The first bank in California was born amid bursts of firecrackers.
To celebrate this grand event, Liang Yao even found a few old Cantonese people who knew how to dance the lion to add to the fun.
Americans had never seen lion dancing before, and they were full of curiosity about this new thing. Many miners even put down their work and came to the bank building in the center of Sacramento to watch this new thing and cheer for the lion dancers.
After the lion dance, Liang Yao wrote an inscription for the bank in both Chinese and English.
"Unveil the plaque!"
After writing the inscription, Liang Yao personally unveiled the red cloth covering the plaque, revealing the four powerful characters of "Bank of China", and below was the English name of the bank.
Liang Yao had a very good reputation in Sacramento. Some individual gold diggers also felt that carrying gold with them could easily lead to unexpected disasters, so they tried to deposit their gold in the Bank of China.
It was just a new bank, and people did not have much confidence in it. Many people deposited their gold in the bank on the first day and redeemed their gold certificates on the second day.
This caused Jones' blood pressure to spike.
"This is simply a waste of our manpower!"
The bank had just been established for two days when Jones, like a deflated ball, ran to Liang Yao dejectedly to complain.
"In two whole days, we only absorbed 2,881 ounces of gold, much of which was stored by private gold prospectors. Our goal is to absorb the gold of gold prospecting companies.
At present, only the Georgia Company has deposited 300 ounces of gold in our bank, and the Boston Company has deposited 400 ounces of gold in our bank. "
This result was also expected by Liang Yao. American banks have no government guarantee and are responsible for their own profits and losses. Once a bank goes bankrupt, the depositors' funds will be wiped out in an instant, and they will become penniless overnight. Therefore, people will be more cautious in choosing banks to cooperate with.
The Commercial Bank of China had just been established, so it was understandable that gold mining companies and gold diggers had limited trust in the Commercial Bank of China.
"For a newly established bank, this is a good result." Liang Yao patted Jones and said something encouraging.
"But this is California." Jones said something Liang Yao often said.
As Liang Yao said, it was definitely explosive news that any bank in the eastern region could absorb 2,881 ounces of gold in two days.
But in California, gold was not worth nearly as much as it was in the eastern states.
"The gold mining companies are reluctant to store their gold with us because they lack confidence in us. You are the president of the RCBC. Tell me what ideas you have."
"Raise the interest rate? Perhaps raising the interest rate a little bit can attract more gold mining companies to store gold with us."
"This is a solution, but it's not a good one. Raising interest rates is only a temporary solution, not a fundamental one."
"If I had an idea, I wouldn't come to you." Jones spread his hands helplessly, indicating that he couldn't think of any other good ideas.
"Strauss, do you have any good ideas?"
Liang Yao looked at Strauss, a new assistant.
Strauss thought for a moment and said, "The best way to make the gold mining companies have confidence in us is to let them know our strength and show that we have enough gold reserves."
"Very good. Go on."
"Counting the gold you have absorbed in the past two days, you currently still have nearly 10,000 ounces of gold in stock. We can do something about this and secretly transport the gold to the mine in the middle of the night when no one is around, and then swagger back to the bank during the day.
Of course, to show that we have more gold, we can put some rocks underneath and put the gold on top, so that they can see it deliberately. As for the safety of the gold, you don't have to worry. I believe no one in Sacramento dares to take your idea. "
"Very good, let's do it." Liang Yao agreed with Strauss's idea. Sartre brought more than 20 guards to deliver more than 800 kilograms of iron to Liang Yao.
In order to fight a price war with Brannan, Liang Yao shipped all the gold mining tools in stock to San Francisco for sale. Sven's fleet that went to Mexico to purchase supplies would not come back so soon, so he bought some iron from Sartre to make tools as an emergency measure.
"Is that all the iron? I remember you have a lot of iron tools."
The amount of iron that Sartre brought was less than he expected, which disappointed Liang Yao a little.
"Yes, I have." Sartre rolled his eyes at Liang Yao. "If those two cannons that saved your life are melted down, they can melt down 700 to 800 kilograms of iron. How about I go back and melt them down and send them to you?"
"This is a mascot, so it's better to worship it." Liang Yao smiled, looking like he deserved a beating.
"I have brought you the men you requested, but in addition to their salaries, you have to pay me an additional fee as a reward. I won't help you in vain."
"That's natural."
"The high-quality soil near the American River Valley has been mined almost completely. You said there are still a lot of high-quality mineral soils. Where are these mineral soils buried?"
Sartre looked at the densely packed tents in the American River Valley. That was the temporary camp of the gold diggers. With so many people panning for gold in the American River Valley, where could there be any high-quality mineral soil nearby?
"It's right under the river. The mineral soil under the river is intact and of high quality. The gold content of this mineral soil must be very high."
Liang Yao pointed to the rushing American River and said.
Liang Yao originally placed his hopes on increasing gold production on mercury, but he has not found mercury yet.
Since it is impossible to improve the gold mining technology, we can only start with the mineral soil at the source. There is a huge difference between high-quality mineral soil and low-quality mineral soil in terms of gold content and extraction difficulty.
"You want to change the course of the American River?" Sartre turned his gaze to the fast-flowing American River and exclaimed, "My God, your idea is crazy. This is a huge project that requires a lot of manpower!"
"It's not crazy at all. I've asked engineers to calculate that this section of the American River is 18 meters wide, 9 meters deep, and has a runoff of about 130 cubic meters. Although the water flow is relatively turbulent, it's not a big river."
Sartre had not seen many big rivers, but in his eyes, the American River in front of him was already a big river.
However, in the eyes of the knowledgeable Liang Yao, the American River is just a small river. Many tributaries of large rivers are wider, deeper, and have faster currents than the American River.
It was not impossible with his present manpower to build a dam on the American River, and to force it to change its course.
As long as he could successfully divert the American River, he would be able to mine the mineral soil under the riverbed, which would be enough for him to mine for two or three months, or even longer.
"Where are the people? To start this huge project, we need at least hundreds of people."
"I have freed up some manpower from my mines. The Boston Company has also expressed interest in this project and they hope to join in.
There is also an organization of old miners, whose leader is James Allen. He is very familiar with the hydrological conditions of the American River, and he is willing to join us. Including the more than 20 guards you brought, we now have more than 280 people, enough to start this project. "
Liang Yao originally wanted to shut down the mine and concentrate more manpower on building the dam, but the mining area still had to pretend to be in front of the bank, so he could only transfer some manpower from the mining area and leave some people to continue panning for gold, to show off to the miners in the surrounding mining areas.
"Then what about your mining area? If you withdraw the people from the mining area, the gold production there will definitely drop significantly." Sartre said with some concern.
Liang Yao had borrowed 1,500 ounces of gold from him. He knew that Liang Yao was now engaged in a price war with Brannan and was losing money almost every day. He was worried that Liang Yao would not be able to pay the interest on time and even the principal would be in danger.
"The old mine only produces about 200 ounces of gold a day. Walker doesn't care about this little bit of money."
"200 ounces of gold is a pittance to you? Your appetite is getting bigger and bigger."