New Employees With an Annual Salary of 1 Trillion Won - Chapter 156

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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 156. Organizing and Tidying Up (1)

The waiting room next to the bidding hall.

Representative Lee Jung-hoon and Representative Oh Chang-jin, who had lost Hana Bank to Tiger Fund, glared at each other as if they wanted to kill one another.

“What the hell happened? Didn’t you say Tiger Fund would bid exactly 2.2 trillion won!”

“Are you saying this is my fault now? Who was the one who set the bid amount to the minimum! I clearly told you. Even if you know the expected price, you have to bid high to win safely!”

“We added a whole trillion won more and it still wasn’t enough – does that make sense?”

“You said acquiring Hana Bank would leave us with at least 2 trillion won profit, right? But you’re giving up the whole deal over a measly 300 billion? Why are you being so petty?”

The two men blamed each other.

Moreover, they sincerely believed that only they were wronged.

“Did the insider get the information right?”

“How could an insider know about last-minute bid increases? Getting the first digits right is already doing their job. You lost it by being stingy with the rest!”

“Are you saying it’s my fault? You can’t even figure out what went wrong, that’s why we keep losing to Tiger Fund. I must be crazy for partnering with someone like you.”

“What did you just say? When did you ask for help, and now you’re screwing up the deal and passing the blame?”

Their voices grew louder and louder.

With no one to stop them, they eventually grabbed each other by the collar and shook violently.

Click!

The shouting that echoed into the hallway caught the attention of several reporters who peeked through the door crack into the waiting room.

They continuously captured the two representatives in their cameras as they screamed like drunkards and grabbed each other’s collars.

Dozens of shutter sounds could be heard.

But the two representatives were so absorbed in tearing each other down that they remained unaware of the situation until the reporters finished taking all their photos and left.

***

We succeeded in the Hana Bank bid.

We spent a day coordinating the detailed conditions, and the next day Chairman came to find me with a newspaper.

“Branch Manager! Did you see the newspaper? At my age, I even looked up words in the dictionary to understand what it meant.”

“Just looking at the photos is enough to understand.”

What filled the front page of the newspaper was the ugly sight of the two representatives.

The scene of them pathetically grabbing and shaking each other’s collars was captured in vivid detail, and the moment I saw that photo, laughter escaped me without realizing it.

“This is why I don’t do partnerships. Even if those guys had acquired Hana Bank, they would have eventually fallen apart.”

“Since they joined hands without a purpose, it won’t be easy for them to turn their backs on each other either, will it?”

“Exactly. As if hyenas would take turns sharing prey nicely. Anyway, after causing such a disgrace, neither Lone Star nor Carlyle Fund will be able to operate in Korea.”

“If they have any dignity, that would be the case, but from what I’ve experienced so far, Oh Chang-jin, Representative of Carlyle Fund, isn’t someone who cares much about saving face.”

What would dignity matter to a hyena?

All that mattered was being able to make money, and Representative Oh Chang-jin couldn’t hunt prey properly if he left the Korean market.

“At least Lone Star seems likely to leave Korea. They do own a few real estate buildings, but they can just sell those through agents.”

“We’ve definitely stepped on them hard, so it doesn’t look like Lone Star will bare its teeth at Tiger Fund again.”

“That’ll be the case for now. Aren’t humans animals of forgetfulness? Even after being beaten like this, they’ll act up again after a few years.”

That was a problem for later.

If they tried to interfere with my work again, I would just step on them harder and crush them down.

“Now that all the troublemakers are gone, we need to start the Hana Bank recovery work.”

“Now the annoying work remains.”

“First, we need to remove the ‘insolvent bank’ label attached to Hana Bank. We should push for a merger with the card company we own as quickly as possible and inject funds to normalize the BIS ratio.”

The label of insolvent bank was never a good thing.

Customer exodus would accelerate, and the bank’s value would inevitably drop noticeably.

“What’s so difficult about removing a label? It wasn’t originally an insolvent bank, so wouldn’t it be over if we just announce the proper figures?”

“If we do that, the financial authorities would have to admit they made a mistake. I don’t want to unnecessarily antagonize the financial authorities.”

Even though Lone Star had played tricks.

Ultimately, it was the financial authorities who designated Hana Bank as insolvent based on that distorted data.

Therefore, us directly correcting and announcing the figures would be no different from declaring war directly against the financial authorities.

“Hmm, merging with a card company won’t pull up the BIS ratio all at once, will it? It seems like it would take too long.”

“Ultimately, we must increase Hana Bank’s profitability. So Chairman needs to go to the United States personally and prepare for real estate derivatives.”

One of the decisive reasons for acquiring Hana Bank was ‘monopolizing commissions.’

Real estate derivatives sold in connection with American banks – a significant portion of that profit came from commissions.

Now, to take all those commissions, we needed a bank channel, and Hana Bank, which already had branches in the United States, could be fully utilized.

“Do I really have to go to the United States personally? Wouldn’t General Manager or other staff members be sufficient?”

“To obtain complex approval procedures and permits, Chairman needs to move personally.”

“Well, the Wall Street bankers won’t just sit still.”

“All preparations are already complete. If Chairman steps forward, we can start selling real estate derivatives through Hana Bank as early as next month.”

The profits from real estate derivatives grew significantly every month.

This was possible because of Everbed, the world’s only real estate sharing website.

Wall Street banks would definitely not want to miss out on such a honey pot either.

That’s why Chairman had to go to the United States.

We had to resolve regulatory issues within the United States, and Chairman’s influence was needed to pass federal bank supervision procedures.

