Chapter 1436 - 1229: First Edition Banknotes (Part 2)

Chapter 1436: Chapter 1229: First Edition Banknotes (Part 2)

After that, they didn’t take all the profit back with them, but went straight into the commercial bank again and deposited it. Looking at those sheets of gleaming white silver notes in their hands, they were so excited they could hardly contain themselves. When they later carried those silver notes back to the Capital City,

and once again withdrew silver from the bank, everyone was even more thrilled, and that one trace of worry in their hearts disappeared completely.

By now they could be absolutely certain this was something that truly existed, something that could really be operated, and they also came to believe in the bank’s reliability. They decided to deposit all their assets into it, keeping only a bit of loose silver on hand.

Of course, someone also raised another point: the denominations of these silver notes were all too large and not convenient for everyday circulation. On this point, Lin Yi was actually well prepared. When someone came to ask, the bank directly took out stacks of neatly printed small-denomination silver notes.

These silver notes were red all over, some printed with 100, some with 50, and even some with 20. When they saw these, everyone was utterly astonished, while Longan just smiled and explained to them.

"Just as all you bosses have said, it’s true that carrying large-denomination silver notes is convenient, but when it comes to settling accounts they can be rather troublesome. You still have to run to the bank and specially exchange them for silver before you can close the deal. That’s really quite inconvenient.

In response, His Majesty specially ordered us to rush out a batch of small silver notes. In other words, these notes have fixed denominations. Look here: the ones printed with 100 represent one hundred taels of silver, the ones printed with 50 represent fifty taels of silver, and the ones printed with 1 represent one tael of silver.

All you need to do is exchange for these silver notes at the bank, and then you can go out and use them directly in transactions. That saves you a great deal of trouble.

After all, these silver notes are extremely convenient to carry. If you need to do a transaction of one hundred taels, you just take one note of one hundred taels.

If you need one hundred and twenty taels, then carry one hundred-tael note and one twenty-tael note, and the deal is done. Isn’t that far quicker and smoother?"

As these words fell, all the bosses around were stunned for a moment, and then their eyes gradually lit up.

Good, this is very good. This really solves a big hassle. Just as the clerk at the counter said,

before, whenever they did business, they had to run to the bank to withdraw silver, and after the deal was done, deposit the silver back in. Compared to the old days, this was already much more convenient,

but now that they’d heard this method from the counter clerk, they realized that even so, the process was still somewhat cumbersome. If small-denomination notes really existed, wouldn’t that make things even more convenient and fast?

And the silver notes themselves looked quite odd and were very pretty too, with extremely bright colors. Just looking at them was pleasing to the eye.

Especially after the clerk had walked them through the whole set of operating procedures, they were even more astonished. Like this, it truly solved their problems in a big way. Now, you could say that even a one-tael transaction could be settled using these silver notes.

Wouldn’t that greatly improve efficiency? Of course, they had no idea that this had long been within Lin Yi’s expectations.

All of this was simply currency issuance and the circulation of a new kind of currency. It was just that the process of circulation was remarkably smooth, without making anyone feel anything was off,

without making anyone feel anything was improper. Instead, people were willingly bringing all the silver and copper coins in their hands to the bank and exchanging them for this paper money.

For Lin Yi, that was a tremendous convenience. As long as things continued this way, it wouldn’t take long before paper money could replace all the current gold, silver, and other metals.

Which is to say, from then on he could take all this gold, silver, and copper and put it to much better use.

As for the question of what to do if people wanted to exchange back? Heh, what a joke. Now that paper money already circulates and can be used in place of silver, who would still insist on converting it back and hoarding silver at home?

If you really insist on exchanging, that’s fine too, we’ll exchange it for you. But surely not everyone will think that way, right?

In that case, wouldn’t all that silver end up effectively belonging to them?

And that would mean many things that couldn’t be done before could now be done. It’s a win–win situation: at the very least, people no longer have to worry about how to store their silver.

After all, the cost of storing large amounts of silver every year is quite high, and copper coins even more so.

Every year, the amount of rotted copper coins is beyond counting.

Paper money is different. Though the cost of making it isn’t low,

compared to gold and silver it’s still far cheaper, especially since once it’s damaged, Lin Yi can simply recycle and remanufacture it.

Or, to put it another way, once a large batch of coins is stored in the vault, all they have to do is replace them with paper notes. As for whether anyone in this era could imitate and produce such paper money,

heh, don’t make me laugh. This is a product of a later age. Not to mention the present—even several hundred years from now, no one would be able to reproduce it.

This was the source of Lin Yi’s confidence. After all, this solid product is nothing like what people can manage now. As for whether the money Lin Yi produced was actually currency from later generations,

heh, of course not. All this money was

custom-made by him.

In other words, he had

ordered a large number of machines that produce modern-style banknotes, but when it came to the designs, he used layouts suited to the current era.

"Everyone, look, the one-thousand-tael silver note actually has His Majesty’s portrait on it!"

"Yes, yes, and not only the one-thousand-tael note—on the one-hundred-tael note it’s His Majesty and the Empress!"

Aren’t you forgetting the five-hundred-tael note? On the five-hundred-tael note it’s the Empress Dowager and the Retired Emperor.

"Right, right, and the fifty-tael note—on that, isn’t it the Young Princess? Yes, that’s our Eldest Princess."

Huh, why is it that on the twenty-tael note it’s no longer His Majesty and the Princess? Why is the Capital City printed on it instead?

After everyone exchanged for these silver notes, they immediately saw the images printed on them, saw the scenes depicted there.

Sure enough, these were the portraits Lin Yi had specifically ordered to be printed: portraits of his whole family, and of the great rivers and mountains of the realm. This was also the very first edition of paper money in the Dayou Kingdom.

When this series of paper money was being printed, Lin Yi even joked that Empress Dowager Ye should collect a full set. A set like this would surely appreciate in value in the future.

But at that, Empress Dowager Ye merely rolled her eyes at her son:

"You’re already the Emperor now. What use is there in collecting paper money? Even if it appreciates, what good does that do?"

Of course, despite what she said, Empress Dowager Ye still rushed over to the mint and kept the earliest notes with the first serial numbers,

such as the ones with all zeros, or the ones with all ones, and so on.

Those notes were all set aside by her.

It’s not that she was stingy, or that she wanted to take advantage of anything.

It was just a childlike impulse, a kind of keepsake.

As for whether these things would ever appreciate in value, Lin Yi and the others hadn’t thought about that at all.

After all, at present, all the wealth in the world already belongs to their family. So what good would more appreciation do?

[To be continued...]

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