New Employees With an Annual Salary of 1 Trillion Won - Chapter 64
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
Chapter 64. Expansion (4)
For the first time in a while, Nexfin had found some breathing room.
The WiFi-enabled portable device patent work I had assigned was finally completed, and the employees were also in a mood to catch their breath.
I watched this scene with satisfaction.
The plan was to rest just for today, and starting tomorrow, drop another large batch of patent drafts on them.
I wanted to drop them right now if I could, but I held back since giving them about a day’s rest would improve work efficiency.
“I can finally go home today. It feels like I go home less than when I was in the military.”
“Department Manager, have you seen Saera Technology’s stock price?”
“Why would I look at that? After selling the stocks, I absolutely didn’t look because it would hurt too much. I know it went up another 10% or so after we sold. Did it go up even more?”
“Go up? It completely crashed!”
At Manager Kim’s exclamation, employees swarmed over like bees.
Everyone had been so focused on work without even time to read newspapers that they had no idea how the world was turning.
“What’s this? Why is the stock price like this?”
“Is a 90% crash even possible?”
“It did drop a bit since last month, but it crashed this much in just one month?”
“If we hadn’t sold then, we all would have really been wiped out.”
The office was quickly filled with a silence mixed with shock and relief.
In that atmosphere, everyone stared blankly at the stock price window, then soon turned their heads toward me.
“Employee Lee! Thank you so much. If you hadn’t told us to sell then, we would have been completely bankrupt.”
“We were lucky. And the General Manager really timed the sale perfectly.”
“If we hadn’t sold, 23.5 billion could have become 200,000 won!”
“Assuming the worst-case scenario, that could have happened.”
“But what about the people who held onto it until now? How greedy must they be to not sell that?”
It was something only someone driven to madness would do.
Although it had already been proven that the IT bubble wasn’t an illusion, there were still countless people blinded by madness who couldn’t cut their losses.
Was it thanks to Saera Technology’s stock price?
Life was returning to my colleagues’ faces.
Seeing them looking healthy, I thought there was no need to wait until tomorrow to reveal the drafts.
“Since everyone’s gathered like this, I’ll reveal the new patent drafts.”
“What? Employee Lee! Please, let’s just rest for one day.”
“For now, just take a look and let’s leave work early today. We can start working on it tomorrow.”
“Phew, alright, let’s at least take a look at what this is.”
Everyone turned into zombies again and examined the patent draft.
Meanwhile, I checked the front page of the newspaper once more.
[Saera Technology Plummets 90%!]
[Foreign Fund Records Over 100 Billion Won Loss]
***
“CEO, Saera Technology’s stock price has fallen 90%. There’s even open talk about delisting.”
“I told you to sell while I was in the United States! What were you doing?”
“You told us to ‘hold onto it,’ so we just…”
“Do I have to take care of everything from one to ten? You should have made that judgment and sold it yourself!”
This was the scene at Cali Fund Korea Office.
The Saera Technology stocks they had taken on through a block deal from Tiger Fund had become worthless paper.
“Headquarters has sent a warning about reducing operational funds.”
“Sigh… We need to make up for it. But we still have the bank acquisition left. If we acquire and sell the bank well, we can make at least 1 trillion won.”
“With that level of profit, we could regain recognition from headquarters.”
“That’s why we absolutely must! We have to secure the Hanseo Bank acquisition!”
“Regulations will be relaxed soon. If we go through Hong Kong banks as a detour, we can definitely acquire it!”
Cali Fund had already experienced profit taking through small and medium bank acquisitions several times.
Those were just practice games for the main event, and now Cali Fund Korea Office had to stake their lives on the 800 billion won Hanseo Bank acquisition battle.
“Crush anyone who tries to interfere with the Hanseo Bank acquisition.”
“Deutsche Bank and Singapore Investment Authority are also showing interest.”
“Internal materials will be disclosed soon. Once the debt scale is revealed, places like that will have no choice but to withdraw.”
CEO Oh Chang-jin regained his smile.
He had prepared for the Hanseo Bank acquisition for a full two years.
He was confident that he was the only acquirer prepared in all fields – legal, tax, accounting, and financial.
“However, what’s concerning is that there’s more debt than expected, and the asset evaluation is quite low.”
