Volume 5: Fellow Traveler Chapter 824: Strength in Numbers
With Lu Sanlang's words as a foundation, when Duke of Chu Zhang Rui returned and found Zhu Ying sitting in his study, leisurely reading and waiting for him to come back, he was naturally angry and amused, but he could do nothing about it. The subsequent contact could be said to be smooth, because Zhu Ying explained the concept of the so-called fund clearly from the beginning.
Funds are only used for investment, which is different from simple shareholding. Funds can be withdrawn at any time. For example, when the situation in the northwest has not been sorted out, and Zhang Shou's research on the optimal cotton varieties in Cangzhou has not yet produced any specific results, there is no way to talk about cotton planting. This huge amount of money is certainly not idle, but used as an investment.
If it was just an investment, then of course he could buy shares, land, and various industries that some wealthy families were in urgent need of money and sold. However, because of the special identities of these investors, if Zhang Shou really went around the world to buy like an investment fund, it would be outrageous, so he had to digest it himself.
Anyway, there is no supervision on funds these days, and the high-quality industries owned by Zhang Shou and Lu Sanlang are the best investment targets. Moreover, the two really need money now, because one is burning money on research and development, and the other is expanding the sales network. They are setting up stalls everywhere and adding staff everywhere, so they naturally have no worries about having money but nowhere to spend it.
Even Zhang Rui, who had just returned to Beijing a few days ago, heard that many people were asking whether the teacher and student couple still needed capital investment, but the answers he got were all that they had sufficient funds - the teacher and student, who got married only a few days before and after, married wives from wealthy families with large dowries. Why wouldn't the investment be cheap for the Yue family? Why did they need outsiders to intervene ?
Therefore, when he heard Fatty Lu talking nonsense that when the money was withdrawn, the overall return would be calculated including principal and interest, and then the new value of the hundred gold and silver initially invested would be calculated based on everyone's share - after returning to Beijing, he heard people talk about Zhang Shou's reputation as a money-making boy, and his ears were callused from hearing it, and he couldn't help but chuckle.
"If that's the case, wouldn't it be a huge profit if the Empress Dowager and the three ladies directly invested their money into the business of Master Zhang and you, Fatty Lu? Why bother looking for something far away?"
"If it's for wealth, my young master has even presented the blueprints of the spinning wheel and loom to the court, and the formula of glass directly to the emperor. How much is it worth? The ladies are not competing with the people for profits on the spinning wheel and loom. You can use the money to open a glass workshop. Which noble official can compete with them? But does Duke Chu think that the ladies are only interested in wealth?"
Seeing that the fat boy even showed some kind of contempt for the ambitions of a swan, Zhang Rui almost got angry.
However, he had to admit that the four people who took out the money this time really didn't care much about money.
The Queen Mother certainly doesn't care about money. It's not because her family is rich, nor because her most valued nephew, Duke of Zhao Zhu Jing, is rich, but because the Queen Mother herself is very rich! Ruizong was able to succeed in the throne because the Queen Mother was good at business. Now she must have many people who are unknown to the ministers!
Most noble ladies would go to Qingning Palace and come back to tell everyone how elegant and simple the empress dowager's life was. But his wife had good eyesight and once told him that many things in the empress dowager's Qingning Palace were priceless and low-key. For example, many porcelains from famous kilns in the Song Dynasty, unless you have good eyesight to recognize them, how could you secretly look at the bottom of a cup in Qingning Palace?
As for the Imperial Noble Consort and the Virtuous Consort, they were a pair of quiet and unyielding people. Their mothers’ families were very ordinary, and they listened to the emperor’s orders. It was said that their mothers’ brothers and nephews had been rejected when they wanted to apply for official positions. The third and fourth princes were not close to their uncle’s family. Therefore, it was not that they did not love money, but that they were used to being cautious and were willing to keep a low profile for the sake of their sons.
As for the current Imperial Concubine, formerly known as Concubine Yu, she is even more arrogant. When the Empress was stingy, she wore old clothes to Qingning Palace to pay homage to the Empress Dowager, and she refused to learn from others to refurbish her old clothes, which made the Empress so angry that she almost threw things in Qingning Palace.
However, although he couldn't say it, Zhang Rui still felt in his heart that the current situation did not mean that it would be the same in the future. The Queen Mother had a son who was the emperor, and she had been in power for many years, so she had a lot of wealth. But the three of them each had a son. Now that the East Palace had a master and seats were assigned, who knew if they would try their best to win over Zhang Shou, a money-making boy with many ideas, for the sake of their sons?
