Chapter 124

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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[Good work everyone.]

“Pheww—”

“Ahhh—”

As the market closed and President Jeong Jin-ho’s voice saying good work echoed through the headsets, the employees finally let out the long breaths they’d been holding.

Even though the air conditioning was on high, their entire bodies were soaked in cold sweat. Partly because many computers were running in the same space, but the tension of not being able to miss a single moment was greater.

“Ugh. My fingers hurt.”

“I feel like my body is paralyzed.”

Groans were bursting out from everywhere.

Manager Seo watched them with a pleased expression.

“I had times like that in the past too.”

“Right. Brings back memories.”

“How many hundred billions did we day-trade with back then? That alone felt like I was going crazy, but compared to now it was a drop in the bucket.”

It wasn’t just Manager Seo.

All the Prime Department employees who had experienced this intense large-scale day-trading since before were each wearing smiles.

“So, did anyone make mistakes today?”

“Amazingly, misordered are at 0%. Not a single mistake.”

“No. Really? Is that possible? With this many people?”

“I know. I was surprised when I saw the results too.”

When Manager Seo first did orientation, he thought there would be tons of misorders since many people looked clueless.

“As expected, the talent that the President selected are different. He really only picked people who are good at clicking without egos and without making mistakes.”

“But how on earth did he know that?”

“Right. I understand he only briefly looked at their profiles, so how can he know someone is right for this job just by looking at that?”

President Jeong Jin-ho’s hiring method was always fascinating.

He doesn’t directly meet the person for an interview.

Nor does he read through self-introductions.

Just one simple profile page.

With only that, he identifies what kind of work a person is suited for.

“Or maybe there’s something we don’t know?”

“Wh-what is it?”

“There’s a separate investigation team.”

“Pardon?”

“They make us bring just simple profiles, but actually there’s a route where someone else thoroughly investigates that person’s history and tendencies…”

“Manager, you’ve been watching too many movies.”

But it did seem certain there was something others didn’t know.

“So, today’s profit? How much did we make?”

“Yes.”

“H-how much?”

Lee Hye-rin received everyone’s attention.

It was such a large-scale day trade that everyone was divided into teams receiving President Jeong’s direction, frantically just trading.

Naturally they couldn’t know the total profit in real time.

“Don’t be shocked.”

“I won’t be shocked. So hurry up and tell me, how much?”

“100 trillion.”

“…?”

The employees who were confident they wouldn’t be shocked stared at Lee Hye-rin with momentarily blank faces.

“Deputy Lee, i-is that real? No, 100 trillion?”

“No, does that make sense?”

“Well, hasn’t our President made nearly double through day-trading before?”

“Th-that’s different in amount! Such an amount really came out of this frozen market?!”

The shock was understandable.

Day-trading with hundreds of trillions was a first for them too.

No, it was unprecedented in financial history.

No matter how you split 500 trillion across the entire European market.

They thought it would be hard for that to convert to big profits.

Because the European market was currently that frozen.

But then a number that exceeded their expectations came out.

If they say they made 100 trillion in just one day, who would believe it?

“Of course, this combines National Pension money and our Gwangwoon money, so how much we earned would need to be calculated separately.”

“O-okay, that aside, the market really accommodated that amount?”

“Yes. You saw too, Manager. Our President really forced the prices to pump.”

This time, Jeong Jin-ho’s strategy was simple.

“Push until it rises. Isn’t that it?”

That was exactly it.

Like ramming with a dump truck.

As if saying, still not going up?

He really pushed until it rose.

Then numerous investment companies waiting on the sidelines jumped in, and individual investors also got sucked into that black hole and started throwing money in.

“That’s why even when we sold off, stock prices didn’t shake much.”

“But doesn’t that method get you badly stuck if you miss the timing once?”

“True. But you know. Our President has a knack for timing things perfectly.”

No matter how many times he saw it, it was fascinating.

How on earth does he know that exquisite timing?

“They say the financial market is a living organism.”

“The President must be able to see that organism’s movements.”

“Know what’s really scary?”

“Wh-what?”

“This is just the beginning. Today was only the first day.”

“…”

While the reassigned employees were already exhausted from just today, President Jeong Jin-ho was conversely full of energy.

Today was just a warm-up for him.

That’s when a thought passed through the employees’ minds.

“Will the EU just stand by and watch this?”

“This is unprecedented market disruption, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know either…”

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

Lately the heads of state seem to attend meetings diligently.

No, more precisely, they seem to appear whenever there’s something to complain about.

[What on earth is this! Nobody said anything about this!]

[Day-trading with 350 billion euros! If we knew they’d disrupt the market like this, we would have blocked it from the start!]

The heads of state swarmed to the video conference.

Their raised voices made Sharol break out in a cold sweat too.

“Everyone please calm down.”

[Do you think this is a situation where we can calm down!? That company from that tiny piece of land is bombing our countries!]

[Chairman Sharol, be honest. Didn’t you receive something from Gwangwoon?]

[You put us at ease while secretly working with Gwangwoon to turn the market into this mess, didn’t you!]

