Zhang Hong, the military officer in charge of money, flipped through the book and said in a little embarrassed manner: "We have no money."

Li Guan was stunned for a moment and said in disbelief: "How is this possible? Where did our money go?"

Zhang Hong spread out the account book and said helplessly: "It's true that there is no money. There is only 110,000 guan left in the account now. 110,000 guan seems to be a lot, but now we are not the same as before. Our family is big and our business is big, so this amount of money is not enough."

During this period, Shamen Town has traded with Zhendonghai, wiped out pirates, robbed almost the entire Daxie Islands, and recently robbed more than 20 pirate bandits. There are a lot of investments every time, why are they out of money?

Zhang Hong poured out the sticks in the calculation bag in front of Li Guan, and took various different marks of sticks to calculate in front of Li Guan. Shamen Town has indeed made a lot of money in the past three months, and it is estimated that one million yuan may be available. However, the money in Shamen Town is easy to get, but it is also like flowing water.

The biggest expenditure is military expenditure, including the salary of the soldiers and the equipment and armor for changing clothes. A set of iron armor is 50 stakes, and a set of leather armor is 20 stakes. Another one is three stakes, a bow is 5 stakes, and a crossbow is 8 stakes. A spear is 2 stakes, a step spear is 3 stakes. A feather arrow is 60 stakes, and a crossbow is 80 stakes. A leather shield is 500 stakes, and a square iron shield is 5 stakes. An iron helmet is 1 stakes, and a strange sword is 20 stakes.

Based on the equipment of the seven main battalions, an ordinary surprise soldier is equipped with an eight-foot three-edged spear, an iron shield on one side, an iron helmet, a set of iron armor, a horizontal knife, a bow, and a pot of thirty arrows. After calculation, it is almost seventy stakes, and one capital is two hundred people, which is 14,000 stakes. Three surprise soldiers in the seven battalions are 42,000 stakes.

Other shield soldiers are similar to crossbow soldiers. The more expensive one is Mo Dao Warrior. Two pairs of iron armor and one Mo Dao, it is more than 100 stalemates. But the more expensive one is still cavalry. Although the cavalry wears leather armor, their war horses are also wearing vests. A set of vests is forty stalks, which is not counted as more than 100 stale per war horse, and the huge monthly consumption of saddles and war horses. The cost of a cavalry is five times that of a surprise soldier. In other words, a surprise soldier requires seventy stalks, and a fully equipped cavalry may cost 350 stalemates. There are now three cavalry units in the entire Shamen Town. Not including the cavalry in the reconnaissance capital, in total, the cavalry has exceeded 700, and the cavalry alone consumes nearly 250,000 stalemates.

One arrow costs 60 cents. One million feather arrows cost more than 60,000 scattered pieces.

This is not counting the warships in Shamen Town now and the pack horses and donkeys needed for logistics. According to the Tang army's standards, 30% of the entire army are logistics auxiliary soldiers, and every ten soldiers must be equipped with six pack donkeys. Shamen Town now has a logistics battalion and transportation battalion, with eight battalions and more than 8,000 people. In addition to the cavalry's war horses and the private horses of officers and soldiers, the load horses and donkeys used for logistics alone are as high as 5,000. If the private horses of the soldiers are included, almost one person and one person is one. Although this ensures the strong mobility and transportation capacity of the Shamen Town Army, the cost of these pack horses is not low. A donkey carries thirty or forty studs of horses, the cost of this is more than 200,000 yuan for logistics.

Eight thousand people, the entire army's equipment, war horses, pack horses, etc. were calculated. The money spent in was as high as 1.2 million. If Shamen Town had not miraculously plundered so much money, it would not have been possible to arm such a huge and well-equipped army. This is a bottomless pit, and people eat horses and eat horses every day to consume a huge amount. This is not the entire expenditure. After each battle, Li Guan's generous rewards and heavy pensions are also an important reason for the huge expenditure.

"The soldiers' food supply and salary expenditures exceed 10,000 yuan per month. If the costs of war horses and logistics pack horses are added, the monthly expenditure is at least 20,000 yuan. This is still the case when not fighting. If a battle occurs, the combat consumption, rewards and pensions must be calculated, and the expenditure is at least five times that when not fighting." Zhang Hong sighed.

I don’t know, but when I counted, I was shocked. The army of 8,000 people now actually threw more than one million chunks into it.

Li Yan took a breath of air conditioning, "We won't really go bankrupt, are we?"

