, even if there were large deposits before, they were almost completely developed by the ancestors thousands of years ago.

The history learned by 21st-century students is five thousand years,

and the history learned by the First Emperor Ying Zheng when he received education was probably also five thousand years... ===== CHAPTER 338 =====