Chapter 168: Act As A Banker
Seven tons of quinine, no, it should be said six tons of quinine, plus two tons of inferior quinine.
These eight tons of quinine, no matter who they are sold to, can fetch a large sum of money.
However, disposing of this batch of quinine is still a bit troublesome.
Although the matter has passed now, if a large amount of quinine of unknown origin appears on the market in the future, it will easily make Mitsui’s people suspicious.
Gu Yansheng still has to find a way to get some more quinine to make the whole thing smooth.
Merchants cannot be used anymore; their reputation in Nanyang is already notoriously bad, and if they go to Nanyang again, they will probably be hacked to death at first sight.
This matter is not urgent for the time being.
Once Ma Shiqi leaves, Gu Yansheng still has to go to Agent Headquarters to complain a couple of sentences, otherwise it would seem like the money was lost too casually.
One foot on the accelerator to No. 76, walking into Ding Mocun’s office, facing Ding Mocun’s welcoming smile, Gu Yansheng berated him right away.
“I say Director Ding, can’t I stay in West Shanghai anymore? My warehouse was robbed, and you didn’t send even one person.”
“Something like that happened? Who dared to rob your warehouse?” Ding Mocun was quite surprised, so surprised that he even wanted to laugh.
Gu Yansheng had no smile on his face, “Very funny? The quinine I just shipped to West Shanghai was robbed.”
“Quinine? Who robbed it? Big loss?”
“Big? Huh?” Gu Yansheng pulled a long face, stretched out his hand and made an eight: “Eight tons of quinine, eight tons! You tell me if that’s big?”
Ding Mocun’s face instantly darkened, and he cursed loudly: “Eight tons? Where are the people? Caught them?”
“Catch? The Japanese Navy bastards blew up the whole ship with one cannon! Now they’re feeding the fish in the sea!” Gu Yansheng recounted the black ghost shelling incident.
“Those damn black skins!” Ding Mocun was furious.
You know, eight tons of quinine sold to the Japanese would give each of them a commission of six hundred thousand US dollars, per ton!
That’s equivalent to four hundred and eighty thousand US dollars gone!
If they sold some more to the Nationalist controlled area, one million US dollars wouldn’t be impossible!
“What the hell are the Japanese thinking? They didn’t know the ship was carrying quinine? And they dared to shell it with cannons?”
Gu Yansheng sat down angrily and said in a deep voice: “If you ask whether they knew or not, the Navy guys might really not know. Sato Kenji wants to sell this batch of medicine at a high price to the army; if the news leaked out in advance, how could he rig the market and sell it later?”
“What a huge loss.” Ding Mocun let out a heavy sigh, sat down dejectedly with a thud, frowned and said, “Brother, you really can’t blame me for this. No. 76 is seriously short-staffed right now, and Shanghai is fighting everywhere.
Military Statistics Bureau people kill officials, kill Japanese, burn warehouses, bomb warehouses; there’s no disruptive act they won’t do. Whenever they do something, we have to rush over from far away, and we can’t send too few people.
Did you see when you came in? There aren’t many people left guarding the entire No. 76.
The Japanese require us to protect the operation of Japanese enterprises, so all our staff are sent to the urban area as bodyguards to catch Military Statistics Bureau.”
“Catch Military Statistics Bureau, catch Military Statistics Bureau, how many have you caught? What’s the use?” Gu Yansheng scolded: “Can you catch all of Military Statistics Bureau? Catch two today, two tomorrow, and then Chongqing sends you four more. Does China lack people?
Even if you destroy the entire Military Statistics Bureau Shanghai District, so what? Not even two months pass, and they pull their troop over and continue causing chaos.”
Ding Mocun opened his mouth, sighed helplessly, “That’s true, but the Japanese said we have to do something, right?
In just this half month, 19 people died, from City Government staff to officials from Nanjing vacationing in Shanghai.
That Minister of Foreign Affairs Chen Lu from Nanjing was shot dead on the spot by Military Statistics Bureau last night. You think the Japanese aren’t anxious? If they keep killing, there won’t be anyone left for two city governments!
Don’t they have to get us to do things?”
Oh, he’s dead, good, that clears the 150,000 silver dollar gun debt. Chen Mo did a great job.
“How did he die?” Gu Yansheng temporarily stopped being angry and first enjoyed the gossip, frowning and asking: “Did someone like that come to Shanghai without guards?”
“Of course he had them. He has his own house in Shanghai, a Western-style villa, with three guards at the door raised by the family.
But last night Chen Lu was hosting a banquet at home, with quite a few people coming in and out. The guards thought it was cold and didn’t want to stand outside opening and closing the door, so they opened the door and hid in the side room to roast fire and eat.
Three guns were pointed at their heads.
