Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 813 Decline and Adjustment ([-])

The east coast has already entered late autumn, and Qingdao Port, which is a trade center and a financial center, has fallen into depression at this time. The reason is the relative shrinkage of the traditional European market.

The third Qingdao Autumn Commodity Trade Fair, which lasted for a full month, has just ended, but the number of merchants who came here in May is less than half of that of previous years. Correspondingly, the turnover of this year's fair is naturally Not very optimistic anymore.With the previous two successful expositions—the previous two domestic enterprises earned profits of 30 and 45 yuan respectively—the third expo is now roughly calculated, and the profit is only less than 40 yuan. , which makes the faces of some relevant units not very good.

However, this is a systemic risk, which is a force majeure factor for domestic manufacturers.The mercantilism trend of the Kingdom of France, a major European country and the second largest market on the east coast, raised tariffs on goods imported from the east coast, which made textiles, which accounted for a considerable share of the east coast’s exports, suddenly unprofitable. It's good, but the loss is heavy.Although their move is not only aimed at the people on the east coast, because this group of proud French also imposed high tariffs on goods imported from the Netherlands, Britain, Genoa, Portugal, Germany and other regions, but their behavior has de facto It has seriously hindered the sales of goods on the east coast and greatly damaged the interests of the east coast republic.

As we all know, the East Bank now spends a lot of money on immigration every year: including shipbuilding, transportation, port construction and related sailor training; the development and construction of transit bases; the opening of new immigration routes; local resettlement costs, etc., which of them Like not spending a lot of money?The main finance of the East Coast government comes from the profits of state-owned enterprises, followed by taxes from all walks of life (including state-owned and private enterprise business taxes, personal income taxes, property taxes, etc.). With a big drop or even a loss, the central fiscal revenue is bound to shrink.But what is painful is that the central government has no plans to cut expenditures at all (in fact, it is difficult to reduce much due to social stability considerations) and reduce immigration. Therefore, a huge fiscal deficit in 1650 is inevitable.After all, the financial gap of 100 million yuan is not so easy to make up!

What's worse is that after France took the lead, other European countries followed suit. Although their tax increases were not as exaggerated as the French, they more or less reduced the profit margins of the people on the east coast.Cutting one's fortune is like killing one's parents. This incident caused by the Frenchman has caused the East Coast to lose more than 100 million yuan in net profit every year. How can this incident be easily let go?The "sea toll booth" in the Caribbean is a serious warning!Of course, as far as the huge and bloated bureaucracy of the Kingdom of France is concerned, it may be two years after they figure out what happened in the Caribbean and respond.

But for people on the east coast, no matter how much money they get back from the Caribbean, it can't make up for the loss of a big market.Because this is not just a question of money, it is also related to the cultivation of industrial atmosphere, the construction of industrial system and many other issues.No matter how much money was robbed from the outside world, most of the citizens did not participate in this process, which did not benefit the industrial development at all.It may have a certain stimulating effect on enterprises that rely on infrastructure (railway, highway, river transportation) for their livelihood. After all, the government has money to continue to build infrastructure, and their products can continue to be sold. As far as the export manufacturing industry is concerned, it will not help.

Without the market, there will be no profit, and without profit, there will be nothing: the cultivation of industrial workers, the application of new technologies, the research and development of new products, etc. will be gone, and the industrial system will be like stagnant water without its source, unable to recover or renew itself , Cannot upgrade itself.Although the government can allocate huge industrial subsidies to maintain it, this is not a long-term solution after all, it can only be used as a temporary emergency.Therefore, in order to continue to develop the domestic industrial system on the east coast, it is extremely necessary to find a new market.

But it is easier said than done, and it will take time!The consequence of slowing down is that in the second half of 1650, there may be a large degree of structural overproduction in the East Bank, and the export industry, especially the textile industry, will be severely impacted. ), Pingan Weaving Factory, these two backbone enterprises will see their profits drop sharply or even lose money. Perhaps only the newly established Rocha Textile Factory, which is only two years old, is due to problems with the market (mainly sold to Great Spain and represented by Genoese) and product structure. It will generate a small profit.

Whenever thinking of this question, Xu Xin, the new Central Executive Committee member in charge of domestic industry, commerce and trade, feels very anxious.Today is June 6rd, the third day after the official closing of the 3rd Qingdao Autumn Trade Fair. Xu Xin specially asked his old friend, the Dutch captain Couette, who was inquiring about the news for the people on the east coast, to inquire about the situation. As one of the merchants, he knows best what the merchants think.

