Overseas trade and investment soon became a hot topic in the capital and the Jiangnan region.

On the contrary, the coastal areas have only just received the news and the reaction is not so intense.

The purpose of the Ming Ocean Trade Chamber of Commerce soon spread.

The extremely high threshold restricts the entry of a large number of families, and no one will react immediately. Even if you are not following the crown prince, it seems that you can do this.

"Will His Highness strike us? After all, we are following His Highness's lead and picking up the spoils. If we are not allowed, we will suffer a great loss."

"You should all know that if you go against His Royal Highness's wishes, you may end up losing more than you gain."

Many small and medium-sized families that were familiar with each other began to unite and set up trade chambers similar to foreign trade.

Their idea was to follow the Ocean Trade Chamber led by the Crown Prince, see what the big brother did, and then learn to do it themselves.

But some people are worried that this may offend His Royal Highness the Crown Prince.

As businessmen, many of them know clearly that it is best to eat alone.

Moreover, this was proposed and led by the Crown Prince, so I felt a little uneasy just following the trend.

After all, the crown prince likes to eat alone, and he has suffered heavy losses in many industries. Once an imperial decree comes down, he will lose all his money.

"Don't be so scared. The so-called ocean trade is naturally all business outside the Ming Dynasty. There are so many countries outside, and the prince can't invest in them all."

"Besides, I heard that the Crown Prince sold his shares this time but left all the money in the Chamber of Commerce. What does this mean? It means that the Crown Prince is not just trying to make a quick buck, but is really trying to expand this Chamber of Commerce."

"Two years ago, many wealthy families were engaged in maritime trade. According to the Crown Prince's requirements, every few ships they traveled had to transport a shipload of grain back to Ming, otherwise their maritime trade qualifications would be revoked."

"From this point, we can see that the Crown Prince must still grow food for external affairs. It seems that we in the Ming Dynasty have no shortage of food, but who would complain about having too much of this life-saving stuff?"

"We will ask the Crown Prince for food. He will eat meat and we will drink soup. When we make money, we will also transport food back. If the Crown Prince knows about this, he will definitely not blame us."

This idea has to be said to be very politically correct, and it quickly spread among a large number of families.

The so-called family, especially the family nowadays, is generally derived from a clan, which is very different from the aristocratic families of the past.

Aristocratic families can be seen as comprehensive groups covering a very large area, with land, soldiers and people in their hands. Their children have a strong sense of dependence on the family, and most of them rely on the family more than on national interests.

The current families are different. Most of them are some clans. Some of them have conditions or luck and have benefited from the dividends of this era and risen rapidly.

Originally, they would have gradually developed into the size of an aristocratic family, but the earliest group of people suffered severe crackdowns from the imperial court when they were developing the land, resulting in large-scale losses, and many were even sentenced to several years of hard labor, which suppressed the trend.

Wealth began to flow from land to treasure notes, and most people chose to deposit the treasure notes in the Ming Dynasty Royal Bank.

This means that the family is ultimately controlled by the court in another form, strengthening the court's control over the family.

…

Zhu Ying has become really busy during this period.

Ming Ocean Trade Chamber of Commerce, although Zhu Ying will not be involved in overseas investment management, but he still has to firmly grasp the roots of Ming Dynasty.

As for the location of the headquarters of the Ming Ocean Trade Chamber of Commerce, Zhu Ying did not choose the capital this time.

But it is located in Hong Kong Island in Guangdong region.

The development of maritime trade cannot be separated from the Hong Kong-Macao Triangle in terms of geographical advantages.

Not only in port transportation, but also in other aspects, Hong Kong's prosperity will inevitably develop with the prosperity of world maritime trade.

As an important port and a key coastal defense location, Zhu Ying would naturally support its development.

At present, with the opening of the sea in the past two years, the population in Hong Kong has been increasing rapidly.

The capital city of Nanjing, due to its saturated population and especially as it is the center of political power, has actually reached a bottleneck.

There are indeed a large number of emerging factories around the capital, but foreign businessmen can no longer enter Nanjing as freely as before.

Not only do you need to go through an identity check, but you also have to wait in long lines. Even if you finally get in, you may not be able to find a place to stay.

This also resulted in small and medium-sized maritime merchants having to move to other places.

In comparison, Hong Kong Island is very convenient.

The prices here are not high and there are basically no restrictions.

