Chapter 108

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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“……”

The Chairman and Division Head who came out after finishing the meeting were silent for a while.

It seemed like each was organizing their complicated thoughts.

“Division Head Jo. What do you… think? About what President Jeong Jin-ho said earlier.”

“It’s a ridiculous story.”

Division Head Jo Sang-sik shook his head.

“First of all, telling us to sell all shares the National Pension holds and convert to cash is itself a ridiculous story. When are we supposed to sell all those shares? Plus, disposing now means we have to sell at a loss, doesn’t it?”

What they wanted was Gwangwoon Securities’ investment techniques.

They wanted to know how exactly they predict stock prices and how they gather information to reach final investment decisions.

Who is Gwangwoon?

A place that’s changing financial history.

So even if they wouldn’t teach all their know-how, they thought they’d at least give some advice. But the words that came from the mouth of the person in charge there were shocking from the start.

“Plus, short selling. This is basically telling us to gamble, isn’t it? With citizens’ property at that!”

The National Pension was created with citizens’ money.

Therefore, they have a responsibility to protect that money and grow it safely.

That’s why the National Pension had internal regulations.

Always put money in safe places and pursue stable profits.

Refrain from high-risk investments like short selling or derivatives.

“Selling all assets we hold to convert to cash goes against those rules in the first place. Although the global market did shake once due to the Singapore incident, it will quickly stabilize. But telling us to liquidate here is clearly a losing move to anyone.”

“……”

“And on top of that, telling us to short sell… is not a normal idea at all.”

Telling them to sell all 700 trillion won worth of shares to convert to cash wasn’t normal in itself, and then telling them to short sell with that?

Are they sane?

“Right. It certainly was an insane idea.”

“Yes. I’m putting it mildly by saying that, but they’re clearly crazy.”

“Right. You’re correct.”

But why?

The Chairman’s expression was subtle.

“Chairman. S-surely……”

“Division Head Jo. But you know, isn’t this situation more crazy?”

“Pardon?”

“Why did we go find President Jeong Jin-ho with the thought of grasping at straws? Because this situation was going crazy. We’re about to miss the golden time, but no one is trying to seriously address this problem.”

Golden time.

The perhaps last opportunity for the National Pension to survive through reform.

But no administration tries to touch the National Pension.

Because if they touch it, their political lives would all blow away at once.

That’s why everyone hushes it up.

“In a crazy situation, don’t we need a crazy method?”

“B-but this goes beyond a crazy method—it’s too extreme. If we take losses, it will be irreversible.”

“I know. But you know too. If we continue like this, it will equally become irreversible.”

If they do nothing now, the National Pension’s depletion becomes reality.

And history will condemn these two people who stood by during this crisis.

“I don’t want to run away scared of votes like those politicians. Shouldn’t someone take responsibility for this situation and lead the change?”

“But this is gambling. Gambling with the nation’s fate at stake at that. What if we lose money? If we lose more than 10%, the acceleration of National Pension depletion will be even faster.”

The Chairman’s hands trembled.

Because just thinking about it was a terrible thing.

But whether slowly drying up and dying, or dying right now.

If the result is the same anyway, he’d rather choose the latter.

Because one of the two has a way to survive, even with very low probability.

“Are you entrusting that fate to one person?”

“It’s not just one person. It’s a person who created the enormous group called Gwangwoon. In a short time at that.”

The Chairman had been closely watching Gwangwoon for a long time.

Jeong Jin-ho, now called the real power of Gwangwoon Group.

He is a figure who changed the landscape of Korean finance.

“No one knows what he was doing before joining Gwangwoon Securities. One day he suddenly appeared and shook the financial world, then made Gwangwoon into a group. Is that all? He boldly expanded overseas and trampled anything that blocked his way, whoever it was.”

In a word, this Gwangwoon is an empire built on blood.

“Jeong Jin-ho, that person. Looking at him from outside, he seems like the kindest person in the world, but he’s actually the most ruthless person. Do you know how many companies and countries have fallen by that person’s hand?”

“And yet you’re entrusting our fate to someone like that?”

“Despite seeming like a person with no mercy in front of money, there’s surprisingly one line he doesn’t cross.”

“What’s that?”

“He doesn’t touch Korean companies.”

People crazy for money usually don’t discriminate nationality in front of money.

