12 Hours After

Translator: Khan

Editor: Aelryinth

The modern economic system is made of credit. We can buy rice, buy shoes, or take a taxi somewhere with a piece of paper featuring a great man from the Joseon Dynasty because there is a belief that it is worth that much.

These days, with the gradual development of fintech, even cash is rarely used; we recognize and exchange our assets by the numbers on monitors and smartphones. Using only the digital symbols on the display, we pay taxes, put in gas to our cars, and travel abroad. The problem is when this credit cracks.

If the money we have is just a fragment of a paper with a portrait on it, if the numbers in our accounts are really nothing more than a digital symbol, our society will collapse in a second.

I sat on the bed and looked out the window. Far away, the sun was rising and the sky was turning red. I looked at it with my arms crossed. I looked down at my cell phone once. The current time was 7:59. The moment it turned into 8:00.

Tiriri tiriri tiriri… The alarm went off and the word “D-day” appeared on the screen. I stared at it, then turned off the alarm. I could hear Ah-young’s voice behind me. “Good morning!”

It was a normal day when I saw Ah-young and the sun outside the window.

“Good morning.” I laughed as I received Ah-young’s greeting.

“Oppa, do you have anything you want to eat today?”

“I don’t want anything to eat… Just make it simple. I’m going to eat a little and go down.”

“Going to work today? All right. Just wait a minute.” Ah-young tied her hair and started cooking while humming, her back turned red by the sun. What a peaceful landscape it was. Looking back at history, all credit crises occurred during these ordinary days.

On a day where everything was considered to be going well, one suddenly collapses, the other collapses, and because of them, one big thing collapses, and many of the things that relied on it fall, fall, and fall. That’s why, historically, people know that it’s happening all the time, but they can’t stop it. These things come to us more secretly than people think.

———————————-

After eating the breakfast that Ah-young had made, I took the elevator to work. Secretary Park, who was guarding the president’s office, was slightly surprised and greeted me. “Are you here, boss?”

“What are you surprised at?” I asked him.

“Oh, you don’t have anything scheduled today, but you’re at work.”

Today was one of the days there was no official schedule. These last days, shareholders’ meetings, meetings of subsidiaries, and welcoming meetings of new employees had kept me so busy, and I’d had no day off at all… but there was nothing scheduled for today.

On such days, I would usually watch a movie with Ah-young at home and play with her while eating, or I would drive my car somewhere else. So, it was no wonder that Secretary Park looked strangely at me when I came to work, after looking at my timetable.

“Ahh… That’s right. I was thinking of something I had to do yesterday,” I said, blurring my words.

“What do you mean? What time will it be?” Secretary Park asked me, once again in full professional mode.

“Oh, well… I’ll tell you later.”

There was no work for me at the moment, but it would happen very quickly, and a lot. That was why I came down in advance. I was going to come and sit down before they came looking for me.

“Yes, boss.”

I nodded to him and then went into the president’s office. When I entered, I found the clock on the wall saying 8:48. I sat down and turned on the computer. It was 8:49. After booting up, I went into the mail site, put my ID and password in, and went to the mailbox. There were just four emails coming in.

[M. 12 Hours After]

[M. 12 Days After]

[M. 12 Weeks After]

[M. 12 Months After]

I opened the email of 12 Hours After.

[Politics – President Joo Sung-won said the Great Depression from China would not affect us as much as possible.

Economy – Shanghai Index Falls, Chinese version of Blackman Day. The domestic stock market is also in a tailspin.

Society – Korean-Chinese people lining up in front of the bank.

Life/Culture – People who make money in a crisis. Commenting on the movie ‘Big Short’.

World – Shanghai and Hong Kong Stock Markets crash. People are devastated.

IT/Science – Did an AI’s rebellion, or Automatic Trading Algorithm cause the big crash?]

Sure enough, there was a complete commotion. Except in the sports and entertainment category, there was only news about the financial crisis from China. I muttered to myself when I saw it, “It’s a big problem…”

I had known all about it in advance, but today, I felt different. From today on, there would be no count of failing companies, failing owners, fired people from companies, those who had invested and would lose their entire fortunes, and those who would suffer from depression and give up their own lives.

I closed my mail, took my cursor to my own HTS and double-clicked it. Usually, I turned on the HTS at this time to have the AI do the algorithmic trade, but I didn’t do that today. My timetable app, which had served as a treasure map, was completely empty for a while. Starting today, there were no surging stocks, whether it was the KOSPI or the KOSDAQ.

[Anti-cancer drug of Jaesung Pharmaceutical passes phase two of clinical trials and its stock price reaches the upper limit price.]