The merchant ships that arrived here could also transport commercial goods to the capital, so naturally the population gathered here began to increase.

And because of the demand for rapid development and the fact that there are not many noble ministers here, construction is carried out as quickly as possible. As a result, Hong Kong currently not only does not have many Chinese-style buildings, but instead has more buildings from other countries.

Walking on the streets of Hong Kong will give you an exotic feeling of being abroad.

"Brother, this is simply outrageous. This is the land of our Ming Dynasty. How can we allow these barbarians to build these houses?"

"I think we should ask them to tear down all the houses. Since we are in the Ming Dynasty, we should follow the style of the Ming Dynasty."

Zhu Yunhuan said fiercely, with strong dissatisfaction in his tone.

Zhu Yunhuan was born in the 11th year of Hongwu, and now it is the 31st year of Hongwu, and he is already 20 years old.

This time, Zhu Ying came to Hong Kong from the capital for a field trip, and brought Zhu Yunhuan with him to see the world.

However, I didn’t expect that Zhu Yunhuan would feel angry when he saw these buildings.

Zhu Ying smiled and said, "It is not necessary. China is vast and rich in resources. It is big and tolerant. It does not need to be reflected in architecture."

"The people who come here the most are foreign merchants. Look at this street. Only three out of ten people are from the Ming Dynasty. The prosperity of Hong Kong Island today is almost entirely built by these foreign merchants."

"On the way, I looked at the tax situation in Xin'an County, Guangzhou Prefecture. Since the opening of the sea, the taxation of the entire Xin'an County has begun to rise sharply, and 90% of it comes from tariffs. Now, compared with before, the taxation has changed dozens of times and has become an important pillar of Xin'an County."

"Last year, the customs duties had reached two million guan of treasure notes, almost all of which came from Hong Kong Island."

"The development of the capital has already begun to have certain limitations, and Hong Kong, with its unique advantages, will surely show great prosperity in the near future. It is very likely to be one of the few highly economically prosperous areas besides the capital."

"We should grasp the current planning of Hong Kong, promote trade exchanges between Ming Dynasty and other countries, and even obtain intelligence from other countries. All these will be reflected in Hong Kong Island in the future."

"For places like this, we cannot look at them with the same old eyes. We should show the openness of the Ming Dynasty."

Zhu Ying analyzed the current situation of Hong Kong Island to Zhu Yunhuan from various angles and explained it in great detail.

This is naturally intended to train Zhu Yunhuan.

In fact, in Zhu Ying's heart, he really wanted to hand over the Ming Ocean Trading Chamber of Commerce to Zhu Yunhuan.

In Zhu Ying's vision, the Ocean Chamber of Commerce is not just about investment, but in the later stage it will also have a large number of overseas armed forces branches. Simply put, it is the concept of a super multinational group, and it will also have the background of the Ming Dynasty court.

After growing into a behemoth, its influence can even determine the succession of the thrones of some small countries.

The bloody primitive accumulation of capital will definitely be accompanied by a bad reputation, so the emperor cannot exercise direct control at the same time.

This requires someone who is trustworthy.

The best candidate at the moment is naturally Zhu Yunhun. After all, he is Zhu Ying’s younger brother, and the two brothers have a good relationship. Zhu Yunhun is also relatively loyal to Zhu Ying.

Zhu Yunhuan witnessed with his own eyes the tremendous changes that the Ming Dynasty under the influence of his eldest brother, and in his heart he had long regarded his eldest brother as the person he admired most.

Zhu Ying's huge popularity in the court, among the people, in the government, in the army, and even in the entire Ming Dynasty has turned Zhu Yunhuan into a real fanboy.

"Big brother is right."

In front of his elder brother, Zhu Yunhuan naturally would not refute at all and quickly changed his words.

Zhu Ying frowned slightly. He felt that what he had just said did not enter Zhu Yunhuan's heart.

However, we cannot rush into these things, as cognition cannot be changed with just a few words.

Zhu Ying tried his best to let his younger brother take control, but if he was really not suitable, he would have to look for other candidates.

This trip to Hong Kong Island is considered an incognito visit.

However, even if the scale was reduced, more than 20 burly men were following behind, looking around with eager eyes. Anyone who was not a fool could understand that this was definitely the offspring of some important person.

Pedestrians on the street avoided him for fear of offending him.

Considering Zhu Ying's identity, this is really very low-key.