"It's not very optimistic." Although Captain Couette is not young, his voice is still loud, and he said in French: "I took the opportunity to ask Mr. Hill from New England, Mr. Hampton, and Mr. Mr. Flores from France and Mr. Adrian from the Southern Netherland, everyone’s purchases are much lower than in previous years. Although the dyed cloth and printed cloth produced on the east coast are still selling well, after all, this is a A good cloth with bright colors and not easy to fade, but the price is too expensive, and only some rich people will buy this high-end product. But you must know that the bulk of the profits often come from the lowest-end goods, textiles on the east coast, for the time being It doesn't look good."

"Now it seems that there are only a few products that can continue to be popular in Europe, such as steel bars, medicines, and bean cakes. Your metal tools, farm tools, dyed leather goods, munitions, grains, and refined flour that you used to sell well are now in the market. Under the obstruction of high tariffs, the sales situation was far from satisfactory. The West India Company has made detailed investigations on this, especially the sales of grain, metal tools, agricultural tools and arms. Recovery, these few commodities of yours are getting harder and harder to sell. You should have noticed that the grain exports in the Racha commodity trading market dropped sharply by at least [-]% last year, and this year's sales have dropped by a lot compared to the same period last year. Not much, and it looks like it will continue to fall next year. Although I haven’t seen your sales data, I can feel it. Therefore, your chances in the grain market should not be great, so forget about this business in the future.”

"In addition, your influence in the Old Continent is too weak. Seriously, few people know you, and few people want to know you. You don't have many powerful commodity agents, so no one I am willing to promote your products. Your reputation is also very bad. The news of the persecution of Catholics in the New World has been spread by people who are interested. In addition, you have bought a large number of Polish slaves from Tatars and Cossacks. This further exacerbated the bad impression of you from the Christian world. In fact, to be honest, I am also very puzzled and disgusted by your massive purchase of Polish prisoners of war and innocent civilians. After all, they are the Lord’s people, and they are civilization after all. People, you shouldn't humiliate them like this. This is my advice as a friend, Xu, I would not say this in front of others. Your policy has gone wrong and needs to be corrected, otherwise you may lose more and more The old continent market. You have to figure out where your current market is, and you shouldn’t offend the Christian world like this.”

Hearing Captain Couette's merciless criticism, Xu Xin's complexion became more and more ugly.In fact, if you think about it carefully, people on the east coast have offended many people over the years, the Spaniards, the Dutch East India Company (of course the two sides have already restored normal relations), the British East India Company, the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania (because of the purchase of prisoners of war and female slaves. ), the Republic of Venice (because of the sale of battleships to the Ottoman Empire and commercial competition), and now they have a festival with the French (although the French did not specifically target the people on the east coast at all), it really offended people.

But in this fucking 17th century, there is really no one that developed without offending others.If you want to export goods, you will inevitably touch the interests of those with vested interests; if you want to develop a market and allies, you will inevitably offend countries and forces that are hostile to them; even your skin and beliefs are original sins, Do you really think that Europeans will chat and drink with you just because you are from the mysterious East?That's pure idiots!People respect you only because of your strength, nothing else. People from the east coast won Spain, so they have a bit of status, but they still suffer from deep-rooted discrimination from established countries. This is the current mainstream political ideology in Europe.

How difficult it is to develop!Xu Xinchang sighed, and felt in his heart that if he wanted to get rid of the current predicament and sweep away the decline of the domestic export manufacturing industry, he still needed to expand new markets.For example, the Greater Spain market, which is rapidly increasing its market share on the east coast, the Moscow market, which is trying to develop, and the Persian Kingdom market, which is a long-term plan.Even the African market can be considered. Those black people are not all stupid fools. They will also trade with outsiders and produce some primary agricultural and mineral products themselves. It is impossible to digest some excess capacity for the domestic industry.

In short, work hard!Xu Xin secretly encouraged himself. Now that the country is in a difficult situation, the East Coast Republic has been developing for almost twenty years. Europeans—especially the Spaniards and Portuguese—would not allow the East Coast to continue to develop indefinitely.In the future, the situation facing the East Coast will become more complicated, so it is inevitable to make some adjustments to domestic industries and foreign markets.But before that, Xu Xin planned to go to Xingnan Port in the southern cone first. To alleviate the foreign trade dilemma on the east coast, the business of the Southern Railway Company was an extremely important part of it.

(End of this chapter)