Murphy arrived in Knockturn Alley, where Locke was waiting anxiously for him at the Siren's Song.
Murphy's professional manager looked haggard, as if he had not had a good night's sleep in days. The moment he saw Murphy, he bowed all the way to the floor. "Lord Murphy, I have failed your trust."
Murphy helped him up. "What happened? I heard someone pass on word that Gringotts has banned gold exchanges?"
He was now preparing to build several more laboratories within Britain, and they would all need to be equipped with wizards, potions, magical creatures, potion ingredients, and so on. All of that required Galleons, not to mention the salaries he had promised those wizards for the queen.
As for his shops in the wizarding world, aside from the potion shop, which made a decent profit, the others basically existed for other purposes. Not only did they not make money, he even had to keep pouring funds into them.
Once gold exchanges were banned, he really would not have many sources of Galleons left.
Locke's face was full of misery. He stood up, yet still did not sit down in his seat. Instead, he lowered his head like a subordinate who had made a mistake and said, "It hasn't been completely banned. They've only raised the exchange commission, lowered the exchange rate, and taken your exchange business out of my hands. They no longer allow department managers to handle major clients' business independently."
Originally, Murphy's gold exchange business, as well as the payment settlements, fund transfers, and other transactions for the various shops under his name, had all been handled by Locke. Locke was essentially Murphy's fund manager.
"How much did they lower the gold exchange rate?" Murphy asked.
"One ounce of gold for twenty Galleons, with an additional five-Galleon