[Six consecutive trading days of rise due to a drop in the price of fluorescence-based pulp.]

[Pien Games gets first place in sales in new mobile games.]

Instead of the news that would be coming out, such news was so prevalent.

[Woojin Construction hit two consecutive low limit price.]

[The institutions are pouring out of Roskut.]

[Foreign investors have sold stocks for fear of a credit crunch.]

Therefore, I couldn’t trade, but it didn’t matter. In the first place, I made only a small amount of money, about forty million dollars this month, but when the news came out today, I would make hundreds of million dollars a day. It would soon become a reality.

The Shanghai Index, which opened at ten, with an hour’s difference from Korea, started trading at a level one percent down due to increased corporate bankruptcies recently. It gradually declined two and then three percent, and trading continued at that point.

Usually, investors talk about adjustments if the Composite Stock Price Index falls around one percent, two percent they say is a slump, and three percent is a sharp fall.

China’s Shanghai market started with an adjustment and was heading for a crash just an hour after the market opened. I propped my elbows on the desk, put my hands together and watched it. By now, the money I had bet on falling stock prices and the Chinese yuan was going up sharply. Around eleven o’clock, when the Shanghai Composite Stock Price Index reached -4%, something seen only once a year, I got a phone call.

“Boss, Vice President Jang wants to visit.”

“Please let him come in.”

Vice President Jang came to see me with a slightly excited look.

“Boss, the big incident happened.”

“… Oh, yes. I’m watching it, too. The Shanghai Composite Stock Price Index is four percent off.” I replied in a rather surprised tone. Of course, it was just me acting.

Jang did not seem to care much about it. He just told me what he knew. “There’s news today that the Bank of China has refused to raise money for a bankrupt local state-run company. If this is true, it’s going to have a huge impact.”

What he called the Bank of China is not the general name of China’s banks, but the state’s bank in China, such as Korea’s BK Bank or Duri Bank. In Chinese characters, ‘Bank of China’ in English is literally the bank that represents China. But the bank didn’t stop state-run corporate bankruptcies. In short, the country was not going to pay for the collapse of state-run corporations.

“… that’s a surprise.”

I continued to give a lame performance, but Jang continued to speak regardless of whether it was due to the importance of the immediate issue.

“Yes, it’s a surprising story. If this is true…”

But then, the Shanghai Composite Stock Price Index, which was on my monitor, dropped in a straight line to -7% in one second and -9% in another three seconds, where the Index stopped. Vice President Jang and I shouted at the same time:

“Circuit break!”

“Circuit break!”

Circuit break refers to when market investors’ fear is so high that when stock prices fall excessively, the trading venue of the market temporarily stops trading. Too much variation can make people greedy, scared, and lose money.

Vice President Jang muttered, “The Shanghai Index is down nine percent…”

At the same time, the KOSPI had also entered the -4% range. Korea had also tripped the circuit break at -5%. It was the same in Japan, -4%. The situation in Southeast Asia was similar.

Vice President Jang was confused. “We have a big problem. No, boss, we…”

I spread my hands a couple of times and then together as I opened them up. Vice President Jang exclaimed in a jubilant voice, “Boss, we have a big hit!”

But I watched the monitor with my face fixed. Then the telephone began to ring. Tiriri tiriri~

I answered the phone and I could hear Secretary Park’s voice. “Boss, Director Kang wants to see you… Oh, and Director Kim… Oh, and Director Chung is here, too.”

“Please let them come in.” I hung up on that remark.

Soon three men came in and shouted out:

“This is awesome, boss! The Chinese Inverse ETF we bought at Nikkei has a profit margin of more than thirty percent!”

“The FX is a lot too! The yuan’s trading is temporarily stopped! I can’t imagine how much revenue it would be if it resumed!”

“The U.S. doesn’t have a market open, but it’s already fluctuating. We’ll be making tens of million dollars this very evening!”

I replied calmly, acknowledging their excitement, “Yes, that’s great! My guess was correct. But just like I said before, don’t get too excited. We just sold yuan and Chinese stocks in line with international speculators. Do you understand?

They nodded, but couldn’t hide their excited looks. Our company’s money, which was now spread around the world, was sweeping up money all around the world.

“Go back to your place and see what’s going on. I’ll be doing that, too,” I told them.

“Yes, boss.” After coming to the president’s office in person so excitedly, they bowed to me solemnly and returned to their desks.

After they all went left the office, I took my hands, looked up at the office ceiling, and let out a long, exhaling breath. “Hoo-woo…” I told them to hide their excitement, but I was the one whose heart was beating faster than anyone else’s!