Foreign exchange is not a strange phenomenon at all. Rather, the method used by the Soviets seems almost too normal. Malazov was aware of a country in the Far East called Japan, whose government would go to any lengths to gather development funds, vigorously developing service industries. Every year, it sent a large number of men overseas to work or women to places like Nanyang to sell their bodies for the country, with the latter being called "Nanyang".
In 1902 alone, Japan's total foreign exchange amounted to about 100 billion yen, with the Nanyang group contributing approximately 20%, prompting the Japanese economic community at the time to exclaim, "Japan will be a modern state built on the bodies of its women."
The yen in the late 19th to early 20th century was not like the yen in later generations; it had high gold content. In 1871, the Meiji Government stipulated that one yen equaled 1.5 grams of pure gold and was equivalent in value to the US Dollar of the time.
