Hu Xueyan was the largest merchant in the late Qing Dynasty of China, and his personal assets reached 30 million taels of silver at its peak, exceeding the treasury reserves of the Qing government. However, his silver empire collapsed in a short period of time, for many reasons, the main reason being that he was politically immature and fell victim to the political struggle between Li Hongzhang and Zuo Zhongtang.
Li Hongzhang and Zuo Zongtang confronted each other in many aspects, such as "foreign affairs," "coastal defense," and "land defense.", with constant differences and dismantling each other, and the open and secret struggles became more and more fierce in the later period. Hu Xueyan's strong financial support for Zuo Zongtang made Zuo Zongtang repeatedly gain the upper hand, which made Li Hongzhang very annoyed. Li Hongzhang set up the strategy of "paizuo must first remove Hu", first cutting off Zuo Zongtang's wings and then knocking him down. In the political struggle between Li Hongzhang and Zuo Zongtang, Hu Xueyan thus became a victim of Li Hongzhang's "paid left must first remove Hu."
Any historical event has complex factors and backgrounds, in the process of Hu Xueyan's downfall, such a powerful figure emerged called Sheng Xuanhuai, who directly subverted the silver empire that buried Hu Xueyan. You have a "Zuo Hu" and "official and business combination", and Li Hongzhang and Sheng Xuanhuai have a pair of "Li Sheng combinations". Sheng Xuanhuai, Li Hongzhang's confidant, zi xingsun, Jiangsu Wujin people. He controlled or participated in the establishment and development of steamship, mining, telegraph, railway, textile and other industries in modern China. He is also the founder of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Tianjin University and Zhangyu Wine Company, and he occupies an extremely important position in the history of China's modern industrial and commercial development.
During the fight between Li Hongzhang and Zuo Zhongtang, Hu Xueyan was proud of his smooth sailing in the shopping mall, and driven by continuous success, he ventured into the silk market and the international market that he was not familiar with, and launched a business war with American businessmen. But he lacked political experience, was caught up in the whirlpool of political struggle, could not judge "the mantis fluttered, the yellow finches were behind", did not know that potential opponents were paying close attention to his flaws, and ignited the fuse of bankruptcy himself.
At that time, Hu Xueyan could not stand the long-term occupation of China's raw silk export market by foreign investors, and proposed that "inviting people to raise funds to buy together, then Yi people must serve", he took the lead in using 20 million taels of silver and hoarding more than 14,000 packages of raw silk, more than two-thirds of the annual trading volume of raw silk in Shanghai. When the market price of raw silk rose, Hu Xueyan not only did not sell, but continued to hoard, trying to force foreign merchants represented by Americans to increase the purchase price. But he did not expect that the international market had been controlled by the United States, and when Chinese merchants wanted to sell their goods, they could not export them. In the end, Hu Xueyan and others had to stop the acquisition, and the hoarded raw silk could not be realized, which directly led to poor capital turnover. In the summer of the ninth year of Guangxu (1883), Hu Xueyan was forced to sell raw silk cheaply, losing more than 10 million taels and losing half a fold in strength.
At this critical moment, the French army attacked the Qing army stationed in Vietnam, and the Sino-French War broke out. Zuo Zongtang was again recruited into the military plane, and Hu Xueyan prepared military salaries for Zuo Zongtang. Li Hongzhang took advantage of Zuo Zongtang's absence in Liangjiang and commanded Sheng Xuanhuai to prepare to attack Hu Xueyan. At this time, Hu Xueyan's huge loan of 800,000 taels to foreign banks for the Qing court was due just in time, and this loan was borrowed by Hu Xueyan for Zuo Zongtang's march and war over the years, and the foreign banks only recognized Hu Xueyan. According to the custom, as soon as the local salaries arrive, the Shanghai Daotai Government will transfer the money to Hu Xueyan and let him repay the loan.
Sheng Xuanhuai made an article in this regard, and he approached Shao Youlian of the Shanghai Daotai and bluntly said that Li Hongzhang meant to slow down the payment of this salary, and the time was twenty days. Shao Youlian was Li Hongzhang's man, and naturally did so. After implementing this matter well, he colluded with foreign banks and collected money from Hu Xueyan on schedule. Due to the suddenness of the incident, in the midst of an emergency, Hu Xueyan had no choice but to transfer 800,000 taels of silver from various qianzhuangs in Fukang Bank and return it to a foreign bank first. Hu Xueyan did not think that this matter was so serious, he thought that the salary must be given to him, and it was not a big deal to send it twenty days late.