Now this alliance may be advocated by the Queen Mother, but who knows what will happen in the future?
The fat boy didn't care what Zhang Rui thought. Seeing Zhu Ying sitting there with a smile on her face and giving him full authority to speak, he naturally spoke fluently.
When Zhang Shou was in Zhang Garden, he immediately packaged the idea he and Zhu Ying had come up with into a perfect fund plan. He thought he was a brilliant man, but he was still very proud of himself in front of Zhang Rui, the Duke of Chu. Even if he had a high title and a high status, so what? He still looked at the problem from the perspective of fighting for power and profit.
Even though the little fat boy actually loved money the most, he didn't want to talk about money at this moment. In the past, Zhang Shou had often mentioned the so-called sense of social responsibility in order to educate this money-loving boy. Now he copied the same thing and threw words at Zhang Rui.
Zhang Rui listened carelessly at first, but as he listened, he found that the fat boy began to talk about the upward channel, national happiness, class solidification, social responsibility... This was more surprising than when he heard some scholars with sharp opinions talk about land annexation and hidden population. Because these were terms he had never heard of!
He found it even more ridiculous when he saw Zhu Ying, who had never been interested in these things, actually listening with a smile on her face.
“Stop, stop!”
He drank twice, and then quickly gestured to the little fat man who was too excited to talk to stop. When the man really stopped talking, he said with a dark face: "Don't say anything, kid. I will pay for it, and I will also provide people. My old subordinates in the northwest are indeed living a hard life. You are such a big thigh, I only need to say a word, and they will certainly be willing to hug. But..."
Zhang Rui slapped the armrest in annoyance and glared at Zhu Ying: "Don't use my name to fool others! And don't even think about tricking me into helping you fool others!"
"Do others need to be coaxed?" Zhu Ying smiled, her smile was as beautiful as a flower, extremely moving. She gently bent her fingers and counted like singing, "Duke Qin, Earl of Weinan, Marquis of Nanyang, Marquis of Huaiqing, Earl of Xiangyang... As long as I go to each of these families, they won't even ask. So, I dragged Lu Gaoyuan to come to you, Uncle Zhang first."
"This is called eating sugar cane from the bottom up. The more you eat, the sweeter it becomes. First, overcome your biggest difficulty, and the rest will be easy."
Zhang Rui saw this little girl who used to be quirky and clever, now smiling brightly and cheerfully. Although he was furious because he was regarded as a tough guy and a big problem, he couldn't help laughing in the end. He stretched out his hand and pointed at Zhu Ying and snorted: "Let's see how many people you can deceive in the end!"
"How can this be called lying?" Lu Sanlang couldn't help but corrected him, "Little Master's Wife is just nostalgic. She never forgets her relatives and friends when something good happens, and she doesn't even care about her enemies. If it were me, I would definitely go and tell my mother, and I would send a casual message to my father, but I would never go to see my elder and second brothers... Humph, let them look down on me in the first place!"
If Zhang Shou were here, he would definitely give a thumbs up to the fat boy - you have learned the essence of MLM by yourself, that is, to recruit people, and to recruit people, you should give priority to your best friends and relatives, you are worthy of being the fat man Lu Sanpang!
Zhang Rui no longer wanted to listen to Lu Sanlang's nonsense, so he held his forehead with his hand helplessly and said, "Okay, okay, okay, anyway, I'll pay for it and send people, can you two let me go?"
"Then I'll wait for you to send the gold and silver over." Zhu Ying's lips curled up, revealing a big smile, and then she happily stood up and flicked her sleeves, "Lu Gaoyuan, let's go to the next company! Time is running out, we can't waste time like we are here, we have to negotiate with at least ten companies today!"
It was a waste of time, and ten companies had to be negotiated. Zhang Rui couldn't help but feel angry and amused. However, seeing Zhu Ying calling Fatty Lu out with a beaming face, he thought about it and actually ordered someone to quietly follow behind and record the itinerary of the two people today and come back to report in the evening. Of course, considering that the two people had the strongest bodyguards around them, he didn't expect to be spotted while following them.
However, at night, when Zhang Rui saw the stalker who came back to report, he learned that Ah Liu did not follow them the whole time. After leaving his Duke Chu's Mansion, he parted ways with Zhu Ying and Lu Sanlang.
At that moment, Zhang Rui couldn't help but curse: "Is he targeting me alone? Good boy, damn girl!"
