12 Hours After

Translator: Khan

Editor: Aelryinth

Doi~ Doi~ Doi~ Doi~. I looked toward the dense forest. A strange-voiced bird kept calling out.

‘What kind of bird is that crying like that?’ I wondered, as a gray-haired middle-aged man told me, “Come this way, Mr. CEO.”

“Oh yes.”

I followed him to the factory in front of me. This was a dumpling factory located at the foot of a mountain in southern Gyeonggi Province. It was where the main products of Changhae Food, a KOSDAQ-listed company, were produced. Inside the factory, women in aprons, latex gloves, and caps were constantly moving their hands.

“Our facilities have all been certified for HACCP. As you can see, it’s very fresh and hygienic. We manage our staff thoroughly.”

I looked from place to place under his guidance. Vice President Jang and Secretary Park accompanied me, watching carefully. Something came into my eyes: the “Mix Dumplings” series. When I was living alone, I remembered buying them in bulk because they were cheap and delicious. It had been a while, since I’d been eating only good things these days, but when I was a poor self-inflicted child, I thought, ‘It’s a great deal on the cost-to-benefit ratio.’

I asked him, “Mix Dumplings continue to grow in sales, right?”

“Yes. Although we’re not growing as explosively as we were at the beginning of the launch, we’re seeing a steady stream of revenue. We are planning to diversify our products, from Hong Kong-style dim sum to Japanese-style yaki dumplings. We were trying to acquire a nearby production line if we had a little more cash.”

‘Well, we can invest some money then.’ I looked around the production line a little more, thinking about it, and then walked out.

“Good to see them.”

The middle-aged man asked me, his hands clasped before him, “Then, when will you decide?”

“We’ll review it and contact you within a month.”

“Yes, Mr. CEO.”

As I said goodbye, I checked his name again, embroidered on his work suit: Woo Hae-jin. We left the factory and got into our car parked in the spacious parking lot. As soon as I got in, I told Vice President Jang, “It looks good. What do you think?”

Vice President Jang told me, “There was nothing I didn’t like.”

Changhae Food had a market capital of $150,000,000. It was a small but profitable company that had never had a deficit since its founding. Most of these food companies were for domestic use, so there was no particular reason to invest in them, but with the success of their Mix Dumplings, Woo Hae-jin, the president of the company, was eager to enter China and Southeast Asia.

I said to Vice President Jang, “It’s good to have dumplings and personal snacks. These days, people are not married anyway, and even if they’re married, there’s no one to cook. This market is bound to grow. I want to look at it positively.”

Vice President Jang nodded. “You are right. Then, shall we proceed with the acquisition process immediately?”

“No, one more thing…”

I picked up my cell phone. I went to the mailbox, opened the future news and made an appointment with Crow. I was going to call Crow and ask him if the financial structure of Changhae Food was really neat and if the money was not going to be useful to the boss Woo Hae-jin. It was neat on the finance side, but there were companies that sometimes cheated on the finance side. Crow would make it perfect. It was a kind of double-verification system that even verified the morality of a CEO.

I spoke to Vice President Jang, “A month or so… I’ll think about it more, and make a final decision then.”

“Yes, boss.”

That period was the month that Crow’s investigation results would come out. It was September 2020 now; there were still about ten months left before “D-Day”, so I still had time.

“Well, I’m done today. What’s up for next week?”

“Next week is Songhae Brewing, near Chuncheon, Gangwon-do.”

Songhae Brewing was also one of the companies in our company’s shopping cart. Like Changhae Food, BPS was growing and one of the defensive stocks, due to its focus on domestic demand with no deficit and accumulated net profit.

‘In some cases, the worse the economy is, the more people drink alcohol, and the stock price tends to rise.’ I didn’t know if sales would actually increase.

“Well, yes. Anyway, how’s the sale of Hyun Young Pharmaceutical going?”

“We are in contact with them carefully, not releasing much information. We are spreading rumors that the reason for the sale is because of other giant M&As. That way, we’ll get the right price.”

“The right price?”

“We`re now worth eight hundred million in terms of stock price, but I think we should get one to one point two billion dollars for a future growth and management premium.”

“One to one point two billion dollars…” I nodded. Jang was a very capable man, especially since he didn’t know the future. I certainly put emphasis on it! “But not too late, let us sell it early next year at the latest. It doesn’t matter if the price is a little lower.”

“Yes, boss.” While bowing, Jang looked at me curiously for a moment. It would have been strange for him to suddenly acquire two defensive companies and get rid of a successful company in a hurry. Although he had walked the elite course since graduating from Seoul National University’s economics department, there were many things that would happen beyond reason. What would happen next year was that kind of thing. We had to be fully prepared for such a thing, which was hard to predict without knowing the future. This all was thorough preparation to turn the crisis into an opportunity.

‘Next week is Gangwon-do… I’m not driving, but I guess I will be a little tired. Songhae Brewing…’ I recounted the name and told Vice President Jang, “What do they usually sell?”