“That’s exactly what we’re good at. Cut out and sell everything profitable, leave only the shell and package it cleanly. If we make it look like a sound bank, people wanting to buy will line up.”
Oh Chang-jin had a thorough understanding of the weaknesses in Korea’s financial structure.
He understood the value of major bank brand names better than anyone.
“What entity would want to buy a bank worth trillions of won? In the end, they’d have to sell it to a Korean company, but which place has that kind of financial power…”
“Have you ever seen anyone buy a bank with their own money? There are so many small and medium banks that want to jump to large scale. Just hand over Hanseo Bank to one of those banks and it’s done.”
All the plans were already complete.
All that remained was succeeding in the bid.
While he was having such happy fantasies.
An urgent contact came in from an internal line at the Financial Supervisory Service.
“CEO! Tiger Fund is showing interest in acquiring Hanseo Bank. They say General Manager Kang Dong-ju came to the Financial Supervisory Service directly!”
“What? Why would Kang Dong-ju? Look into it more thoroughly!”
The happy fantasy was shattered in an instant.
At the sudden appearance of a large catfish, CEO Oh Chang-jin became anxious, gnawing at his innocent fingernails.
Should this be called a blessing in disguise?
The information from the Financial Supervisory Service line was corrected.
“It’s not the entire bank. They’re only moving to acquire the ‘card company’ that Hanseo Bank owns.”
“The card company? Not the bank, but why the card company?”
“Since they own a PG company, it seems they want to acquire the card company for the purpose of expanding payment infrastructure.”
“They must be planning to do something by combining the payment service provider and card company.”
Cali Fund employees immediately began gathering materials related to the card company,
and made contacts in various directions to understand Tiger Fund’s true intentions.
And they reached a conclusion.
This… was an opportunity to screw them over.
“Hanseo Card’s condition is very poor. The delinquency rate is high, and the scale of non-performing loans is estimated at over 40 billion won.”
“Have you figured out how much they’re trying to acquire it for?”
“They presented two options. First is 30 billion won including non-performing loans, second is 60 billion won with the government taking on the non-performing loans.”
The scale of non-performing loans was 40 billion won.
And on top of that, a high delinquency rate.
For Hanseo Bank, the card company was one of the main culprits of insolvency.
“The card company’s condition is more serious than expected.”
“In my personal opinion, Tiger Fund acquiring Hanseo Card seems advantageous for us. We’d have to separate the card company anyway if we acquire the bank.”
“So they’re doing garbage separation for us instead.”
“If they’re taking the garbage away themselves, there’s no reason to stop them, is there?”
That wasn’t all.
If the card companies were separated and sold off, the value of the banks themselves would also decrease.
This meant they could acquire the banks at cheaper prices and reduce risks.
“But we can’t let them dump the trash on the government and just take the container.”
“We will definitely block any plan for the government to take on the non-performing loans.”
“The Financial Supervisory Service and Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation are the main negotiators, right? How many of our people do we have planted there?”
“We have quite a few deeply embedded, even at high levels.”
“Good. Make sure they force them to take everything including the non-performing loans. The trash and the trash can must go together as a set.”
The network established for bank acquisitions.
I thought it was a waste since it was a line that had to be used once and discarded, but thanks to Tiger Fund, an opportunity arose to use it once more.
“Looking at the Financial Supervisory Service as a whole, there’s absolutely no reason to oppose the sale of Hanseo Card.”
“If we mobilize our network there, we can force through the negotiation terms.”
“But according to what we heard through our Financial Supervisory Service network, there might be about 10 billion won more in hidden non-performing loans.”
“All of that too. Definitely dump everything on them wholesale.”
Key employees of Cali Fund simultaneously left the office.
Their destinations were the Financial Supervisory Service and Korea Deposit Insurance Corporation.
It was Cali Fund working for Tiger Fund, not for themselves.
***
The next day.
The General Manager greeted me, unable to contain his laughter.
“Is there some good news?”
“The Hanseo Card acquisition is flowing in an interesting direction. If things go quickly, we might be able to complete the acquisition within this month.”
“Didn’t you say it would take at least several months to acquire it?”
“Thanks to Cali Fund’s help, we’ve been able to save a lot of time. We don’t even need to do separate lobbying anymore.”
