Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 372 Interest Groups
"Yuan Chonghuan?"

"It's Yuan Chonghuan!"

Zhu Shenzhui looked solemn. He never expected to hear Yuan Chonghuan's name from Zhou Anmin.

After the Chinese New Year, Zhou Anmin officially handed over border trade affairs and handed over the work of Weiyuanwei to Tian Ergeng's people, but he did not return to Pingshun. Instead, he went to Taiyuan Jinyiwei Yamen to take up a post.

As a result, Weiyuanwei was taken over by Tian Ergeng's people, and Zhou Anmin no longer interfered in the matter. However, although Zhou Anmin had left Weiyuanwei, he still had some say in Weiyuanwei. After all, Zhou Anmin was in charge of border trade from the beginning, and all the people from top to bottom were arranged by Zhou Anmin. In addition, there were also people on his side on the grassland, and Kang Youfu was in charge of the details. From this point of view, even if Zhou Anmin no longer cared about this matter, he still had influence.

However, Zhou Anmin still readily handed over the border trade matter and went to Taiyuan to continue his post as a captain of the Jinyiwei. In order to make up for his departure from Weiyuanwei, Tian Ergeng also gave him a benefit, which was to give Zhou Anmin the title of commander, and at the same time, he handed over the entire Shanxi Qianhu to Zhou Anmin.

This can be considered an exchange of interests, and both parties know it well. So after Zhou Anmin left, the border trade of Weiyuanwei continued. On the surface, there was no difference from before, but in fact, after the change of people, it was more or less affected. Zhou Anmin was naturally aware of this situation, and Zhu Shenzhu also understood it.

No one knows how long the border trade cooperation can last. However, in the past two years, Zhu Shenzhu has obtained a lot of things he needs through border trade. In addition to the huge profits obtained from border trade, these things are the rapid development of business under the pretext of border trade.

Before the border trade, although Hengtong Commercial Bank was well-known in Shanxi, it was still far behind the wealthy merchants in Shanxi. But after the border trade, as Kang Youfu cooperated with Zhou Anmin in a series of business operations, Hengtong Commercial Bank expanded rapidly. Through a series of means such as wooing, uniting, and suppressing, Hengtong is now different from the past. It is not only one of the largest commercial banks in Shanxi, but also has extended its tentacles to other provinces. At the same time, it has opened money houses and bill shops in various places. Hengtong's bills have become hard currency. Not only can they be circulated smoothly in the business world of Daming, but even on the grasslands, Hengtong's bills can also be used as silver.

However, during its expansion, Hengtong Trading Company did not have smooth sailing, especially in Shanxi, where there were many business competitors that were not on good terms with Hengtong.

The leaders among them are the Zhang family of Zhoupu and the Wang family of Jingsheng. These two families have a high status in the Shanxi business community. Coupled with the noble status of their ancestors, they have always been the leaders of the Shanxi business community.

When Hengtong united with Shanxi business houses to form an alliance, these two families were the most determined to oppose it. First, they looked down on Hengtong, which suddenly emerged, and second, Hengtong's rise also threatened their position in the business world. As the saying goes, competitors are enemies. The Zhang and Wang families did not want to see Hengtong's rise and replace their positions, so their relationship with Hengtong was very bad.

In addition, there is another family, the Jiexiu Fan family, which has always followed the lead of the Zhang and Wang families. Compared with the attitudes of the Zhang and Wang families, the Fan family seems to be more tactful. Although the Fan family is also not interested in Hengtong, they have not directly expressed opposition. However, from the later investigation, the Fan family has been making small moves. It is also said that the reason why the Zhang and Wang families oppose the Hengtong merger is that the Fan family played a lot of roles. It seems that the Fan family is really insidious.

Because of the incident that happened before, the mastermind behind the incident has never been found. Zhu Shenzhui has always suspected that someone was behind the incident and even set his sights on the Shanxi business community. In order to avoid similar incidents, Zhu Shenzhui has never given up on finding the truth and even used means to attack several suspected possible targets. However, the final result told Zhu Shenzhui that these people were not the culprits of the year.

After a while, Zhu Shenzhui gradually shifted his target to the Zhang and Wang families, because they were more likely to take action in terms of strength and other aspects. But as the investigation continued, Zhu Shenzhui denied this point. Although the Zhang and Wang families were not on good terms with Hengtong, they were not willing to do such a thing with their background. Even though they were competing with Hengtong for resources in the market due to their philosophy, the Zhang and Wang families only used their methods in business and did not use any tricks in private.

In this way, although Zhu Shencui did not completely dispel his suspicion of them, he also reduced the degree of suspicion of these two families. On the contrary, the Jiexiu Fan family gradually surfaced, causing Zhu Shencui to shift his attention to them.

Last year, Zhu Shenzhui had people start investigating the situation of the Fan family in Jiexiu. Now Zhou Anmin finally has news, but this news surprised Zhu Shenzhui.

He never thought that the Jiexiu Fan family would be related to Yuan Chonghuan. How did they get together? The Fan family was in Shanxi, Yuan Chonghuan was in Liaodong, and Yuan Chonghuan had always been the main general of Ningyuan. Not long ago, he had just won a so-called Ningyuan victory and was in great demand. What was going on?

"Yuan Chonghuan has a younger brother named Yuan Chongyu. Have you heard of him?" Zhou Anmin asked.