The military officer Li Chun smiled and said, "Zhang Bingcao just reminded the general in advance. Judging from the current situation, we can actually not use 8,000 soldiers and horses to guard the two forts and nine garrisons of the seventeen islands. I think we can maintain about 3,000 regular soldiers. Others can be used as soldiers and return home to farm and make a living. If there is any war, it will not be too late to recruit them. Raising soldiers is too expensive, and it is really unpaid to keep them without war."

Li Guan denied Uncle Cong’s proposal, and the war was about to come, so why would there be too many soldiers? Now seeing that there are a little more soldiers, but once the battle starts, no one will say that again.

"We actually have money." Zhang Hong finally said something that made Li Guan relax: "But we have no cash, only 110,000 guan of copper coins, and a little more silk, more than 300,000 guan, and more than 200,000 guan. Now the town's liquor workshop, perfume workshop and rock sugar workshop, and even the ordnance workshop, as well as the newly built lighter workshop and canning workshop, and salt drying factories, all profits are very high. However, according to the general's instructions, each workshop is now taking the goods for barter, liquor exchange for grain, and weapons exchange for materials, and there is really no money to make. The money in our hands has flowed to the soldiers and the workers of the workshop on the island, and they are all paid for the salary. Seeing that there is no cash in our warehouse, it is too short of money."

Zhang Hong talked about the current situation on the island. The salaries of soldiers and workers in Shamen Town and the salaries of workers in the workshop are higher than those outside, and the army and workshops in Shamen Town are all made for meals. This leads to the fact that everyone spends less and they keep the money in their hands after receiving the salary. Shamen Town has no cash flowing in foreign business, and the money in their hands continues to flow into the hands of the people and is no longer used. The money is used less and less, and even the silk that works with money is getting smaller and less. If it goes on, it won’t take long to use Shamen Town, and there is no money to pay the salaries of soldiers and craftsmen.

"Or what if you charge half of the money during foreign transactions?" Zhang Hong asked. The money shortage in the late Tang Dynasty was originally, but now the money shortage in Shamen Town is even more serious.

"No, it's just March, and the spring drought is very serious. This year will definitely be another year of severe drought in the north. Food is tight, and grain will become increasingly difficult to buy in the future. Even if we have money, we may not be able to buy it. So while the products we have in our hands are still sold, we have to take the opportunity to exchange these goods for grain and raw materials. The weapons shop should continue to change raw materials. Although we have stored a lot of weapons now, those seized are useless. I plan to sell them all, and we must use them carefully to create them."

"Our current food is enough for military and civilians to eat for two years, and the current food price is getting higher and higher day by day. At this time, we will make every effort to exchange for grain storage. If there is a bumper harvest next year and the grain falls, we will lose money." Li Chun reminded Li Guan.

Li Yan shook his head and said slowly: "You must believe me. The price of grain in the future will only be higher than now, more expensive than now, and will never be cheaper. From now on, we can buy as much as we can, and exchange as much as we can. We will stock up on all our efforts. And whether it is rice, corn, wheat, or even sorghum, barley and soybeans, as long as it is edible, we will buy and stock up on all our efforts. The canned workshop should also be stepped up and catch more fish to make canned food and store it."

Everyone was a little surprised by Li Guan's comprehensive behavior of preparing for the wasteland, but considering that he had been suffering from severe drought for two consecutive years, he felt that it was nothing to do.

"What should I do if there is a shortage of money?" Zhang Hong asked with a headache. Last time they brought back three coin furnaces from Maodao in the Feng family of Liaohai, as well as more than 100 craftsmen. Li Guan secretly made private coins, and each of the coin coins were cast. The profit could be about 150 jin, and the profit of 15% seemed very high. However, a coin furnace started construction throughout the year, and only 3,000 jin of coins were cast. The three furnaces were only 10,000 jin of coins. Calculated, it was only 1,500 jin of coins. This seemed to be a little useless to Li Guan. He also thought about adding coin furnaces, but casting money required a large amount of copper coins, lead and tin, and a coin cost nearly four jin of copper. Ten thousand jin is more than 40,000 jin of copper. But copper, lead and tin were all metals regulated by the imperial court, and it was difficult to get it.

Li Guan also frowned. If the money shortage continues, the people on the island can only barter, which will be a serious blow to the island's economy.

Zhang Chengye, who had been attending the meeting, suddenly said, "After we went to the island, we saw the soldiers on the island take the money to the military officer to change the paper for some work points, and then use the work points recorded in this piece to buy a house. I have always felt it was strange. Now that the money is short, can we temporarily use this work points to replace it on the island?"