“It’s too disappointing to return to the United States already. Next time there’s an interesting operation, you must call me without fail.”

“I’ll do that. I don’t know when it will be, but if there’s a major event, I’ll definitely report it to you.”

“What are you planning to do now?”

Chairman asked with an expression tinged with regret.

Since I had already designed all the plans, I could answer without a moment’s hesitation.

“While pushing for Hana Bank’s normalization, I plan to focus on semiconductor, battery, and distribution businesses.”

“You’ll be very busy. But is there a reason you brought the battery business specifically to Korea? And the foundry business too. Wouldn’t it be more advantageous in various ways to proceed in Hong Kong, Taiwan, or China rather than Korea?”

Chairman was ultimately a financier who valued numbers.

The most important number in company operations was ultimately labor costs, and he was asking why we were doing business in Korea where labor costs were expensive.

“Labor costs are important, but what’s more important is technology security. If we do business overseas, it’s difficult to prevent technology leaks.”

“No matter how much you fear technology leaks, doesn’t the labor cost difference amount to several times? Manufacturing is ultimately about labor cost competition. Korea too became the manufacturing powerhouse it is today thanks to cheap labor costs, didn’t it?”

Korea’s labor costs were rising steeply.

They paused briefly due to the IMF crisis, but soon jumped up significantly again.

In this situation, Chairman saw it as more beneficial to build factories in other Asian regions that were relatively much cheaper.

“You can’t do semiconductor and battery business just because labor costs are cheap. Related infrastructure and technical personnel must be supported.”

“Well, Hong Kong is just a financial hub with a weak manufacturing base. And China has too much risk.”

“And there’s a most important reason.”

The previous explanation was actually close to an excuse.

The real reason for bringing all businesses to Korea was simple.

“What reason is that?”

“To control them directly myself. Everything from one to ten must be within my hands to ensure business success.”

“Haha, that’s an arrogant statement. Are you saying businesses fail if they’re not within your reach?”

“That’s not it. Businesses that will succeed will succeed someday even without me. However, if I directly manage and control them, I can accelerate that success much faster.”

I revealed my honest feelings.

I expected Chairman to be displeased, but surprisingly he smiled and nodded.

“Now that I hear it, you’re right. The final person in charge must directly control and obsess over everything for business to succeed.”

“Thank you for thinking that way.”

“Can’t we see that just by looking at Tiger Fund? When I let go and left work to subordinates, it almost went bankrupt. Without you and Mike General Manager, Tiger Fund would have left no trace long ago.”

Actually, there was one more decisive reason I didn’t mention.

Overseas business trips.

I didn’t want to waste time trapped on airplanes.

No matter how much I created patents and conceived other plans on planes, breaking my routine was the same.

And my domain was still limited to Korea.

For acquired companies to be incorporated into my routine, they absolutely had to be in Korea.

***

Chairman finally returned to the United States.

General Manager had prepared everything so work could start immediately when Chairman returned to the United States, and he wouldn’t have time to think about anything else for a while.

So now I could comfortably proceed with work according to plan.

The first matter to handle was normalizing Hana Bank.

“Song Sang-yeon, how is the merger between Hana Bank and the card company progressing?”

“We’ve already received all the necessary approvals from the Financial Authorities. The merger can proceed immediately once we complete the formal procedures at the Board of Directors and Shareholders’ Meeting.”

“Hanho Card, which just changed its name not too long ago, might have to change its name again.”

Hanho Card was created by merging Hanseo Card and GL Card.

Through massive advertising campaigns, it had recovered its credibility.

Now it was time to use Hanho Card as material to restore Hana Bank’s credibility.

“Once the merger is completed, client departures from Hana Bank should decrease.”

“Client departures haven’t been as significant as expected. When news spread that Tiger Fund had acquired it, the atmosphere actually became more trusting, with people feeling reassured by the solid financial backing.”

“Well, Tiger Fund’s financial power is far stronger than commercial banks, so it makes sense that clients would feel secure.”

This wasn’t a typical situation.

Usually when a Foreign Fund acquires a bank, anxiety grows and client departures follow.

But Tiger Fund was different.

From semiconductors to construction, and even Rollbook.

The name had already become so familiar to Korean people that the opposite phenomenon was occurring.

“Stock prices are also recovering rapidly. They’ve already risen over 10%.”

“The stock price is rising even though we haven’t taken any measures yet.”

“The market seems confident that Tiger Fund will normalize Hana Bank. Moreover, as merger rumors with Hanho Card spread, investors are showing interest. Overseas investors in particular have begun large-scale purchases.”

A 20% increase instead of 10% wouldn’t have been strange either.

Hana Bank wasn’t a failing bank, after all.

Wall Street investment firms must have noticed this fact too.

Furthermore, since global credit rating agencies had already conducted valuations of Hana Bank, those results were certainly being shared internally and spreading through the market.

“Just proceeding with the merger should push stock prices up over 20%.”

“If stock prices rise to 50%, it would be equivalent to fully recovering the amount used to acquire Hana Bank.”

“This is why Lone Star was so desperate to acquire Hana Bank. Just by holding onto it, they could easily double their investment within 2-3 years.”

We had deliciously consumed the table that Lone Star had set.

Not only that, but we had also sprinkled various sauces on the prepared dishes to make them even more delicious.

“If Hana Bank’s United States branches also sell real estate derivatives, stock prices could rise even more than 50%.”

“I think so too.”

“Please take charge of the Hana Bank merger project, Song Sang-yeon.”

Now it was time to focus on other matters.

Having secured short-term profits through the bank acquisition, we now needed to concentrate on semiconductors and batteries that would guarantee long-term profits.

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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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