Chapter 122

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Heavy silence flowed in the hot sauna heat.

Soon my hyung briefly exhaled and said.

“Vice President.”

“Ah, yes, Chairman.”

“I’m greatly disappointed.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

The Vice President was completely chastened today.

“I believed you’d do better than this at least.”

“If I may excuse myself. There’s been a lot of this and that to do lately. We recently started operating the asset management company too.”

“That’s why I gave you a week off. To practice.”

There was a reason my hyung was scolding the Vice President in the sauna today.

“If you’re a tank, act like a tank and go forward to body-block for teammates and fight! What do you mean backing off!”

“Survival instinct kicked in without me knowing…”

“You were like that when you were a trader too. You could have eaten if you pushed forward more, but you always retreated pursuing only safety.”

“Still… I didn’t lose much.”

“You didn’t gain anything either, did you?”

“…”

The reason my hyung was nagging the Vice President today was none other than today’s raid.

“Jin-ho. You say something.”

“Well, what can I say? The Vice President worked hard.”

“P-President!”

“Of course, the tank kept not staying in front and falling back, so the dealers there got mass-killed, the healers were ruthlessly murdered, and it was a total disaster.”

“…”

“We couldn’t clear the raid and wasted time, but it’s fine. We can clear it next time, right? No wait. Will he retreat again then too and get all the guild members wiped out and fail to clear…”

“Please just curse at me, President.”

My hyung and I burst out laughing looking at the gloomily bowed Vice President.

“It’s a joke, man. It wasn’t a raid we couldn’t clear because you alone died.”

“What? But didn’t we really not clear it?”

“Everyone pretended on purpose to mess with you. Heh heh, if we really tried hard it ends in an instant. Our guild members are on the older side, but everyone’s serious about gaming. They’re good too, and above all, Jin-ho gathered the guild members separately and trained them.”

The Vice President made an expression of being properly fooled.

“Still, practice a bit. A tank showing their back to the boss is unthinkable.”

“Understood. I’ll do my best not to be a burden to our guild!”

“Good attitude. But don’t feel too pressured. The reason Jin-ho built this landmark is to play comfortably on weekends like this, right?”

“Yes. President Jeong’s decision to build this landmark was truly excellent.”

“Ah, you’re all making me blush again.”

“No. Usually when I go out to play alone on weekends, my wife complains, but now she likes this place the most. Other guild members have maximum satisfaction too. The wives have things to do, the kids can play separately, we play games—this is paradise.”

When I first said I’d build a landmark for our guild members, reactions around me were lukewarm.

The question was whether they could really come here to play every weekend.

But after it was completed, guild members gathered with their families every weekend without exception.

“Coming every weekend to refresh, playing at ease, how great is it? Of course, maintenance costs must be no joke.”

“Well, this much is fine. I’m doing it because I like it.”

“Oh right. Sorry to talk business when we came here, but what’s this about Tottenham? The team our country’s player is on, right?”

“Yes, that’s right. To be precise, ENIC wants to sell all their stake in Tottenham.”

Tottenham is a team representing North London, England.

Called one of the Big 6 with a thick fan base, this club is owned by ENIC.

“ENIC… isn’t that a famous investment company in England?”

“That’s right. ENIC holds 85% stake in Tottenham, and they’re putting it all on the market and testing the waters everywhere.”

Tottenham was originally one of the clubs with good profitability.

But due to corona’s influence, all football clubs worldwide were currently suffering.

They can’t accept spectators, so they can’t earn ticket money.

They can’t do promotional broadcasts or advertisements, and meanwhile player wages and employment costs continue going out.

“So Tottenham chairman Samuel Levy revealed this is the first such financial crisis and conducted massive restructuring.”

“And it’s still not resolved?”

“No. If the British government gave loans, it would give some breathing room, but Britain isn’t comfortable enough to lend hundreds of billions right now. Moreover, Tottenham built a new stadium and their debt exceeds 1 trillion won.”

It meant no income was coming in and only money was going out.

“So how much are they selling for?”

“About 7 trillion won.”

“7 trillion won? That seems expensive?”

“It is expensive. According to Forbes and KPMG reports, the club value is estimated at about 3 trillion won.”

“But they want to sell for 7 trillion won?”

“Since they’re selling anyway, they must want to make a killing. Especially since our country’s most famous player is at Tottenham.”

They deliberately attached a premium and put it up at an expensive price.

“What thugs.”

“They’re originally famous for that sort of thing.”

“Even so, this isn’t right. Selling at 2x the price? They wouldn’t raise the price that much for other countries. Let’s just drop this. We weren’t interested in that anyway.”

“Yes. I was going to oppose acquisition too.”

“What about you, Jin-ho?”

“I have no intention of acquiring at that price either.”

They were trying to properly catch a sucker, and I had no intention of accepting.

But why.

“…?”

A strangely tingling signal seemed to pass through my body.

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

“President. The EU sent a new document, and they say they’ll proceed under conditions similar to the US. No, actually it’s even more drastic. The US freed us but agreed we’d hold positions for 3 months. Here, there’s nothing like that.”

“…Why?”

“I’m not sure.”

The EU was trying to squeeze us with all kinds of regulations and use our money as they pleased.

But they suddenly changed that stance.

All I did was send a blank document.

“There aren’t poison clauses or anything like that, right?”

“Yes. Nothing like that at all. They say they’ve already consulted with multiple European countries and reached a conclusion. To free us more, like the US.”