That was it; Military Statistics Bureau people stripped off their clothes and pants, tied them up with ropes, stuffed their underwear in their mouths, then swapped their hats and clothes. In the dark, the three of them went around to the kitchen. Even if someone saw them, no one thought anything was wrong.
The two bodyguards at the villa door didn’t realize Military Statistics Bureau people would appear behind them, and they were rushed from the kitchen to the living room and killed Chen Lu.”
Ding Mocun pointed to his forehead, “Two shots, killed on the spot.”
No wonder officials shouldn’t be too stingy; they don’t know to hire more guards. Also, he was too used to Nanjing life, didn’t know how deep the waters in Shanghai are, and still dared to host a banquet. Like Gu Yansheng hosting a banquet under Japanese protection, that requires twenty or so guards.
Gu Yansheng tsked, leaned back with a frown, “Now Military Statistics Bureau is so ruthless, rushing into homes to kill?”
“Yeah, so scary.” Ding Mocun nodded: “You say, once this spreads, won’t all these government officials in Shanghai and Nanjing be in fear for their lives? The Japanese don’t even want this news to spread now, but can they cover it up? In just these two days, the information will be flying everywhere.”
“I say, this guy was too stingy. What use are five guards? Also, the guards dared to hide in the room to burn fire for warmth. I don’t get it—was he too kind to the guards usually, indulging them, or did he not pay enough so they slacked off?”
“Not just five, eight, but two guards went out to receive people, and one was upstairs playing with his son. Honestly, that’s quite a few bodyguards. For a guy from Nanjing, with a house in Shanghai not lived in often, bringing eight bodyguards from out of town is already good.”
Eight bodyguards is actually quite a lot.
One person per month, even at twenty silver dollars expense, eight bodyguards would cost nearly two thousand silver dollars a year.
This doesn’t even count the two cars needed for the eight bodyguards to travel, plus Chen Lu himself. If there are more family members, they’d need at least four cars, plus eating subsidies and such; daily expenses are huge.
Officials in foreign affairs aren’t like them at No. 76, where their own people provide protection without spending a dime, all covered by office funding.
Foreign affairs—Nanjing Reform Government has no real foreign affairs, just empty shell departments. No oil and water, not even a drop of oil to see. To afford eight bodyguards now, besides scraping some money from his own general affairs department, the rest has to come from the family fortune he saved from his days in the Yuan Datou government and National Government.
“Looks like I need to recruit some bodyguards too.” Gu Yansheng pondered.
Ding Mocun chuckled, “Don’t you have enough people already?”
Gu Yansheng has more than twenty bodyguards at home; just keeping them costs six or seven thousand silver dollars a year.
Sigh, Gu Yansheng sighed, “This money has to be spent. Spend where needed, earn where possible. Busy for so long, all for nothing, too wasteful.”
“It is wasteful.” Ding Mocun also sighed.
Gu Yansheng said: “The key is this matter is hard to handle now. Mitsui still wants medicine, but the merchants have thoroughly offended the blacks in Nanyang. To make this money, I have to think of another way.”
“This is indeed a problem. After doing this once, the smuggled quinine medicine might even run out of stock.” Ding Mocun frowned too, thought for a moment and said: “How about changing places? Get medicine from South America?”
“That’s too far, and we’d have to assign them a few translators.”
Ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling.
Ding Mocun got up to pick up the phone.
“Hello, yes, it’s me. Okay, I got it.”
Ding Mocun hung up the phone and walked over, “Don’t know what happened again. Gendarmerie Headquarters wants me and Li Shiqun to come over, and the tone was pretty bad. I was going to have a meal with you, but it’s soup again. How about you wait for me to come back?”
“Forget it, no mood. I’ll go home to eat.”
“Okay, then next time. Let’s go out together.”
Gu Yansheng and Ding Mocun went out together; Ding Mocun still had to call Li Shiqun.
Gu Yansheng went to say hello and ran into Li Shiqun’s wife, Ye Jiqing, who was also there.
“Mr. Gu.” Ye Jiqing was very enthusiastic, her eyes lighting up at the sight of Gu Yansheng.
Ding Mocun told Li Shiqun a few words about going out, and Ye Jiqing immediately said: “You guys go, I have something with Mr. Gu. Mr. Gu, got time to chat?”
“Then we’ll go first.” The two greeted Gu Yansheng.
Gu Yansheng nodded, “What’s up?”
“To give you your reward. Let’s talk in my office.”
Ye Jiqing took Gu Yansheng to her office and directly took out four large yellow croakers from the safe, put them in a jewelry box, and pushed it over.
She smiled: “Haven’t given you the dividend from the last short selling information yet. Since we ran into each other today, take it back.”