After scolding him, he saw that the stalker had his head bowed, but he could tell that he wanted to laugh but didn't dare to. He shouted angrily, "What are you laughing at? Without that Ah Liu watching you, wouldn't it be easy for you to stalk today?"
The stalker immediately cried out in pain: "Master, God have mercy on me, how can I feel relaxed? I almost broke my legs from running! The young lady and Mr. Lu were running non-stop today, running from one house to another. I counted and visited twelve families in total throughout the day!"
Seeing people saying names one by one while bending their fingers, Zhang Rui just felt unbelievable. Zhu Ying said so before, but he felt that Zhu Ying was targeting his connections and old subordinates in the northwest, and the others were just used as a cover. After all, there were too many people, and the interests were difficult to reconcile. And if it got out, the four people in the palace might not be happy...
As a result, that damn girl really dared to do it! Could it be that she was really prepared to recruit as many people as she could? Not to mention that even if Zhang Shou himself was short of money, he had the full support of the Duke of Zhao's Mansion. Even if the four most noble women in the palace really needed money, how much money could they not take out? And people like him, Duke of Qin Zhang Chuan, Earl of Xiangyang Zhang Qiong and Earl of Weinan Zhang Kang, and those few rich people...
Not to mention hundreds of gold and silver, even thousands of gold and silver can be taken out!
In this case, if a total number is set , the number of people needed to be recruited for the same amount can be reduced tenfold, and Zhu Ying and Fatty Lu can visit fewer houses and talk less. Is it really necessary to recruit so many people?
You know, Zhang Rui just found out that the twelve people that Zhu Ying and Lu Sanlang went to meet were not all top dukes, marquises, earls, and nobles. Apart from the Duke of Qin, several of them were from ordinary military families, but there were also civil servants like Lu Sanlang. And one of the biggest common points was that the children and grandchildren of these families were all in Banshan Hall!
But was it worth it for Zhang Shou to show kindness to his students? As far as he knew, those students were almost subservient to Zhang Shou!
When Zhang Shou returned to his study room at home that evening, he could only hear the little fat man chattering away excitedly about his invincible victory today: "Young sir, you don't know, after I blocked the Duke of Chu, I talked him into a daze with just a few words, and in the end he had no choice but to invite me into his home..."
"The same goes for the other companies. When I told them about the matter, they all gave their full support . They were not like Duke Chu, who was hesitant and unhappy. They all believed that if we were to do it, the Daming Northwest Development Fund would definitely be successful!"
Zhang Shou couldn't help but smile when he heard the little fat boy's praise. He understood why he could achieve his goal so easily.
The first was Zhu Ying's involvement, which naturally had an extraordinary effect; the second was not the name of the Northwest Development Fund, but the endorsement of the four nobles in the palace; the third was Zhang Shou's reputation over the past year; the fourth was the last, but not the least, in English, that is last but not least, this amount of money was really not much for a wealthy family.
One hundred gold and one hundred silver may sound horrible, but in those days the exchange rate of gold to silver was less than one to five, and the exchange rate of copper and silver was one string of money to one tael of silver, so that was less than six hundred strings of money, and it could be taken out if one squeezed through one's teeth.
If he wants to become bigger and stronger in this era, his own strength is not enough, and Duke Zhao's Mansion has more than one daughter, Zhu Ying, and he doesn't want to use his father-in-law's family resources without limit. In this case, funds are much more useful than stocks.
Stocks also pay dividends, but funds do not. After setting an investment period, he could learn from modern practices, where people can choose whether to continue the next cycle of operation or redeem and get cash directly, and the redeemed share can be bought by others. Now of course, he has set the starting point very high, because this fund is different, and the threshold will be lowered when it expands in the future.
By that time, there might be a threshold of one kan of money.
Moreover, holding shares by a fund is different from holding shares by individuals or even families, which also avoids interference from certain powerful people.
Wu Dawei, who was not asked to leave, was wiping the bookshelf behind Zhang Shou, but he pricked up his ears and listened attentively to everyone's conversation. The so-called fund and other terms were firmly remembered in his mind. In addition, he was thinking about the strange Chinese characters and formulas he saw in the papers that he cleaned out of Zhang Shou's wastebasket during the lunch break.
Although he didn't recognize most of the words and didn't quite understand what was being said, he still instinctively felt that the great Colenzo of Florence would be very interested in what Mr. Zhang and Mr. Lu were talking about. It's a pity that they are dead!