Looking at Jeong Jin-ho’s track record until now, he’s been swinging his blade pursuing only profits, coldly with no tears.

That person living in such madness only held onto the thread of reason in Korea.

“Jeong Jin-ho often said things like this. Rather than competing with Korean companies, he wants to grow together. He hopes Korean companies do better than foreign companies.”

“Is that… sincere?”

“Surprisingly, yes. A company has grown that much, yet is there any major Korean corporation keeping Gwangwoon in check?”

Come to think of it, that’s true.

When a company grows rapidly like Gwangwoon, major corporations usually apply pressure.

Of course, there were some putting pressure through political circles at first.

But now there’s no one.

“Those people also know. That their companies are also benefiting thanks to Gwangwoon. Just look at Kangsung. By cooperating with Gwangwoon, they even captured the foundry market they had been pushed out of.”

When Gwangwoon stepped forward to topple nations or companies, the companies behind them filled their bellies eating the falling crumbs.

“Gwangwoon has cut out without exception those who only wear the mask of being Korean companies while trying to control the market with foreign shares. LK, which has now collapsed, was the start. After that, they’ve been diligently developing domestic companies. That wanting to grow together with this country was sincere. Now do you understand why I want to place hope here?”

Only now did the Division Head understand the Chairman’s heart.

That in this crazy situation, a crazy idea is needed.

But… but even so,

“Isn’t a 700 trillion won short a bit too much?”

————————————————————————————————————————

Will the National Pension do short selling?

Half right, half wrong.

The National Pension does short through purchasing various derivatives for hedging purposes.

That is, for risk management.

But they absolutely don’t do highly speculative short selling.

There are ethical issues partly, but above all, the important thing is risk.

Especially since short selling has very large risk, they couldn’t do such gambling.

And I wasn’t advising them to short sell right now.

First, I just advised them to recover all shares and convert to cash.

“If the National Pension tries to convert everything to cash, bonds are the problem first. Nearly half the National Pension’s money is in bonds. But if a large institution like the National Pension suddenly starts selling bonds, rumors will definitely spread throughout the financial world.”

“What if they take their time?”

“The National Pension’s capital is extremely large. But if they take several months to carefully liquidate positions… it’s not impossible. They should be able to proceed with conversion to cash while minimizing market shock.”

“How long would it take?”

“With the National Pension’s skill, 3 months.”

3 months to liquidate all positions.

This is possible only because they’re skilled veterans.

Just looking at us, even liquidating over 10 trillion won in positions takes more than a week.

But they’re liquidating a whopping 700 trillion.

To quietly liquidate positions without shocking the market takes time. Even 3 months was a short time.

“What about our side?”

“After the Singapore incident, following the President’s instructions, we liquidated all positions and haven’t put capital anywhere since.”

This was because of the images my intuition showed.

Whether it was the US, China, Korea, or Europe, when I brought my hand to those countries’ indices, they all showed massive plunges.

So for now, I had pulled all assets out.

“But President. Did you really… advise the pension to sell all assets and convert to cash?”

“Yes.”

“D-do you think the pension side will actually accept that?”

I don’t know either.

But one thing is certain: if the National Pension continues like this, all the money will be depleted, causing massive social chaos.

“They probably won’t accept it, right?”

“Converting all holdings to cash isn’t an easy thing.”

“Plus I told them to prepare for short selling.”

“…Then they definitely won’t. The National Pension has internal regulations, so they absolutely don’t do gambling investments like short selling.”

It’s not legally prohibited, but it’s a regulation the company itself established, so they can’t break it. And fundamentally, the National Pension is all citizens’ money.

Even to me, telling them to gamble with that was a crazy thing.

“Let’s forget about that side. Even I think they won’t accept our proposal.”

“Yes. Then… are we entering short positions? Which market exactly should we target?”

That was the problem.

Which market to target.

After this Singapore incident, our assets have grown once more, so we need to invest 15 trillion won into the market. We can’t dump this into one market, so it needs to be distributed across multiple places.

The problem is everywhere I touch, crash warnings are coming in like crazy, so there’s no problem taking short positions anywhere.

What’s important is the ratio and timing.

Which market to position in at the optimal ratio, and when to enter.

Now I need to decide that.

‘It’ll take some time.’

Setting those one by one takes more time than you’d think.

