Clipper ships, with speeds of up to 14 knots in a tailwind, greatly shortened the distance in the world. The Safavid Empire's envoys arrived in Daqin after more than a month of sailing on clipper ships.
Because the Safavid Empire was a country established by the Persians and ruled the ancient Persian region, the people of Qin Dynasty still habitually called this country Persian.
Of course, this first time, it was only Abbas II's envoy who came, and the Persian princess did not send it immediately.
After all, they are a big country, and agreeing to marry the princess is a common political marriage method.
However, a political marriage must be approved by the Emperor of Qin before it can be carried out. If the princess is sent over immediately with just a word from a general of Qin, it is not a marriage, but the surrender of hostages by the defeated country to the victorious country.
The trade agreement drafted by the Ministry of Revenue was handed over to Qin Mu's desk by Xu Yingjie, the left minister of the Ministry of Revenue, before the Persian envoy officially arrived in Beijing.
Qin Mu looked at it carefully and felt very satisfied. Da Qin's officials are now much more pragmatic. Although the traditional benevolence, justice and morality still account for a large part of the content of this trade agreement, in terms of actual trade terms, But very level;
Certain clauses seem to have given the Persians great benefits. Only those who are very familiar with the national conditions of the two countries can see that in fact they are beneficial to Qin in the long run.
For example, there are clauses that allow Persia to charge a 5% tariff on tea from Daqin, while Daqin will impose zero tariff on Persian carpets.
The two commodities are the top products of the two countries respectively. This is indeed a preferential treatment given by Great Qin to Persia. It seems that Persia takes a big advantage in this clause.
But when it comes to real trade, the Persian Empire cannot take advantage.
Firstly, Daqin has no shortage of raw materials for producing carpets and can produce them in its own country;
If we find some skilled craftsmen from Persia and combine them with Da Qin's weaving skills, in the future Da Qin's carpets will not necessarily be worse than those from Persia.
Again. Carpets are a luxury product with limited demand.
Tea is both a luxury product and a necessity in life.
Some high-end teas can cost as much as dozens of Persian rugs.
Ordinary tea is one of the indispensable necessities of life for ordinary people. Seven things to do before opening the door: firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar, and tea.
Moreover, Persia does not produce tea, and Da Qin's tea has no competitors in Persia, and its demand is completely different from that of carpets.
Therefore, this clause can be regarded as a deliberate offer to Persia to win the name of benevolence and righteousness, but in actual trade. Da Qin did not suffer a loss. Persia's gold and silver will continue to flow to Da Qin.
This agreement can be said to have given Da Qin both face and dignity. The Persians lost the trade war and have nothing to say because your competitiveness is inferior to others. Who can blame you
"Very well, let's talk to the Persians."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Qin Mu put down the agreement and asked Xu Yingjie, "Xu Qing, how is the situation with the paper dragon coins?"
There are two main types of currency in the Qin Dynasty: paper dragon coins and silver dragon coins, collectively called dragon coins.
Hard currency transforms into credit currency. This is a necessary trend of history, so no matter how difficult it is, Qin Mu will push it forward.
Xu Yingjie said happily: "Your Majesty, now the credibility of banknotes has been established. In the market, many people would rather get banknotes than collect silver coins. The reason is that there are more and more bad coins circulating in the market. Many silver coins have been People scraped off silver shavings and showed signs of wear and tear. People were worried about losing money if they took these bad coins, so they preferred to have paper money. Therefore, paper money is now more popular than silver coins in the market. Based on this, I think it can gradually be done. It’s time to recycle silver coins and issue more banknotes.”
Hard currency can never avoid the problem of bad coins chasing good coins. When a good silver coin reaches the hands of the people, it is inevitable that greedy people will scrape some silver shavings from the silver coin and then spend the silver coin.
In this way, the more silver coins he handles, the more silver shavings he scrapes off, and the sand accumulates into a tower, which is always a windfall for nothing.
You scrape a little, I scrape a little, the original good silver coins will be insufficient, the good coins will be reduced, and they will become bad coins.