Li Guan's eyes flashed with a flash of inspiration and he couldn't help but slap heavily. This Chengye really woke up the dreamer. How could he forget this? The money shortage is because the copper coins themselves are of high value and have little copper output. The imperial court has little money. New coins worth more than 300,000 ounces a year are often melted by the people and cast into bronze, or even traded directly to foreign vassal states.

But if you use banknotes, it is completely different, and banknotes themselves are of no value. In history, during the Anti-Japanese War, the Japanese also issued military coupons, and our army also issued border coupons. Li Guan could also issue banknotes in Shamen Town to upgrade this labor point and use them to temporarily replace money.

Of course, it is impossible to directly issue banknotes from later generations. After thinking for a long time, Li Guan raised his idea of ​​banknotes.

"We set up a bank and issued two types of banknotes. One is an unnamed banknote, divided into four types: 100, 200, 500 and 1,000. It is used directly instead of copper coins, but only for use on the thirteen islands of this town. One hundred coins is equivalent to one hundred coins. Later, the salary paid by the army and the salary paid by the workshop will be issued directly. The other is to issue registered banknotes, which are similar to flying coins, with registered banknotes from one to one hundred coins."

"Will everyone not accept it? After all, a thin piece of paper represents everyone's hard-earned money for a month."

Li Guan smiled, "The key is that this paper must have purchasing power. Like work points, it is not a piece of paper, but everyone uses money to exchange work points to buy a house. In the future, the shops on our island will be unified, and when selling items, they use money to settle the bill. In this way, we can use money to circulate on the island without money, to solve the problem of money shortage."

"Are those merchants willing? If they want to go out to purchase goods, don't they have to pay back cash?"

"This can be exchanged for them. According to the actual purchase situation, we will collect the money from them and exchange it for copper coins or silk for them."

The idea of ​​the banknotes in this banknotes made everyone here actively participate and constantly put forward various opinions. Li Guan was very happy to see this and came up with solutions to the questions raised one by one with everyone. Although the issuance of this banknote is still a bit immature, Li Guan believes that if you do it well, it is definitely an excellent strategy, which can at least stimulate the island economy and avoid the loss of money.

Let’s try it out first. Jiaozi can be circulated in the Northern Song Dynasty. Li Guan didn’t believe that his banknotes would be circulated in such a dozen islands, and that it would be circulated internally among more than 100,000 people.

There was already a papermaking workshop and a printing workshop in Shamen Town. It was originally Li Guan who saw that the people worshipped Buddhism at the late Tang Dynasty, and the incense of the temples was so popular, and even the Buddhist scriptures were sold very well. Li Guan himself was a Buddhist who did not believe in Buddhism, but in order to make money and accumulate food, Li Guan now worked hard. Seeing that the Buddhist scriptures were so popular, he couldn't help but think of printing Buddhist scriptures for sale.

He inquired for a while and found that the Buddhist scriptures had great potential, especially Japan, which was separated by a sea, worshipped Buddhism the most. Every year, merchants in the Tang Dynasty had to export large quantities of Buddha statues, Buddhist scriptures, sandalwood and other items, and the profits were amazing. After knowing this situation, Li Guan naturally would not miss it. He recruited a group of papermaking workers and printed workers to pull up the workshop.

However, since Li Guan wanted to do this business, of course it would not be a small fuss. Using his own knowledge, Li Guan improved the process of the papermaking workshop by several levels and created several better papers at a lower cost. Li Guan even asked the craftsmen to make a piece of straw paper for use in the toilet, which finally ended the troubles of using the toilet in the Tang Dynasty.

In terms of printing, Li Guan even introduced lead type movable type printing technology. Since the Buddhist scriptures are printed, each of them has a large printing volume, the printing of this woodblock movable type is very suitable and the cost is greatly reduced. The new business is now in full swing, and the first batch of Buddhist scriptures have been stored in a warehouse.

With the convenience of paper mills and printing factories, Li Guan simply studied and made a better paper as banknote paper with the craftsmen. Each new banknote is a five-color overprinting technology, and has extremely high anti-counterfeiting performance. However, Li Guan was also very cautious about issuing banknotes and specially set up a banknote to appoint many officials and supervisors. In the first batch, Li Guan did not dare to print more, and only printed 500,000 yuan of banknotes, and issued one to five according to the 100,000 copper principal he deposited into the banknote.
Chapter completed!