It is always C — M, the conversion of commodity-capital into money-capital, which for the merchant assumes the form of M — C — M, inasmuch as he advances capital to purchase commodities from their producers; it is always the first metamorphosis of commodity-capital, although for a producer, or for industrial capital in process of reproduction, the same transaction may amount to M — C, to a reconversion of money into commodities (means of production), to the second phase of the metamorphosis. For the linen producer, the first metamorphosis was C — M, the conversion of his commodity-capital into money-capital. For the merchant the same act appears as M — C, as a conversion of his money-capital into commodity-capital. Now, if he sells this linen to a bleacher, it will mean M — C, i.e., the conversion of money capital into productive capital, this being the second metamorphosis of his commodity-capital for the bleacher, while for the merchant it means C — M, the sale of the linen he had bought. But in fact it is only at this point that the commodity-capital produced by the linen manufacturer has been finally sold. In other words, this M — C — M of the merchant represents no more than a middleman's function for C — M between two manufacturers. Or let us assume that the linen manufacturer buys yarn from a yarn dealer with a portion of the value of the sold linen. This is M — C for him. But for the merchant selling the yarn it is C — M, the resale of the yarn. As concerning the yarn in its capacity of commodity-capital, it is no more than its final sale, whereby it passes from the sphere of circulation into that of consumption; it is C — M, the consummation of its first metamorphosis. Whether the merchant buys, or sells to the industrial capitalist, his M — C — M, the circuit of merchant's capital, always expresses what is just C — M, or simply the completion of its first metamorphosis, with regard to the commodity-capital, a transient form of industrial capital in process of reproduction. The M — C of merchant's capital is C — M only for the industrial capitalist, not for the commodity-capital produced by him. It is but the transfer of commodity-capital from the industrial capitalist to the circulation agent. It is not until the merchant's capital closes C — M that functioning commodity-capital performs its final C — M. M — C — M amounts solely to two C — M's of the same commodity-capital, two successive sales of it, which merely effect its last and final sale.