Cali Fund is helping us?
It was completely incomprehensible.
After the short selling incident, Cali Fund had a relationship with Tiger Fund that was worse than enemies.
For them to help us meant there was definitely some other ulterior motive.
“Why are they helping us?”
“Because Hanseo Card is so troubled. They’re telling us to eat spoiled food and get sick.”
“If it’s in such a serious state, shouldn’t we reconsider the acquisition instead?”
“We’ve reviewed it in various ways. Hanseo Card’s value is roughly around 80 billion won, and even if we acquire it including the non-performing loans, we can make at least 10 billion won or more.”
The acquisition price is 30 billion won.
The scale of non-performing loans is about 40 billion won.
Looking at the simple numbers alone, it was definitely a profitable business.
But there must be something we don’t know for Cali Fund to be acting this way, right?
“Could there be more undisclosed non-performing loans?”
“Even spoiled food becomes medicine if you digest it well. And we need to acquire the card company to execute our next strategy.”
“What kind of strategy?”
The General Manager smiled mysteriously.
It was a smile that sent chills down my spine just looking at it, and the answer that followed was even more brutal.
“A strategy to sabotage Hanseo Bank’s acquisition. If we acquire the card company, we officially become stakeholders too. We’ll secure the minimum justification to jump into the acquisition war.”
“Are you planning to participate in the bank acquisition war to drive up the price?”
“If we simply drive up the price, we might get marked by the Korean Financial Authorities. We’ll jump into the acquisition war with the mindset of actually acquiring it.”
I could feel his sincerity.
Rather than being serious about the bank acquisition war.
The General Manager was serious about screwing over Cali Fund.
Was he always this ruthless?
I had always only seen his good side, so I never knew he had this aspect.
I reminded myself over and over again that I should never become enemies with this person.
***
In front of Yeouido Station exit.
Attention was focused on the newly opened coffee specialty shop ‘Max Coffee’.
“When do you start business?”
“We start this afternoon!”
“Then I’ll come after work. But is it really 1,000 won? It’s bean coffee, right?”
“We only use Ethiopian direct import beans. The espresso machine is also a modified Italian original machine.”
“And it’s still 1,000 won?”
“We’re offering it at a special price only during the opening event period.”
The potential customer nodded and turned away.
Lee Jung-hoo’s parents waved their hands earnestly toward him.
“But, honey… can we lower the coffee price to 1,000 won on our own?”
“It’s the event period. We need to make an impression first to get regular customers.”
“Customers will come, right? It’s still amazing to me that people pay money to buy coffee.”
“For office workers these days, coffee is basically like water. Don’t worry.”
Finally, the first day of business began.
A small but clean store,
Simple interior design along with the powerful pricing strategy of ‘1,000 won’.
Customers began lining up.
“10 Americanos please!”
“3 lattes, 6 Americanos, quickly!”
“You do extra shots, right? One iced Americano with an extra shot!”
“3 iced Americanos and 4 hot Americanos please!”
Orders began flooding in as soon as they opened.
As if they had been waiting, customers started lining up, and they could only catch their breath well past closing time.
“Honey, are you okay?”
“I don’t know how the day went by… How many cups did we sell today?”
“Just from the afternoon business alone, we sold over 300 cups!”
“Really? I heard it’s hard to sell over 300 cups even doing business all day?”
“I guess customers flocked here because it’s 1,000 won.”
“Let’s try doing it like this just until this week.”
Lee Jung-hoo had hoped that ‘his parents would work comfortably’…
But the exact opposite result of that wish was unfolding.
New Employee with 1 Trillion Won Annual Salary Chapter 64
E-book Publication Date | 2025.11.27
Author | Seo Oh
Publishers | Heo Heung-beom, Park Geon-won
Publishing House | Poten
Address | [04783] 10th Floor, 8 Yeonmujang 11-gil, Seongdong-gu, Seoul
Phone | 02-6320-8500
Fax | 02-6320-8585
ISBN | 9791175305892
Price | 100 won
ⓒ Seo Oh 2025
This e-book is a copyrighted work protected by copyright law.
This e-book is published under the author’s contract, and unauthorized reproduction, copying, distribution, and sharing are prohibited without written consent from both parties.
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
