Steel Dynasty - Chapter 835

[Chapter 834 The Skill of Paper Money]

“Paper money!”

Pang Yukun was a little surprised when he heard this. Historically, the country of Chongqing has been using vouchers like silver notes, and there has never been such a thing as paper money.

Xiao Ming had a premonition of Pang Yukun’s reaction. He directly used the technology crystal to tell Pang Yukun what banknotes it was.

“There is no doubt that industry will enrich products, and at the same time the currency representing the flow of products will also increase. In this case, the court will need to issue currency based on the quantity of private products to maintain transactions between goods.”

“In this case , then how much should be issued?” Pang Yukun was a little confused.

“Naturally, the number of issuances cannot be arbitrary. To put it simply, paper and pen are equivalent to the previous copper coins. If too many issuances are made, the copper coins will depreciate. Originally, one copper coin could buy a buried head, but now it takes ten copper coins to buy a steamed bun. In the long run, it will It will cause turmoil in the country, so the issuance of banknotes must be equal to the current total industrial and agricultural production of Great Chongqing. At the same time, in order to ensure the value of the currency itself, the currency needs to be linked to gold and silver,” Xiao Ming said thoughtfully.

Although Dayu has a tendency to surpass the West in terms of firearms, the current social system of Dayu still has many imperfections.

Especially in the financial area, he lagged too far behind, so after expelling the barbarians and making the country basically stable, he decided to make up for the shortcomings in this area.

Moreover, he has a great ambition, which is to establish an international monetary system dominated by Great Chongqing and construct financial hegemony.

Although this ideal is still some distance away, preparations must begin now, and the issuance of banknotes is what we need to do now.

Pang Yukun gradually understood under Xiao Ming’s explanation, and he said: “If this is the case, the old minister suggests that the current Chongqing country adopts a silver-standard currency. After all, gold is too scarce, and silver is the currency that has been circulating in the Chongqing country.”

Xiao Ming pointed out He nodded. He once wanted to establish a gold standard currency system, but now the conditions are not met.

“That’s what I mean, but we can also mix gold and silver and formulate a gold-silver ratio exchange system.” Xiao Ming said, he was laying the back-up plan for the gold standard so that he could directly use the gold standard in the future.

Pang Yukun thought for a moment and raised his last concern. He said: “Your Majesty, there are many people who counterfeit banknotes among the people. If banknotes are issued, how to prevent them?”

Without diamonds, he would not do the porcelain work. Xiao Ming dared to issue banknotes. Naturally, the country of Chongqing can realize the technology of printing money, so he said: “You don’t have to worry about this, I have my own way to solve it.”

Pang Yukun nodded, “In this case, I will go back and deal with the Cao family bank first.”

After saying that, Pang Yukun bowed and turned to leave.

After watching Pang Yukun leave, Xiao Ming retrieved the information in the technology crystal. Issuing banknotes was not a simple matter, so naturally he did not dare to do anything wrong.

The reason why it is now on the agenda is that on the one hand, the Cao family bank has been uprooted, and on the other hand, he is confident that the quality of the banknotes issued is strong enough.

Generally speaking, banknotes have very high requirements for paper, and ordinary paper must not be used. After all, this type of paper is easily damaged by water.

Therefore, the paper actually used for banknotes is banknote paper, which is made of cotton linters.

This kind of cotton linters is also called cotton seed lint. It is the short fibers that remain on the cotton seeds after ginning. Use a lint stripper to peel off these short fibers, which is cotton linters.

Because of the complicated collection process, lint is much more valuable than ordinary papermaking raw materials.

Having the materials is only the first step. The next step is to master the raw material formula of this paper and produce it according to strict proportions.

In this way, the paper produced is smooth and delicate in texture, tough and resistant to folding. You can hold the banknote with your hands and shake it in the air, or hold the two ends of the banknote with both hands and pull it loosely and tightly, or flick the paper with your fingers. The surface will make a clear and crisp sound.

Relatively speaking, the raw materials of ordinary printing paper are mostly straw, wheat straw, etc. The texture of this kind of paper is soft and rough, with insufficient toughness and tension. It is easy to break and the sound will be muffled if shaken in the air.

Therefore, just because of the high manufacturing level of this banknote, merchants from Chongqing cannot imitate it. After all, the cost of counterfeiting will be very high.

In addition, he also has another magic weapon to prevent counterfeiting, which is the watermark.

Watermarks are an ancient anti-counterfeiting method. His country was the first country to master watermark squeeze technology in ancient times.

At that time, the paper curtain was woven with threads to form a texture or pattern that protruded from the curtain surface. When the paper was made, the density of the pulp was different, and bright and alternate patterns appeared when viewed through the light, thus forming a watermark.

In the Tang Dynasty, there was “Yanbo Jian” watermark paper, and in the late Qing Dynasty, there was watermark paper with the words “Wang Liuji”. In Europe, the Saxony banknotes issued by Prussia in 1772 used watermarks. Since then, the use of watermarks has become more common.

In addition to these two items, the third money printing technology that Dayu can achieve is letterpress printing, which uses raised patterns.

In this way, the surface of the banknote will become convex and concave, and the last thing is the printing pigment, mineral pigment.

Compared with plant pigments, the colors of various paintings painted with mineral pigments remain unchanged for thousands of years without fading.

Thinking of this, Xiao Ming said to Qian Dafu: “Now come with me to the printing workshop.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.” Qian Dafu responded and went out to prepare.

At this time, Xiao Ming picked up a pen and recorded the key technologies. Next, he will recruit technical backbones to establish a banknote workshop.

This workshop will be the top secret of the Great Chongqing Kingdom, and the method of printing banknotes will be the secret among secrets.

After finishing writing, Xiao Ming got up and went to the printing workshop. This workshop had always been under the control of the newspaper company. He directly asked Fan Zeng to select some people with clean backgrounds.

At the same time, he was ordered to establish a set of workshops from papermaking to printing in accordance with the newspaper’s publishing procedures.

And he gathered the selected people into Qingzhou University.

Because this issuance of banknotes is very important, Xiao Ming asked the government to prepare a confidentiality agreement for each of them. After signing the agreement, they will strictly keep the secrets about the banknote printing workshop. Any violation will violate the Dayu State Secrecy Act. .

The craftsmen selected by Fan Zeng are all people who have lived in Qingzhou City for generations. The information of several generations is very clear, and the entire family also lives in Qingzhou City.

Such craftsmen are very safe for Xiao Ming, because they have many scruples and the probability of being bribed is very low.

In the next few days, Xiao Ming handed over the core technology of printing money to them. Of course, the procedures were separate, and each craftsman could only master part of it.

At the same time, he also ordered the Equipment Department to manufacture a saw-tooth velvet stripping machine. With the current industrial capabilities, this kind of machine is not a problem.

(End of chapter)