The Heart of Brazilian Life in the USA

  The problem is, like, super complicated 'cause there's, like, no docs for that time period and the accounting stuff was all mixed up with capital-stock expenses and current expenses, you know? 66 Planters just did the math on their yearly cash flow to see how they were vibing. This lowkey made them think they were flexin' on their financial status, but it was all cap. Then like, Brazil and its metropolis, Portugal, were like always lacking money in circulation, especially in the period before 1580. This led to prac- tices like the swap of goods for services or for other stuff, payments over time and a reliance on complex credit vibes. The manager of Engenho São Jorge was like, "Yo, in 1548, this situation was like totally different, you know? But then, between 1580 and 1620, the Portuguese in Brazil started getting their hands on Peruvian silver through some sneaky contraband stuff via Buenos Aires. 

The crown was like, 'Whoa, that's like 500,000 cruzados in coin and bar every year, dude!' 

But this door was like totally closed after 1621 and the previous conditions of shortage came back, ugh. So like, the planters were totally bummed about not having enough cash flow, which made them always in debt and made it super hard to figure out how much money they were making and spending. So like, for the first 50 years of the sugar industry, we gotta rely on random observations, a couple of estimates from back then, and like, comparing it to later trends, ya know? In the beginning years of the industry, like, some capital came from noble or foreign merchant investors or the state, ya know? But, like, many of the mills were set up depending on credit extended by merchants in the sugar trade. No cap. Yo, back in the day, peeps would get land by snagging it through grants and making the Indians work for 'em. It helped keep the initial costs low and jumpstarted the whole capital formation thing, ya know? Like, yo, they had to like, build stuff and get machinery, buy or make kettles and sugar forms, get livestock, build boats and ox-carts to move the cane, and prepare or contract the cane lands. It was a whole vibe, you know? One source of cap for the sugar indus- try seems to have been gov offices. 

Like, there were totally similar vibes goin' on in Bahia and Pernambuco, ya know?

Those tryna get into the sugar-making game usually found that cash money was hard to come by, so credit was hella important to start things off for both the planters and the cane farmers — sometimes the farmers relied on the planters to hook them up with it. If later patterns can be used as a vibe, many plantations were set up with an ou- tlay of only about one-third of the necessary capital, the rest being flexed by credit. This like totally let peeps with not a lotta cash to flex and become senhor de engenho, and it meant their gains were way higher than what you'd expect based on their capital to annual income ratio. Lit, right? Credit was like, totally obtained from a bunch of sources, ya know? The charitable brotherhoods (misericórdias), convents, and other religious institutions were like, the major sources loaning money on easy terms of about 6.25 percent to low risk or high profile borrowers. So chill, right? These loans were like, hella long term. OMG, like, borrowers who weren't as lucky got loans with way higher rates from merchants who were, like, finding sneaky ways to get around the rules on charging crazy interest. Many old heads established an engenho, but they were flexing on credit, ya know? But that often caused beef with merchants over foreclosure for debt. SMH. The recent studies by João Fragoso on the sugar game in Rio de Janeiro spill the tea that most of Rio's sugar fams before 1620 were flexing their admin skills to secure the bag and make that plantership life possible, you know what I mean? Succeeding gens totally flexed on those sugar mills and had mad clout in the Rio de Janeiro council, keeping that office and fortune game strong. Royal office, the flexin' tax contracts, and municipal office all straight up generated mad capital that was invested in the sugar industry. 

The lack of notarial records for this period from Pernambu-co or Bahia are, like, a major bummer in figuring out what kind of credit stuff was going on. 

What's hella obvious is that the Amsterdam notarial registers, where mad transactions involving New Christian investors linked to the Brazil trade and the Portuguese imperial economy go down, don't really show any proof of straight-up investing in sugar production70. OMG, it looks like the local peeps and homies in the colony were mostly giving credit instead of the European peeps. OMG, like, in the 1570s, the sugar industry was totally blowing up! People were all like, "OMG, those sugar planters are sooo rich and fancy!" They were all about throwing epic parties, living their best lives, and flexing their noble vibes. In Antonil's iconic saying, being a senhor de engenho in Brazil was like flexing with a title among the nobility of Portugal. But prestige wasn't the same as flex. Despite being all about that bougie life, the returns on capital for planters don't seem to have been as lit as some modern estimates have hyped up. They totally overestimated the output and underestimated the costs, fam. Labor was, like, a major part of these expenses, ya know? It was a fixed cost for buying, replacing, feeding, and taking care of slaves, like around 25% of yearly expenses. But there were also salaries paid to sugar making experts, artisans, and occasional workers, which made up like 20-30% of the annual costs. OMG, like, we've totally seen how sugar planters were all about cutting expenses in this area.