Time Travel to 1859: The Iron-Blooded Soldier King

Seeing Yung Wing coming from afar, Liu Ye on the side signaled Li Jixian with his eyes. Li Jixian's face turned red, he had been waiting for this moment!

"Quick, quick, light the firecrackers for me, five thousand firecrackers, light them all!"

Crack, crackle, crackle...

The people below quickly lit the firecrackers, and the atmosphere was ignited in an instant. The lion dance teams on both sides began to dance excitedly, and it was very lively!

Liu Ye walked quickly towards Yung Wing and laughed, "Brother Chunfu, you're finally back. This can be considered a glorious return. Haha, welcome back victorious!"

Yung Wing's face turned red. It would be more accurate to say that this war was fought by Liu Ye rather than by himself. He was truly planning and winning from thousands of miles away. Even Zhuge Liang was no better than him when he was alive!

Yung Wing said respectfully, "Your Excellency, I dare not take any credit for this. It is all thanks to your guidance that we have achieved this great victory. From now on, I will stay by your side and be willing to serve you wholeheartedly!"

Liu Ye waved his hand and replied, "Brother Chunfu, you've been educated abroad. We don't care about these things. We only have one goal, and to achieve this goal, everyone needs to put all their energy and spirit into it. You know what this goal is, don't you?"

Yung Wing's face flushed red as he shouted, "To enrich the country and strengthen the military, to revitalize China, I will devote my life to this cause and will never regret it, even if I die!"

Liu Ye patted Rong Hong on the shoulder. By this time, Li Jixian and the others had gathered around, each one of them looking ashamed and mortified. Just a few months ago, everyone was still skeptical. Now, in just a few months, this young man had earned millions of taels of silver for Qilu Bank! Even with Qilu Bank's rapid growth, its annual profit was only a few hundred thousand taels. This amount of income could completely offset Qilu Bank's income for at least the next five or six years!

Li Jixian said excitedly, "Mr. Rong, this is incredible! You are the reincarnation of Tao Zhugong, or Fan Li. In just a few months, you have earned millions of taels of silver. We old men are blind. From today on, we firmly support every move you make in Qilu Bank!"

Yung Wing was polite and everyone entered the Qilu Bank together.

Yung Wing sat down and said, "Your Excellency, since we are thousands of miles apart, communication is very inconvenient. I have made a decision on one matter without consulting you. I beg your forgiveness."

Liu Ye smiled and said, "Decision? Tell me, what decision?"

Yung Wing replied, "Before returning, I privately decided to use a portion of my earnings to recruit American financial elites. I brought back the team of more than a dozen people I had assembled in America to Shandong. However, this expense is not a small amount, and I haven't asked for your permission. This..."

Liu Ye's eyes lit up and he laughed loudly, "Brother Chunfu, this matter is nothing. You are the general manager of Qilu Bank. You can make the decision on hiring management and technical personnel on your own. You don't need to ask me for permission, let alone the managers. This is your most basic right!"

Wang Youshun, who was standing by, asked, "Mr. Rong, I wonder how much it cost to hire these people?"

Yung Wing whispered, "There are sixteen of them in total, all top graduates from the University of Valencia and Harvard University, with outstanding abilities. I promised them an annual salary of seven thousand US dollars each, a total of one hundred and thirty thousand taels of silver..."

hiss……

These shopkeepers all gasped, and one of them even spat out the hot tea he had just drunk!

One hundred and thirty thousand taels!

Oh my god, 130,000 taels! How many 130,000 taels of silver can the entire Qilu Bank earn in a year? That's a lot of money!

Wang Youshun stammered, "Mr. Rong, I didn't hear you wrong, did I? One hundred and thirty thousand taels of silver?"

Yung Wing nodded and replied, "Yes, 130,000 taels of silver, there is no mistake!"

Looking at Yung Wing's determined face, if it weren't for the fact that Yung Wing had just earned millions of taels of silver for everyone, I'm afraid everyone would have joined forces and beaten Yung Wing to death!

That’s 130,000 taels of silver!

"Why? You can't bear to leave?"

Liu Ye asked calmly.

Wang Youshun sucked his teeth and answered with difficulty, "Sir, this is 130,000 taels of silver, not 130,000 copper coins. My bank can't even make that much money in a year..."

"Humph, you deserve not to earn that much money!"

Liu Ye snorted coldly, "Don't you know that it's easy to get thousands of soldiers, but it's hard to get a general? Hiring a top figure from the most prestigious university in America for $7,000 a year is already a bargain! If it weren't for the recent war between the North and the South, and the unrest, they wouldn't have thought of coming to China without $10,000! Look, they spend $7,000 a year on us, but you don't know how much benefit they can bring us in a year! I tell you, these sixteen people, as long as you work hard, it won't be difficult for you to earn us hundreds of thousands or even millions of taels of silver a year! Manager Wang, you need to have a broader vision and a more open mind, only then can you achieve great things..."

"Yes, yes, I know I was wrong..."

Wang Youshun felt bad for the money, but he kept apologizing to Liu Ye and Rong Hong. After all, at this moment, what the governor and Mr. Rong did was absolutely right. As long as they could earn more money, who would care how much they spent on hiring people? You can't catch a wolf without sacrificing your child!

Liu Ye nodded and said, "Brother Chunfu, how do you plan to arrange these people?"

Rong Hong said in a deep voice, "Sir, those who don't plan for the overall situation are not qualified to plan for a specific area! I have already had them review and study the Articles of Association of Qilu Bank. Although there are some good points in this Articles of Association, it is very irregular. The first thing we need to do now is to have these people work together to develop a set of standardized Articles of Association. Then we need to formulate a development plan and business model for Qilu Bank. These are all essential for a bank to grow and develop. As the saying goes, if you want to do your job well, you must first sharpen your tools. This is exactly the truth."

Liu Ye smiled and said, "Well, that's right. Chunping and I came up with the previous charter. Although we both know a little bit about it, after all, everyone has their own expertise and our levels are far apart. Let's follow your plan. After completing this work, I need you to make a development plan for Qilu Bank in Shandong and the rest of the country. Shandong, as our home base, is our foundation. At the same time, we need to extend our reach to other provinces, especially important cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Suzhou, and Guangzhou. We must have branches in these important cities, and each important branch will have one of our people in charge. This is called the regional management system!"