She does business quite morally. Gu Yansheng sighed and pushed it back, “No need, right? The grain requisition information was also passed through Wu Sibao; you guys helped me too.”
“One code to one code. Can’t swallow the money-making alone, or next time Mr. Gu won’t take us to play.” Ye Jiqing was very perceptive; the God of Wealth must be offered tribute.
“Then I’ll take it, thanks.” Gu Yansheng just put on a show; what should be taken must be taken.
Ye Jiqing took the chance to ask, “Mr. Gu, any money-making opportunities lately? Houses can’t be sold off for a while, and the stock market isn’t safe. My money is just sitting there with nowhere to go.”
“Mm.” Gu Yansheng thought about it. No need to take them to make money if there’s nothing, but with things happening frequently now, finding an opportunity to contact Ye Jiqing more is fine.
At least, what Li Shiqun and Ding Mocun are going to Gendarmerie Headquarters for, Gu Yansheng is quite interested in. He can come back tomorrow.
Thinking of this, Gu Yansheng said: “Opportunities come with waiting. We pursue not risk, but stable money-making. Especially with your business involved, how could I let you lose money? Can’t talk nonsense.”
“I know, I know.”
“But if you say opportunities, they’re actually not absent.”
Ye Jiqing’s eyes lit up, and she leaned in closer, “Please advise.”
Gu Yansheng thought and said: “I’ve been thinking lately, how to stably make money in this stock market. Like Wu Sibao staying in the exchange every day, not knowing if prices rise or fall, joy and sorrow all controlled by the market maker—isn’t that too passive?
So I’m thinking, why not act as a banker ourselves.”
Ye Jiqing was smart and immediately understood, “We acquire a company and manipulate its stock price?”
“Acquire stocks.”
“Right, right, stocks.”
Gu Yansheng tapped the table, “Now Military Statistics Bureau is causing chaos everywhere, and the market trend isn’t good, right? Find a way to make it even more chaotic, press the stock price lower, and we’ll slowly accumulate. When the timing is right, release positive news, rally the price a bit to attract retail investors in to help us lift it, then sell off.
Once we sell, the stock price will fall, and we’ll slowly buy back. Keep doing this back and forth.”
“Right.”
“Understood.”
Ye Jiqing leaned back, her expression smiling with some reminiscence as she pondered.
Her eyes flashed, and she asked: “Mr. Gu, this approach requires quite a lot of funds, right?”
“Requires a lot, but earns a lot too.”
“That’s the reason. So, which one do we pick?” Ye Jiqing was decisive and immediately decided to do it.
“I haven’t researched specifics yet, but we have a rough scope. First, no foreign companies; we can’t control them. Shanghai enterprises are simple: either related to food or clothing—food, clothing, housing, and transportation. Can’t go wrong staying in that range for safety?”
“Mm.” Ye Jiqing nodded, picked up the phone and called Wu Sibao, “Sibao, come to my office right now.”
Once Wu Sibao arrived, Ye Jiqing explained Gu Yansheng’s plan to him.
Mainly, everyone has to invest money and effort in this; acting as a banker requires a lot of money, and Wu Sibao likes watching stocks, so his time at the exchange won’t be wasted.
Wu Sibao laughed excitedly: “Hahaha, I get to act as a banker too? This is interesting, too interesting. Awesome, Director Gu. I watch the stock market every day, how did I not think of such an interesting way?
Act as a banker, ha, let’s see who dares say I’m unlucky from now on! Market makers ever get unlucky?”
Ye Jiqing’s mouth twitched; she suddenly regretted calling Wu Sibao.
“Don’t just laugh. You stay at the exchange every day; tell us, which companies fit the requirements.”
“Yong’an Department Store!” Wu Sibao blurted out without thinking, “This company is a Hong Kong company, Chinese capital. Look, it sells everything, big reputation. If we want to rally the price and sell off, once the price rallies, stockholders will all take over.”
Ye Jiqing looked at Gu Yansheng, “Mr. Gu, what do you think?”
Yong’an Department Store? How could a famous company like that not have a market maker, and likely a big one.
But Gu Yansheng didn’t care.
“Reputation is big, but as long as it’s a Chinese capital company, it should be similar. As long as we can control the boss, does it make a difference to us?”
“That’s the reason.” Ye Jiqing nodded, “Then Yong’an Department Store? For specific investment, we’ll discuss after investigation?”
“Okay.” Gu Yansheng nodded.
“Hahaha, then Yong’an Department Store. I’m going to be the market maker for Yong’an Department Store.” Wu Sibao laughed.
They chatted a bit, agreed to first have them collect basic information on Yong’an Department Store company, who the bosses are, what sales are like.
Gu Yansheng declined their dinner invitation and went straight home.