Banknotes do not have these problems. If you tear off thousands of small corners, they will be worthless in total. Naturally, no one will bother with banknotes.
In the past few years, the total amount of banknotes issued by Daqin has been no more than two million.
This is a very small proportion compared to the total amount of currency in circulation in Da Qin, which is hundreds of millions.
There is no spam, and the imperial court has been supporting paper money in recent years. You can use paper money to pay taxes equal to the silver coins, and you can exchange them for silver coins of the same value at any time at the bank.
After several years of perseverance, it finally gradually won the trust of the people.
Nowadays, because there are more and more bad coins in silver coins, when banks receive silver coin deposits, they will use a balance accurate to the gram to weigh the larger number of silver coins. Each silver coin originally weighs 7.25 cents. Your total weight How much is it, then divide the total amount by 7.25 as your actual deposit amount.
In the same way, people who use silver coins to deposit will often suffer some losses. This makes many people no longer want to accept silver coins when doing transactions, but instead accept banknotes that have a good reputation and don't have to worry about losing money.
At this point, Qin Mu also believed that the time was ripe for the issuance of additional banknotes, so he said: "That's it. When the bank takes back a silver coin, it will issue an additional banknote. Slowly, in a step-by-step process, gradually replace the silver coin with banknotes in circulation. "
Xu Yingjie said: "Your Majesty, this is definitely not a problem. Most people now come to the bank to withdraw money and ask for banknotes. Because the number of banknotes is scarce and it is difficult to meet the demand, many businessmen would rather use more silver coins to exchange for banknotes for the sake of convenience. .
Now on the market, some people are even willing to exchange 102 silver coins for 100 banknotes. Under such circumstances, if the policy is to issue additional banknotes according to the ratio of recycling one silver coin, I am sure that there will be no problem. "
Qin Mu asked casually: "What about foreign trade?"
Xu Yingjie immediately replied: "Your Majesty, this is not a problem. If merchants go to sea for trade and need hard currency, they can just take the banknotes to the bank and exchange them for silver coins. This does not prevent them from trading with foreign merchants."
Qin Mu nodded and said: "You cannot use paper dragon coins to trade with foreign businessmen. This is not a solution after all. Xu Qing, haven't we already established branches in countries such as the imperial court and Japan? We need to speed up the circulation of paper money in these countries. ”
"Your Majesty, our Da Qin's silver coins are very popular in North Korea and Japan because of their high quality. However, it will take a long time for paper currency to win the trust of the people in these countries. There is no way around it."
Is there really no way
Qin Mu recalled the U.S. dollar in the 1970s. The U.S. dollar was originally issued based on gold reserves. People took the U.S. dollars to the bank and could exchange them for gold of equal value at any time.
However, due to the Vietnam War and other reasons, by the early 1970s, the United States' gold reserves decreased sharply and were no longer enough to cope with people's runs. The U.S. government had no choice but to decouple the U.S. dollar from gold.
In this way, the U.S. dollar becomes an ordinary legal tender and is no longer a currency issued based on gold reserves.
So why does the U.S. dollar guarantee its credibility and allow countries to continue to accept it
If countries no longer want to use the U.S. dollar, then the U.S. dollar’s world currency hegemony will collapse.
At this critical moment of life and death for the U.S. dollar, Nixon and Kissinger came up with a solution.
Kissinger immediately flew to Saudi Arabia and assured Saudi Arabia that the United States would ensure Saudi Arabia's security at the expense of OPEC oil-producing countries led by Saudi Arabia, which must use U.S. dollars to settle oil transactions.
Which country in the world does not need oil? If you want oil, you have to ask the United States for U.S. dollars to settle the matter. In this way, the U.S. dollar's world hegemony is maintained.
Thinking of this, Qin Mu felt inspired. Did he, at the appropriate time, decree that a certain product must be settled with banknotes issued by Da Qin
Does Daqin have products like oil that are necessary for all countries in later generations
Even if there is, I'm afraid things are not that simple, right? Wucuo Novel Network has many words
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