New Employees With an Annual Salary of 1 Trillion Won - Chapter 140

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 140. Cracks (4)

Disassembly and assembly.

It was my only hobby.

After finishing work and returning home, I would spend time disassembling and assembling various electronic devices.

Beyond electronics, I had even started disassembling and assembling cars.

For my hobby, I contracted with a car center and even had a dedicated lift installed.

But recently, I hadn’t visited the car center even once.

Because I had found something even more interesting to disassemble and assemble.

“Manager Jung has poor performance, but he’s popular on-site, so he’d be good for Team 3.”

My new hobby was none other than organizational disassembly and assembly.

I had already conducted organizational restructuring once targeting Daehyeon Construction executives, and confirmed that the gear structure operated much more smoothly as a result.

However, I regretted not being able to restructure all employees due to time constraints.

So after work, as a hobby, I would flip through employee evaluations and spend time rearranging the organization’s gears.

My hobby didn’t end there.

When organizational restructuring became boring, I would examine the gear structures of various companies.

Some days I would discover companies that suddenly developed cracks and were creaking, while other days I would find companies unexpectedly picking up speed.

Of course, I couldn’t see every company’s structure.

Only IT companies or companies in fields I was particularly interested in were visible, and the more similar they were to companies Tiger Fund had acquired, the clearer their structures appeared.

What I was particularly focusing on lately were credit card companies.

Tiger Fund had already acquired Hanseo Card, and in that process I had encountered countless pieces of information related to card companies.

Moreover, having experience introducing various systems including credit scoring to lower Hanseo Card’s debt ratio, I could grasp other card companies’ structures in considerable detail.

“It’s definitely not a normal structure.”

Hanseo Card under Tiger Fund had a nearly perfect structure.

Though smaller in scale than other card companies, all its gears meshed smoothly and rotated stably.

In contrast, other card companies’ structures were different.

Their gears were severely worn, and there were large cracks in the central axles.

Each rotation produced ear-piercing discord, and as time passed, that noise was growing louder.

“I need to look more closely.”

This wasn’t something to end as a hobby.

I hurried to the fund office and summoned the deputy branch manager and related staff.

***

Two days later.

The General Manager returned from his overseas business trip and came to the fund office.

Seeing our disheveled appearance, he was shocked and asked about our well-being.

“Did some war break out? Why does everyone look like that?”

“We found stocks on the verge of collapse.”

“Really? What stocks were they that had everyone working like this?”

The General Manager casually threw his coat on a chair and approached.

I pulled out the materials I had analyzed so far and began explaining.

“Korean card companies are in really terrible condition. At this rate, most will face bankruptcy within a year. Several have a very high possibility of actually collapsing.”

“Card companies? Don’t card companies break their performance records every year? Even Hanseo Card grew more than twice its size from a year ago.”

Hanseo Card had now established itself as a stable revenue source.

Though not large in scale, its sales were growing little by little each month,

and explosive growth was possible especially thanks to its connection with Rollbook Mart and Rollbook Shopping.

However, other card companies’ situations were completely different.

They didn’t have clear growth reasons like we did.

“They didn’t grow healthily, but rather it’s closer to force-feeding junk food to gain weight artificially.”

“So you’re saying their internal situation isn’t good.”

“Correct. They’re competitively issuing cards indiscriminately and even recklessly providing cash advances. Though it looks profitable now as high-interest short-term loans, delinquency rates are rising noticeably. They’re essentially carrying increasingly large bombs.”

The situation was more serious than when we acquired Hanseo Card.

On the streets, they were issuing cards to university students and housewives regardless of credit rating.

Card companies that fell behind in the issuance competition were excessively expanding cash advance limits to boost short-term profits.

“Do you think the bomb will explode soon?”

“Card companies are issuing large-scale card bonds to secure liquidity. But they’re short-term bonds with short maturities, so they’ll mature within a year.”

“Several card companies won’t be able to handle the approaching maturity.”

“Actually, it’s not just several. All Korean card companies are in similar situations. As you can see from the data, if we apply the credit score system we used for Hanseo Card to other card companies, they don’t even score 40 points.”

The credit scoring system I created.

By existing credit rating standards, the card companies’ condition wasn’t bad.

In fact, looking only at credit ratings, they were receiving much higher ratings than Hanseo Card.

“The gap between credit ratings and credit scores is serious.”

“Because rising delinquency rates and increasing bad debt ratios aren’t properly reflected. They’re caught in the illusion of rapid growth and recklessly emphasizing only maximum performance.”

“If it’s this certain, we must definitely move. What’s your plan?”

The General Manager had entrusted me with all authority regarding Korean investments.

There was no problem proceeding with investments without reporting, but he wanted to know the plan out of curiosity.

“We plan to proceed with short selling. Currently listed card companies are GL Card, Samjin Card, and Foreign Exchange Card.”

“There really aren’t any other listed card companies besides those. The scale won’t be that large.”

“Even GL Card, the industry leader, has a scale of only 7 trillion won. All three card companies combined don’t exceed 20 trillion won.”

“Then the short-sellable volume would be limited to about 3 trillion won.”