“Fifty-year-old Makgeolli is the main product. These days, Makgeolli is diversifying its variety by putting chestnut or banana scent into it. I hear young people drink it a lot these days.”

“Really? When we get back to Seoul, let’s go to a nice bar instead of dinner and have a drink with the Makgeolli. It might be more important than a tour of the factory.”

Jang smiled cheerfully and agreed, “Haha, yes, sir!”

——————————

“Please go in.”

“Oh, yes.”

I stepped into the elevator at the send-off of Secretary Park. Pressing the “P” button, a mechanical voice came out, “Please enter your password.”

I pressed a few floors quickly, ’32, 18, 7, 3, 21, 15.’

The voice of that machine tone came out once again. “The password is incorrect. Please enter it again.”

‘Huh? Wrong?’ I took a deep breath. This time, I pressed the floors that were passworded correctly, ’32, 18, 7, 3, 22, 15.’

“Penthouse,” it spoke the floor I was going to, and the door closed itself. It quickly arrived at the penthouse.

When the door opened, I could see Ah-young wearing an apron, her arms folded. I raised my hands and said, “I’m here!”

She saw my red face and said to me, “You drank a lot today, didn’t you?”

“Hmm? Uh-huh. Vice President Jang was so happy that his daughter won first place in school. He kept eating a lot. Even if his position is lower than me, he is older, and I couldn’t get out of there.”

She took off my jacket and said, “But drink moderately, oppa. Would it be okay for a man to do something big to get around like this?”

When I heard that, I said with a big smile. “You’re doing well.”

“What?”

“The role of a wife.”

Ah-young was untying my tie, and she hit my chest with the palm of her hand. “Enough!”

I looked at her with a real smile. It had been a month since Ah-young had moved here. First of all, we were getting along without much dissatisfaction with each other. Before, even in the last apartment, her home was next door and we almost lived together, so we got used to each other.

I asked her before I went into the shower, “Could you make a hangover soup, like dried pollack soup, tomorrow morning? Well, I guess you learned something about it at the academy.”

She had changed her school from the announcer’s to Korean Cooking. She looked at me and said, “I’ve already done the dried pollack soup.”

“Really?”

Ah-young said, lifting her apron slightly. “Yes. I was going to make dinner, but oppa said that you were going out for a drink after dinner. So, I prepared some hangover soup.”

“Oh, yes. Good job! My Ah-young is smart.” I kissed her a little. Her soft lips touched my lips, and caused a fire. I tried to put my hand inside the apron.

Ah-young pushed me right away and said, “Ahoo, the smell of drink! “Please wash yourself and come back.”

“Oh, yeah, okay.” I nodded and headed for the shower. It had only been a month since we lived together, but I thought we could live together at this rate…

——————————–

In November 2020, I acquired both Changhae Food and Songhae Brewing. In the press, my investment had become a hot topic in the public, as I gave a premium to the existing investors to take over their shares, and did the capital increase by issuing new stock for the shortfall.

The media sent out the following news:

[Han Sang-hoon, CEO of Invictus Investment, an investment genius, has acquired Changhae Food.]

[The acquisition of Changhae, CEO Han Sang-hoon is going into the food industry.]

[Hang Sang-hoon’s acquisition of Songhae Brewing follows Changhae Food.]

[What is CEO Han Sang-hoon’s innermost thoughts, buying a series of small and medium-sized companies?]

Ant investors responded to the questions.

[Now let’s buy them. If we hold them for three years, we’ll be rich, right?]

[Twenty times of Kai Games, three times of Hyun Young Pharmaceutical, double of OH Entertainment, If we follow Han Sang Hoon, we’ll be rich.]

[I trust CEO Han Sang-hoon and I will sell my apartment and buy them. Let’s go turn our lives!]

They responded like that. Stock prices also jumped temporarily. This was a celebrity effect. In the past, Warren Buffett was found to have bought a company in Korea, which led to a slight rise in stock price due to the institutional ants that followed him. The situation now was very similar to that.

As I was looking at it, I thought, ‘I’m not sure if they are going up…’

In the first place, I didn’t pick the stocks to rise, but not to come down. At the same time, I went ahead with the sale of Hyun Young Pharmaceutical. Originally, I had capped my $800,000,000 stake at $1,200,000,000, rather high for the market; but for now, I canceled it. It was because the profits from the new drug from Hyun Young Pharmaceutical was gradually rising, as it was selling in the U.S.

My shares, which used to be worth eight hundred million, were trading at about 1.1 billion these days. I couldn’t sell it at the same asking price after the price went up. I put it up for sale at a real estate agency, but like a Gangnam apartment seller who saw the price rise, I took it back and put it back up at 1.5 billion. Although the price had gone up three hundred million dollars, someone was still willing to buy it. I thought the stock of Hyun Young Pharmaceutical would go up even more by the end of the year.

‘July next year…’ I made that trade, keeping D-Day in mind. I bought and sold the companies in the first place, and all of this was in preparation for the main game that would come in July next year.