At the heads of state’s pressing, Sharol finally snapped after bearing with it.

“Everyone’s going too far! Do I really look like I’m working for compensation from Gwangwoon?!”

At her sudden outburst, everyone shut their mouths.

“Of course, I too was flustered that Gwangwoon came out that way. But Gwangwoon kept their promise with us. First, they invested 130 billion euros to buy corporate bonds in mass quantity and stabilized CDS, didn’t they?”

[That’s true, but the actions afterward weren’t right, were they?]

“Yes. Disrupting the market by day-trading all that money across Europe is clearly wrong. But tell me. Which of your markets recorded a negative today?”

[…]

Nobody refuted.

Because today, the stock markets of every single country belonging to the EU rose.

Moreover, even markets where National Pension and Gwangwoon funds weren’t invested rose along with the influence of other markets.

“I know well that it’s an unprecedented, truly destructive method. But looking at the results, our frozen markets have regained vitality, haven’t they?”

[But there are companies about to shut down because of this incident.]

“Well, that’s a story that applies to forces that were shorting. Since there was a massive short squeeze, naturally they’d have to shut down. Their sacrifice is unfortunate, but ultimately the majority is improving, isn’t it?”

The conclusion was that the EU market was getting healthier.

They’re disrupting the market, yet it’s becoming a drastic prescription.

“If anyone still has complaints, please speak up. I’ll contact Gwangwoon right now and block them from entering that market.”

[…!]

This time too, no one spoke up.

They knew too.

If they block Gwangwoon’s funds here, all capital in the country would flow overseas.

The citizens jumping into the market right now also knew someone was disrupting the market.

But rather than criticizing it, everyone was rushing in together to play the money game.

If they forcibly blocked it, where would all that money flow to?

It would flow to these countries who are saying nothing now, fattening their bellies.

“Since no one has anything to say, I can proceed as is, right?”

[But… we can’t just leave this alone. The market might be pumping up now, but we don’t know when this madness might suddenly end.]

“I’m well aware of that. And Gwangwoon probably is too. They’re leaving it alone now because the market is rising, but if the opposite situation occurs, we just need to show we won’t just take it, right?”

[…]

And so the heads of state withdrew.

Sharol, who listened to all their complaints until she developed symptoms of hair loss, let out a sigh.

“Why do I feel like I’m defending Gwangwoon?”

Gwangwoon did threaten her, but perhaps Sharol also instinctively knows.

That something extreme like Gwangwoon is needed to save this market.

The only thing she was curious about was, what crazy person came up with the idea to day-trade with that much money?

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

“Ugh—”

It felt like smoke was puffing out from my temples.

There was a smell of an overheated engine at the tip of my nose.

I pressed on my dully aching temples.

“Am I reaching my limit?”

Having done nothing but day-trading for 3 days straight, it was expected.

Not stopping for a single second here, I watched all these markets and gave instructions according to the intuitions that came in.

If I pressed the wrong button and gave instructions, irrelevant money could fly away, so I really proceeded while being mindful.

So right now, my fingers, eyes, shoulders, arms, legs, neck—there was nowhere that didn’t hurt.

But despite all that suffering, the residue of thrilling dopamine still seemed to float in my head.

Currently, my mood was indescribably the best.

“President. Good work today too.”

“No. The employees worked harder than me.”

Manager Seo brought me the compiled results for today.

“Adding up profits through Day 3, it’s a total of 350 trillion.”

“Hmm. That’s a bit disappointing.”

“Pardon? D-disappointing?”

“I was thinking I could make about 200 trillion per day, but this turned out to be harder than expected.”

Manager Seo stared at me with a momentarily dumbfounded face.

“But it should be reaching the limit soon, right?”

“Ah… the market, you mean?”

“Yes. I utilized the overheated market well until now, but at the end today I felt it was running dry.”

Until mid Day 3, my intuition really ran without stopping.

But entering the latter half, the sensation suddenly cut off.

From my long experience, that too was a kind of signal.

A signal telling me that the time to play freely day-trading in this market was now over.

“We see it that way too. Actually, far more money than we expected poured into the European market. And in a short period. So now there’s no more money to gather, and I think they’ve quickly gone through a transition period.”

Then it’s time to start pulling out.

But pulling all the money out and leaving wasn’t acceptable.

Hadn’t we already caused tremendous market disruption by day-trading with that much money?

And now we made a profit so we dip out?

That would be no different from declaring war with the EU.

“We’ll need stocks to bury for a few months.”

“Yes. Actually, I did bring a few documents for that.”

I glanced through the file the manager handed me. But nothing particularly caught my intuition.

“Oh right. And this is a new proposal sent by ENIC.”

“Hm? From ENIC?”

“Yes. They sent it saying please save them now…”

What does that mean?

Save them?

“ENIC is currently experiencing severe financial difficulties. There were many investment companies that got short-squeezed this time, and ENIC is one of them. Also, stocks they were long on have prices hitting rock bottom, and on top of that they were forced to liquidate positions and have been driven to the brink of bankruptcy.”