3 trillion won wasn’t a small scale by any means.

If card companies faced bankruptcy as expected, we could earn 50% returns.

Short selling just 3 trillion won could yield massive profits of 1.5 trillion won.

But it seemed woefully insufficient to our eyes.

We couldn’t finish this long-awaited opportunity with just 1.5 trillion won, so we had already prepared other contingency plans.

“We want to also short sell securities companies and financial companies that are major shareholders of card companies. That way we can expand the short selling scale to 5 trillion won total.”

“If card companies face bankruptcy, related securities and financial companies’ stock prices will also fall together.”

“Though not as drastically as card companies, they should drop at least 10% and up to 20%.”

“5 trillion won scale isn’t bad, but it’s still a bit disappointing.”

The General Manager wasn’t satisfied even with 5 trillion won.

Of course, I felt the same way, and had been researching methods to invest larger amounts with the fund employees.

“So we also plan to invest in CDS.”

“You’re extending to derivatives that bet on bond defaults too. Well, the higher the risk, the greater the returns. And above all, you won’t be bound by volume restrictions like stock short selling.”

CDS was simply put, insurance.

Precisely, it was buying and selling insurance that bet on corporate defaults.

If companies actually went bankrupt or their creditworthiness plummeted causing bond values to drop significantly, massive profits could be obtained.

It had a similar structure to short selling but was different.

If short selling simply bet on stock price declines, CDS bet on corporate creditworthiness and bond defaults.

Though they appeared similar on the surface, there was a crucial difference.

Short selling had limits on the volume of stocks that could be borrowed, but CDS could be issued indefinitely.

It was a structure where both risk and returns could grow endlessly.

“How much CDS will you contract?”

“We’re thinking 5 trillion won, the same amount as short selling. If everything proceeds as planned, total profits of 5 trillion won are possible.”

“Investing 10 trillion won to earn 5 trillion won would be quite satisfactory. With 5 trillion won, we could acquire another decent company. Do you already have somewhere in mind?”

The General Manager guessed I was planning to acquire another company.

Since I had led major acquisitions like Daehyeon Construction, semiconductors, and delivery services over the past year, such a reaction was natural.

And in fact, I was indeed making such plans.

“I’m thinking of acquiring a card company.”

“Short selling card companies and acquiring a card company? Well, that’s Wall Street’s way, but I didn’t know you’d use such methods, Branch Manager.”

“It’s a method to maximize returns while acquiring a card company cheaply. If everything proceeds as designed, we can acquire a card company without spending a single penny.”

Card companies were definite cash cows.

Just looking at Hanseo Card, though its debt ratio was serious, once we reduced the ratio and improved soundness, it recorded tremendous profits every month.

So there was no reason to hesitate.

If we could acquire the industry’s number one card company, which was much larger than Hanseo Card, we could not only expand sales but also enable various linked businesses through economies of scale.

“Which card company are you considering acquiring?”

“We’re considering acquiring GL Card, the industry leader. If we acquire GL Card, which has over 30% market share, and merge it with Hanseo Card, we can solidly maintain the number one position in the industry for at least 10 years.”

“Looking at the materials, GL Card’s situation seems to be the most serious.”

The General Manager looked over the materials again.

I pointed to the debt section among the GL Card-related materials.

“The estimated debt reaches 20 trillion won. It’s a debt scale that even the entire GL Group couldn’t possibly handle to protect GL Card.”

“The debt is more serious than Daehyeon Construction. Can we handle it?”

“The Fund doesn’t need to handle the debt. We just need to make the creditor group forgive the debt.”

“Even if they forgive a lot of debt, wouldn’t 50% be the maximum? Then the Fund would have to handle 10 trillion won in debt.”

Even if we made 5 trillion won through short selling and CDS, handling 10 trillion won in debt would be difficult.

But there was no need to repay the debt immediately, and just by applying the system used for Hanseo Card to GL Card, we could significantly reduce the debt.

“If GL Card is normalized, it can generate over 10 trillion won in net profit within 10 years.”

“Then it’s certainly not a bad investment.”

“And we can obtain intangible assets that are more important than profitability. All the data held by the industry’s number one card company will come to us. Just being able to secure vast amounts of data that money can’t buy is sufficient reason to acquire GL Card Company.”

The more data, the better.

If we could secure large amounts of data, money wouldn’t matter at all.

Only with more data could we create more detailed gear structures.

“If the Branch Manager likes it, I have no reason to oppose it. But won’t it be difficult? I’m worried that if the Korea Branch handles too many projects simultaneously, the Branch Manager will suffer from work overload.”

“I’m fine. I can handle this much sufficiently.”

It wasn’t difficult at all.

Rather, it was enjoyable. To the point where I’d go crazy if I didn’t work.

Every time I saw the gear structures being completed one by one, intense euphoria would surge through me.

Conversely, when I saw incomplete structures, I felt such strong discomfort that hives would break out on my body.

To eliminate these symptoms, aggressive investment was necessary.

Once all the structures I designed were completed, then I could just sit still and watch the perfectly turning gears.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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