Because I need to gather information about that market, and based on that, adjust ratios one by one according to intuition.

“Then first, from reports……”

Just as I was about to give that instruction.

“President.”

An employee came into the meeting room.

“We just got a contact from the National Pension side.”

“From the pension side?”

“Yes. They say they’ll follow your proposal from before. So they say they need related materials……”

At those words, our team members were more surprised.

“What? Th-they’ll follow?”

“Wait. Hold on. S-so they’re really going to convert everything to cash and short sell with that money?”

They just came to report, but the employee nodded with a flustered face.

“700 trillion? Really?”

“I just received the contact and came to report……”

The team members also knew.

They’re just acting that way because they can’t believe it.

And I was the same.

I never thought they’d actually accept that proposal.

“President. This must be approached carefully. If the investment fails even once……”

It’s not just us who would take losses.

The worst situation where all Korean citizens suffer losses could occur.

“One fortunate thing is, even if the National Pension really moves according to the President’s instructions and invests and takes losses, the President bears no responsibility. Because we haven’t set up an asset management company to manage their money on their behalf.”

But conversely, what if this investment succeeds?

“Then won’t the pension side want to entrust all their money to us? We set up Gwangwoon Asset Management and manage all the National Pension’s money. It would be considerable profit for our company.”

Of course, there’s the disadvantage of having to strictly manage money according to the National Pension’s regulations. But through this, they decided to ignore all the rules they’d kept and cross the line.

The line is hard to cross once, but from the second time it’s easy.

In other words, if this investment succeeds, it means we gain the sturdy ally called the National Pension, which manages over 700 trillion won.

————————————————————————————————————————

“Chairman. Wh-what in the world is going on?”

He knew they would come swarming.

At the instructions given this morning, the directors came running to the Chairman’s office with foam at their mouths.

“Everyone heard last time, didn’t they? That I went to Gwangwoon and received advice directly.”

“And that was to sell all assets and convert to cash?”

“But telling us to sell all assets we hold without leaving anything. Within 3 months at that!”

It was tight timing, but not impossible.

What they were questioning was why such instructions were given.

The Chairman burst out laughing.

Because he could already imagine how much more they’d faint when they heard the next part.

“It’s not simply converting to cash. Instructions haven’t gone out yet, but soon when materials come from Gwangwoon, we plan to take new positions according to that.”

“Wh-what do you… Is some stock price going up a lot?”

“No. Rather the opposite. President Jeong Jin-ho predicted something like a depression exceeding a financial crisis would come.”

“What?! Wait. Then you’re going to short sell……”

The directors’ heads went blank and they momentarily lost words.

They glanced at the Division Head sitting next to the Chairman.

He also shook his head as if his attempts to dissuade were useless.

“Chairman. The market outlook right now is very good. But in such a market, you’re telling us to convert everything to cash and furthermore short sell with that massive capital?”

The market that had shaken due to Singapore is restoring stability and surging vertically.

And here they’re not just selling all assets but also short selling?

“Absolutely not.”

It was hard to accept by common sense.

“I’ve already made up my mind.”

“Then we will stop you, Chairman.”

“Then hurry. Instructions have already gone out, and to stop me, you’ll have to drag me down from this position. But that’s not as easy as you think. It’ll take at least a month. By then, about half our assets will already be converted to cash.”

“Chairman!”

The Chairman stood up from his seat as if he had nothing more to hear and walked toward the window.

“I also know well the gravity of this matter. I will take all responsibility. If it fails, I’ll be handcuffed, but if it succeeds, wouldn’t it be a revolution that saves future generations?”

The directors knew well the Chairman’s stubbornness.

Look at those eyes.

There was a will that once he made up his mind, he absolutely wouldn’t bend.

“……”

The directors eventually gave up and left the Chairman’s office.

Then the Division Head who had been quiet carefully opened his mouth.

“The directors won’t just sit still.”

“I know. That’s why we need to hurry even more.”

“…Will you really be alright?”

“I’m fine.”

No. Actually, he wasn’t fine.

It was natural for any human with normal thinking.

Right now, every minute and second felt like fear.

Because this was a once-in-a-lifetime bet with the fate of all Korean citizens at stake.

“I’ve already steeled myself.”

Still, the Chairman tried to act like he was fine.

Even though the hand in his pocket was trembling like crazy.