“Does that mean the European market is that tough?”

“Initially they were being prideful, but as the market situation kept worsening and public opinion deteriorated, they seem to have changed their minds. I heard the EU chairman enthusiastically persuaded the heads of state.”

So they judged it wasn’t time to be picky and should take our money at least to save the financial market.

The EU chairman probably thought it was best to release large amounts of money as quickly as possible.

Or there’s some other reason to help us.

“What should we do?”

“If they’re easing regulations this much, there’s no reason not to. Good thing we put money in the account.”

“Yes. Honestly, I never thought they’d suddenly ease regulations this much. Maybe they realized after the fire dropped on their feet. Then, shall I give you the research materials first?”

I glanced at the employees waiting behind Manager Seo.

Reports were piled high.

“…There’s a lot.”

“This time we’re not entering a single country’s financial market like the US, but investing across the entire European market. There are 27 countries in the EU alone, and even if we won’t enter all those markets, we need at least basic information.”

The documents piled like a mountain made me feel my breath was blocked.

But… what needs to be done, needs to be done.

And I wasn’t doing this work alone. The team members here have to review more diligently than me.

“The basic proposal is to buy corporate bonds to prioritize stabilizing CDS first. After using those amounts first, the final amount we can operate is about 500 trillion.”

That didn’t mean there were no proposals at all.

First was buying corporate bonds en masse for the most urgent CDS stabilization and giving them a moment to breathe.

“The representative EU financial markets are France, Germany, and Italy—these three countries. To revive the financial markets of European countries in the EU, entering these three countries’ markets first is the best approach.”

And once these three countries stabilize, Spain, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland, etc.

They thought injecting funds sequentially was right.

“So dividing roughly by percentage, first inject about 80% into France, Germany, and Italy, and it’s right to evenly distribute the rest across other markets. Germany and France each have about 5,000 trillion won financial market scale so fund utilization is smooth, but Italy is about 1,500 trillion won, so suddenly injecting a lot of money would be a big shock.”

I nodded and checked the reports the team members brought.

“…”

Indeed, as if waiting for this day.

As soon as I opened the research materials, my intuition was vigorously running wild.

Lights were twinkling here and there as if asking to be bought, and I checked them off one by one.

Is the quantity too much to finish today?

I have to split up 500 trillion won and spread it.

In other words, I need to decide exactly how much to put in. And that’s not all.

“Um, President. But checking these stocks means buying them, so how long should the period be?”

In the US, we were forcibly locked in for 3 months.

This EU market doesn’t require that, but shouldn’t we hold for at least 1-2 months?

If we truly want to revive these markets.

“Then should we make it about 2 months?”

At Manager Seo’s words, I waited for my intuition to react. But no feeling came at all.

“If you don’t like 2 months, should we make it 1 month?”

“…”

No feeling came this time either, so I shook my head.

“Th-then about 3 weeks?”

“…”

The problem was no reaction at 3 weeks either.

The manager kept lowering the number.

“2 weeks, 10 days, 1 week…”

“…”

“F-5 days? No, 3 days!”

Still no reaction, so this time Hye-rin shouted.

“1 day!”

This isn’t some auction or something.

But even at 1 day, my intuition was completely silent.

Could my intuition have suddenly broken?

If not…

“President. N-no you can’t!”

“Pardon?”

“That alone is absolutely not allowed!!”

Wh-what is it?

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

When Chairman Sharol said she would lift all restrictions, there was fierce backlash in the EU.

Saying she must be completely insane.

But the heated emotions were only momentary.

They too eventually had to cool their heads.

Reality is much colder than that, isn’t it.

If they don’t do a bailout right now, businesses will burst in droves.

The situation was such that they had no choice but to open the way for Gwangwoon and National Pension.

Of course… Sharol felt personal threat and was more desperately persuading the heads of state.

How bad must it have been for people around her to say Sharol must have received money from Gwangwoon.

‘Everyone doesn’t know my heart.’

She would have rather been okay if she had received money.

The fear she felt when she received hundreds of pages—filled with nothing but blanks.

Those who haven’t experienced it directly could never understand.

“So, how is it? Are they spreading money now?”

“Yes. Gwangwoon and National Pension are buying corporate bonds as first priority to stabilize CDS.”

Today was that first day.

That’s why the chairman was watching all day how Gwangwoon and National Pension’s funds were moving.

She gave them a free pass, but at least she should pretend to watch from the side.

“That’s a relief.”

And they seemed to be executing well according to the contract.

First, they were buying up all those corporate bonds and saving companies on the verge of bankruptcy.

“What about other things?”

“After purchasing corporate bonds, they’re sweeping up stocks in earnest.”

As expected, they’re doing well step by step.

Plan probably to buy lots of stocks, raise prices, then sell after a few months.

Didn’t they make a ton of money in the US that way?

Honestly, her insides were burning.

But if that method could save the European market, it doesn’t matter.

She even thought bringing them in was really the right call.

“But the behavior after that is a bit strange.”

“Hm? What’s strange?”

“I thought they’d hold a bit after buying stocks in large quantities, but not long after they immediately sold.”

“Pfft!”

At that report, Sharol spat out the water she was drinking.

“Wh-what? Sold immediately? When they just bought it?”

“Yes. There were cases where buy and sell orders were executed in just a few minutes, and in severe cases, it happened in seconds.”

“!?”

Then what does this mean?

“Y-you’re saying Gwangwoon is day-trading right now?!”

With that much money?