"It's ridiculous. The population of Hong Kong Island is now nearly 200,000, and although most of them are not permanent residents, there is no government control over such a large area."

"Immediately send a message to the Guangzhou government office to set up the Hong Kong County Office immediately. It should include all other offices and will not be under the jurisdiction of the Xin'an County Office, but directly under the jurisdiction of the Guangzhou government office."

There are not many populated places on Hong Kong Island today, mainly in the port area of ​​Xiangbutou.

Xiangbutou is what later became Tsim Sha Tsui.

After walking around for most of the day, Zhu Ying discovered that the people mainly responsible for public security were the local headmen and village chiefs, while the Xin'an County Government enjoyed taxes from Hong Kong Island but did not send anyone to manage the place.

The public security in the surrounding areas is even maintained by the navy department.

Are all these officials blind?

Obviously, there must be something fishy going on here.

After thinking for a while, Zhu Ying instructed: "Find a local and arrange for a visit to the dental clinic here."

The captain of the Jinyiwei who was in charge of the escort was named Shi Di. Upon hearing this, he immediately stopped a passerby and asked him questions.

The man was obviously a little afraid. He quickly told the address and left quickly. It was obvious that he didn't want to provoke Zhu Ying and his group.

With so many ferocious guards following you, you could get into big trouble if you're not careful.

Hong Kong dental clinic.

The dental clinic here is much busier than other places, and the place is quite hidden, hidden behind several houses. If you don't know its exact location, you might miss it.

It is a two-story building with walls made of cement bricks.

The courtyard and the hall were packed with people queuing up. A quick glance showed there were at least two or three hundred of them, all foreigners.

"Why are there so many people?" Zhu Yunwen was a little surprised.

Zhu Ying frowned, he felt as if things were not that simple.

At this moment, the waiter in the pawnshop spotted Zhu Ying and the others, and quickly stood up and pushed through the crowd to rush over.

"Sir, please come in. We have a private room inside, but it's much quieter."

This was clearly an act of queue-jumping, but the foreign businessmen in the queue did not show any dissatisfaction at all.

After all, the twenty or so guards behind are the best deterrent.

Upon hearing this, Zhu Ying followed the waiter from the pawnshop into the room, and the crowd wisely made way for them.

The waiter said somewhat embarrassedly: "Sir, our place is small, and I'm afraid the private room can't accommodate so many people."

Zhu Ying nodded, turned around and said, "Yunxun, follow me in, and the others wait outside."

Qian Hu Shi Di bowed and clasped his fists, saying, "I obey your order, sir."

This style shocked the surrounding foreign businessmen, and the waiter was also frightened.

I walked around the crowd and arrived at the backyard. It was much quieter here, but I could vaguely hear the noise in the front.

"Gentlemen, please come in."

This small house in the backyard is obviously prepared for distinguished guests. You can smell the fragrance of tea as soon as you come in.

In the room, through the window you can see a girl making tea.

This is also a specialty of the Guangzhou area, Kung Fu tea.

Most businessmen like to chat while drinking tea, and there will be women who specialize in tea art to serve them.

Seeing Zhu Ying and Zhu Yunhuan come in, the woman stood up and bowed, but said nothing.

"Please rest assured, gentlemen. They were all born with disabilities and cannot speak or hear," the waiter explained with a smile.

To put it bluntly, he is a deaf-mute.

This is indeed more covert for many businessmen, as most businessmen do not like their secrets to be known.

It seems that there is something special about this dental business.

Zhu Ying didn't rush to speak.

Zhu Yunhuan sat down, drank a sip of tea, frowned slightly, and then put the cup aside. It was obvious that he was not satisfied with the taste of the tea here.

The waiter was obviously of some status, and seeing this he quickly gestured to the woman.

The woman saw the tea leaves in the cup were poured into the bucket next to it and immediately replaced it with new tea.

This tea is obviously much more valuable, and you can smell the rich tea aroma just by brewing it.

However, as Zhu Yunhuan grew up in the palace, he drank tribute from the palace.

Although this tea is delicious, I can only drink it reluctantly.

The waiter took all of this in, and had already made an estimate in his mind.

"You two gentlemen, you came to the pawn shop, but you need something. To be honest, in this Hong Kong Island, no matter what you need, we can help you. We will definitely not let you down."

There was a hint of pride in the waiter's tone, and he was obviously very confident.