ENIC is by no means a small company.

Yet they’ve been pushed that far into defensive position?

“…?”

But strangely, my intuition that had been quiet stirred right there.

“How much are they planning to sell Tottenham for?”

“2.5 trillion won. Tottenham currently has over 1 trillion in debt, and they say they’ll handle that themselves.”

That’s how desperate they are.

“Tottenham, how does it look? Seems good?”

“From the stadium to player facilities, everything was newly built and in great condition. There’s nothing among EPL clubs that can match Tottenham’s facilities. But in terms of profitability, it will take quite some time. The corona impact is big. Empty stadium games are continuing too.”

“But it’ll get better with time?”

“Yes. Besides, the EPL is the world’s most popular league, isn’t it? Even if it’s slow now, wouldn’t it rebound later?”

I looked at the report on Tottenham. My intuition was reacting to it.

“Then please proceed with acquisition at this price.”

“Yes.”

But I felt something was lacking.

What is it?

This nagging feeling.

“Is there anything else ENIC is putting out?”

“Ah. They’re busily selling all the stocks they have right now. But many aren’t selling because prices have dropped too much.”

“What kind of things?”

“Quite a lot of green energy stocks. Wasn’t Europe putting a lot of effort into developing that market? So they seem to have held large stakes in that market…”

My intuition stirred once more there.

“Could you bring me that list?”

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

While Europe was buzzing with astronomical money being invested, no one was actually focusing on that.

“So that guy became it after all.”

“It was an expected course.”

“Was Trent’s approval rating that low? He was self-praising a lot about reviving the US market.”

“He benefitted somewhat from that, which is why he got that many votes.”

The US election had ended.

A two-way race between Aiden and Trent.

And the winner of this election was Aiden.

“He’s still a good president for us anyway. What President Aiden emphasized since he was a candidate is the semiconductor market. We Kangsung have that market locked down, don’t we?”

“I’m a bit worried. What if they try to shake us down for money?”

“There’s certainly that possibility, but they won’t be able to just take from us. We’ll cooperate only if there’s something for our side to gain too.”

“So with Aiden elected as president, we Kangsung benefit the most?”

“That won’t be the case.”

Chairman Kang Seong-ho slightly narrowed his brow.

“Then who?”

“It’s likely to be Gwangwoon.”

“Gwangwoon? Gwangwoon is involved in the semiconductor market too, but they should be far below us? Plus they’re holding the graphics card market.”

“It’s not because of semiconductors. It’s because of something else.”

“…?”

At the executive’s words, Kang Seong-ho tilted his head.

“Remember the Tottenham talk from last time?”

“Ah. That. Those guys asked for double the price like thugs, right?”

“Yes. Gwangwoon naturally rejected that. But that seems to have rubbed Gwangwoon the wrong way. They immediately dumped massive money into the EU market, secretly attacked ENIC, and now they’re on the verge of bankruptcy.”

Kang Seong-ho burst out laughing.

Idiots.

Messing with Jeong Jin-ho of all people.

“ENIC couldn’t hold out either, and eventually surrendered and handed over Tottenham at a cheap price.”

“President Jeong really must be interested in sports.”

“Yes. We thought so at first too.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“What Gwangwoon was after wasn’t Tottenham.”

“…?”

It wasn’t Tottenham they were after?

“Tottenham was just one of the spoils. What Gwangwoon really wanted were the stakes ENIC was holding.”

“Stakes?”

“Yes. ENIC held large amounts of stakes in green energy companies in Europe, and from this attack, they all got forced position liquidation and had to urgently secure funds. Also, energy sector prices were completely destroyed.”

“And Gwangwoon swept all that up at a bargain price?”

“Yes. They took everything ENIC put out. Right now, the ones holding the most stakes in green energy sector companies in Europe are Gwangwoon and the National Pension. And do you know what Aiden is pushing even more than semiconductors?”

That’s when Kang Seong-ho blinked.

“Green energy?”

“Yes. Aiden issued an executive order on his first day in office to rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement that Trent withdrew from, and announced his position that he’ll invest the most in green energy as he promised.”

That meant Gwangwoon would benefit the most.

“Wait. But what Gwangwoon has are European companies, right? Ultimately the US will push their own domestic companies, won’t they?”

“They would. But in green tech, Europe has the best technology. Green energy companies in the US are all connected to Europe. Like it or not, Gwangwoon has now become the core of President Aiden’s policy execution.”

“!?”

That’s when the puzzle pieces clicked into place.

“Tottenham was just a smokescreen, and the stakes ENIC was holding were Gwangwoon’s real target?”

“Yes. It’s clear they were aiming for that from the start. I don’t know what close relationship they had with the Aiden administration, but now the two forces inevitably have to join hands. No, maybe they’ve already been cooperating for a long time. As if Aiden was also waiting for this, he declared he would actively push green energy.”

“Th-then what.”

Naturally he assumed they were on Trent’s side.

“They were actually on Aiden’s side?!”