Zhu Shenzhu shook his head. This was the first time he had heard of this name. Zhou Anmin immediately explained the relationship to Zhu Shenzhu in detail. There were three brothers in Yuan Chonghuan's family. One of them had passed away, leaving only Yuan Chonghuan and Yuan Chongyu. Yuan Chongyu was the youngest. Compared with his brother Yuan Chonghuan, Yuan Chongyu was not a seed of study, let alone the imperial examination, he was not even a scholar. Compared with his brother who studied and pursued a career in officialdom, Yuan Chongyu was more keen on doing business. When he was in his hometown, Yuan Chongyu was a small businessman. When Yuan Chonghuan went to Liaodong, he was soon valued by Sun Chengzong in Liaodong and entrusted with important tasks. Yuan Chongyu ran from his hometown to Liaodong to join his brother Yuan Chonghuan, and started doing business by taking advantage of the power in Yuan Chonghuan's hands and the complicated political situation in Liaodong.

In just a few years, Yuan Chongyu went from a small businessman to a wealthy businessman in Liaodong. He started out by selling private salt and trading materials in Liaodong. The former was similar to what Zhu Shenzhui did at the beginning, but Yuan Chongyu's private salt trade was much larger. With Yuan Chonghuan's support, Yuan Chongyu smuggled unscrupulously, and even joined forces with other merchants from Shandong and Shanxi, using the military to directly monopolize the Liaodong Salt Road, gaining a huge amount of wealth in a short period of time.

The same was true for the material trade in Liaodong. Sun Chengzong's economic blockade of the Later Jin and Jiannu led to an urgent shortage of materials in Liaodong, which also caused the prices of daily necessities such as grain in Liaodong to rise sharply.

This gave Yuan Chongyu the opportunity to make a lot of money. Yuan Chongyu and his partners privately transported a large amount of supplies for smuggling and made huge profits from it. The most important of his partners was the Jiexiu Fan family.

"According to investigation, 40% of Yuan Chongyu's private salt and more than 50% of his supplies were provided by the Fan family in Jiexiu. These supplies included not only grain, cloth, tea, etc., but even pig iron and gunpowder. Most of the sales were shipped to the Later Jin Jiannu..." Zhou Anmin said with concentration.

"Bastard!" Zhu Shenzhui raised his hand and slapped him hard, and couldn't help but curse out loud.

This is aiding the enemy! The Liaodong battlefield is the most important place for the Ming Dynasty. Since the Battle of Sarhu, the Ming Dynasty has been defeated repeatedly in Liaodong. Even the death of the famous Xiong Tingbi was related to the Liaodong battlefield. Since Sun Chengzong took over as the governor of Ji Liao, the Ming Dynasty has spent tens of millions of dollars to carry out a comprehensive blockade of the Later Jin Jiannu in Liaodong, and stabilized the situation in Liaodong by taking defense as offense.

But who could have imagined that the blockade was in place while smuggling was going on below, and that the biggest smuggler and the biggest beneficiary of the smuggling was the younger brother of the commander stationed at the front line, who was known as the "pillar of the country"? This is simply ironic.

Didn't Yuan Chonghuan know what Yuan Chongyu was doing? This is definitely impossible. Without Yuan Chonghuan's acquiescence or even support, how could Yuan Chongyu, a businessman without an official position, do such a thing? It is simply a fantasy.

Maybe Yuan Chongyu was Yuan Chonghuan's white glove, and everything was done by Yuan Chonghuan. Yuan Chonghuan was really too bold to do such a thing? What on earth did he want to do?

"In addition to cooperating with the Fan family, Yuan Chongyu also cooperated with the Liaodong generals. Yuan Chongyu was able to thrive in Liaodong because of the help of the Zu family and the Wu family. In fact, smuggling in Liaodong has always existed. Long before Lao Nu started his rebellion, the Liaodong generals were engaged in this business. What they are doing now is not surprising."

"There is a difference between smuggling and illegal smuggling. For example, Mao Wenlong in Pidao was more rampant in smuggling. But compared with Yuan Chongyu, Mao Wenlong's smuggling had a bottom line. At least Mao Wenlong would not sell the goods to the Later Jin Jiannu, but smuggled them to Korea and Japan to make a profit."

"It is impossible to eliminate this situation. I think you are also aware of the shortcomings of the Ming army. There are many cases of delayed pay and arrears in pay in the army. It is impossible for the court to provide enough pay. If the border troops want to be combat-ready, it is inevitable to support servants, and to support servants, you need money in hand."

"Without silver, the troops under my command can't even get enough food, let alone fight. Especially for Mao Wenlong in Pi Island, the imperial court has set a military salary quota of 300,000 yuan per year for Mao Wenlong, which does not include the original amount, and even less will actually fall into Mao Wenlong's hands."

"There are nearly 500,000 soldiers and civilians in Pi Island right now. Even if the annual military pay is 300,000, it is less than one or two taels of silver per person. So how can Mao Wenlong feed so many people without smuggling? However, the situation in Pi Island is different from that of Yuan Chonghuan. Yuan Chonghuan has enough money for military pay, and he does not have so many soldiers and civilians. Just in Ningyuan alone, there are no more than 10,000 people at most."

Zhou Anmin's words were very clear. Judging from his attitude, he was extremely dissatisfied with Yuan Chonghuan. Just as he said, smuggling could not be eliminated. There were many reasons for this, especially since none of the border army generals were clean. It was impossible to say that they had never been involved in smuggling.

You should know that Zhu Shenzhui started out as a salt smuggler. After founding Hengtong, he led a caravan northward to engage in smuggling trade with the Mongols, and only then did he gradually grow to the current scale. From the beginning of Zhu Shenzhui's salt smuggling to the present, Zhou Anmin has helped him a lot. It can be said that without Zhou Anmin's efforts, there would be no Hengtong today.

(End of this chapter)