Secretly, Sheng Xuanhuai, through a telegram, knew all the amount of money transferred by Hu Xueyan, and he began to strike a fatal blow to Hu Xueyan. He seized the emptiness of Fukang Bank and organized people to withdraw money to the bank to run. These withdrawalees are all gentlemen and merchants, ranging from thousands to tens of thousands. He also let people go around, saying that Hu Xueyan had hoarded raw silk and lost a lot of money and embezzled deposits from Fukang Bank. Today, 800,000 loans are still owed to foreign banks, and Fukang Bank is about to collapse. With such a clamor, depositors quickly withdrew money, and a run storm broke out in Shanghai. Sheng Xuanhuai sat there, fanning the wind and igniting the fire to make the movement very large.
Hu Xueyan rushed to Shanghai at night and asked the general manager to urge Shao Youlian of the Shanghai Daotai to quickly pay the salary, and Shao hid from him. Hu Xueyan hurriedly sent a telegram to Zuo Zongtang, asking Zuo to help him save the emergency. Sheng Xuanhuai secretly asked someone to withhold the telegram, so that Zuo Zongtang could not receive the telegram. The next day Hu Xueyan saw that zuo Zongtang had no reply, which was really urgent, and personally went to the Shanghai Daotai mansion to urge, Shao Youlian had slipped away.
Hu Xueyan had to sell his land title deeds and real estate, and at the same time sell the accumulated silk cheaply, hoping to survive the run. I don't want this tide to come quickly and become more intense, and the Shanghai run will soon get out of control. Fukang banks everywhere are also crowded, deposits have been withdrawn, and bank thresholds have been broken. Shanxi ticket numbers and foreign banks also could not withstand the pressure, and they stopped capital injection and borrowing, and restricted the repayment of long-term loans by the end of October of that year. Hu Xueyan's Fukang Xueji Qianzhuang first collapsed, and then Hu Qingyutang changed owners and declared bankruptcy. Frenzied withdrawals and interruptions led to Hu Xueyan's Fukang brand in Beijing, Hangzhou, Ningbo, Fuzhou, Zhenjiang, Hubei, Hunan and other places falling like dominoes, all of which collapsed and declared bankruptcy.
Hu Xueyan only then understood that someone had done his hands and feet. The collapse of the Fukang Bank was a matter of great importance, Shao Youlian hurriedly reported it to the imperial court, and Zuo Zongtang hurriedly came from the Capital Division. In a panic, Hu Xueyan met with Zuo Zongtang three times and asked Zuo to find a way to clean up the mess for him. However, as a big customer of Fukang Qianzhuang, Prince Gong Yixuan, Shangshu of the Punishment Department, And others, who co-founded the university Scholar Wenyu, saw that death was not saved, and they all slipped away. Li Hongzhang and others added fuel to the fire and also shook out the fact that Hu Xueyan overstated interest when he borrowed money from foreign banks, and Empress Dowager Cixi was furious when she learned of this, asked Hu Xueyan to double the compensation, and ordered the confiscation of Hu Xueyan's family property.
In the tenth year of Guangxu (1884), Zuo Zongtang fell ill. Zeng Guoquan acted as the governor of Liangjiang, and he said, "Hu Guangyong's case was used for public expense, not embezzled," but hu Xueyan tried to find a way to evade the investigation, but it was fruitless. In the eleventh year of Guangxu, Zuo Zongtang died of illness, and Hu Xueyan's biggest patron collapsed violently. Hubu Shangshu Yan Jingming fell into the well and asked "the revolutionary Daoists to embezzle public and private funds, please hand over the punishment department to punish the crime, and correct the law of the country", the imperial court immediately approved the performance, Hu Xueyan had already died of illness before the arrival of the escort and imprisonment order. Hu Xueyan's life was thus over, and the Qing court could not solve his case.
After Hu Xueyan's death, Sheng Xuanhuai lacked a strong competitor and his career flourished. In 1885, he went to the Steamship Merchants Bureau as an inspector, and at the invitation of Zhang Zhidong, he returned to Hubei to organize the Hanyang Iron Works, after which Sheng Xuanhuai was appointed as the Minister of Commerce and Shangshu of the Ministry of Posts and Communications.
The main reason for Hu Xueyan's failure was that he was too ambitious and eager to expand, which caused the bank to be squeezed due to lack of liquidity. But the deep-seated reason is the collapse of the official background and the collapse of the official field, from the blows of political opponents. Although Hu Xueyan also wore a two-pin top, he did wander outside the official field, did not understand official reasoning, did not know how to be flexible, and became a "victim" of Li Hongzhang's strategy of "rowing left first, reversing left first" strategy.
Watching Hu Xueyan traverse the rivers and lakes, rich enough to be enemy of the country, going in and out of the imperial court temple, but in a short period of time, his career collapsed, his reputation was broken, and a sudden change of "building up and down" was staged on the stage of history, which made people sigh.