Story of a Big Player from Gangnam

Gun-Ho continued to speak to the news reporters in the meeting room, “Dyeon Korea is a financially stable company with a successful business. I have no idea why our company’s stock was recently tied to politics and considered as a theme stock. I hope that investors do not go along with the stock manipulators that are disturbing the stock market intentionally. I want to make it clear that Dyeon Korea has nothing to do with Party Leader Jin-Woo Lee.”

The next day, every economic newspaper covered what Gun-Ho had said.

[During the press conference yesterday, Dyeon Korea’s President Gun-Ho Goo admitted that Gongmyeong Party’s Leader Jin-Woo Lee’s little brother is working for Dyeon Korea as its senior director. Party Leader Jin-Woo Lee’s little brother— Mr. Hyeong-Woo Lee— studied in the U.S, and he joined Dyeon Korea to handle the company’s expansion to overseas markets. He is currently in Guangdong Province, China to establish a manufacturing facility for Dyeon Korea there.

Dyeon Korea’s President Gun-Ho Goo stated that he had no idea why Dyeon Korea’s stock price is substantially increasing recently, and he was surprised himself when his company was deemed to be connected to Party Leader Jin-Woo Lee. He then added that Dyeon Korea had nothing to do with Party Leader Jin-Woo Lee.]

Once the news was published, Dyeon Korea’s stock became even more popular. Gun-Ho’s statement was meant to make the fact straight and calm the investors, but it worked as adding fuel to the fire.

“So, it is true that Party Leader Jin-Woo Lee’s little brother is working for Dyeon Korea as a senior director, huh? The company’s president just admitted it.”

“Party Leader Jin-Woo Lee’s brother being in Guangdong Province, China might have something to do with his brother’s political activities like making a secret agreement with the Chinese government or something, huh?”

All sorts of speculations were being made among the investors, and Dyeon Korea’s stock price kept hitting the upper limit two days in a row. The stock price was now exceeding 36,000 won. KOSDAQ Market Division finally issued a trading warning with an order to make the stock unavailable to trade for ten days.

However, once the warning was lifted, Dyeon Korea’s stock price hit the upper limit again. As the stock price kept increasing as if it had no limit, even Gun-Ho was stunned.

“The stock market is crazy.”

The stock market seemed to become out of control. Gun-Ho made a call to SH Investment Partners’ President Geun-Soo Son.

“Let’s sell the stock now.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The stock market is not normal. Let’s sell all of the stock that we have.”

As a matter of fact, it took more than 15 days for SH Investment Partners to purchase 3 million Dyeon Korea’s stock for Gun-Ho. It would usually take several days to sell them as well, but there were so many buy requests for Dyeon Korea’s stock, and it took only 2 days to sell all of Dyeon Korea’s stock that SH Investment Partners was holding. The stock price was still high. It wasn’t hitting the upper limit, but it was still increasing by 3% to 7% constantly.

In the afternoon, Gun-Ho received a call from President Geun-Soo Son.

“We sold all of it, sir. It took me only 2 days to sell them all though. I can’t believe that there were this many buy requests for the stock. As we put 300 million shares back to the stock market, the price no longer hit the upper limit again.”

“For how much did we sell our stock on average?”

“We sold it at 45,600 won per share, sir.”

“How much did we make then?”

“It’s 136.8 billion won, sir.”

“Okay. Well, you did a good job today. You can take a day off tomorrow, and take a deep rest.”

After getting off the phone with President Geun-Soo Son, Gun-Ho did his math.

‘SH Investment Partners is a legal entity, so it has to pay corporate tax. I invested 16.8 billion won and made 136.8 billion won. After paying corporate tax and my income tax from dividends, how much money will fall into my hands? It should be less than 100 billion won.

Say, I will make 90 billion won. I have cash of 160 billion won in my account with Gangnam Stock Brokerage Company. So, that would make my cash 250 billion won in total. I still have a long way to go to achieve my goal of 1 trillion won. Well, I can use 250 billion won as my seed money to make 1 trillion won. It won’t take too long. I can do it.’

Gun-Ho looked at his watch. It was little after 2 pm. Gun-Ho didn’t even have his lunch that day yet. Gun-Ho thought that President Geun-Soo Son hadn’t had his lunch yet either. They both had a very busy morning because of Dyeon Korea’s stock. Gun-Ho called for Secretary Yeon-Soo Oh.

“I’m going to make a call to Dyeon Korea’s Vice President Adam Castler now and ask him to meet me this afternoon. I want you to interpret for me.

“Yes, sir.”

Gun-Ho called Mr. Adam Castler.

“Hello? Adam Castler?”

“Oh, boss. An Nyeong Ha Seh Yoh (How are you)?”

Mr. Adam Castler greeted Gun-Ho in Korean. He seemed to be having fun doing it. Gun-Ho handed the phone to Secretary Yeon-Soo Oh.

“Mr. President Goo would like you to come to Seoul right now. He has something to discuss with you urgently. He wants to meet you at the Seoul Station. You can take a KTX and get off at the Seoul Station.”

Secretary Yeon-Soo Oh interpreted what Gun-Ho told her to tell Mr. Adam Castler. She then asked Gun-Ho in a low voice while covering the phone with her hand, “He is asking what urgent matter you want to discuss with him?”

“Just tell him that I will talk to him when I see him. Tell him that I will go to the Seoul Station with Ms. Secretary Yeon-Soo Oh. I can meet him at Caffe Pascucci inside the Seoul Station.”

Secretary Yeon-Soo Oh interpreted what Gun-Ho just said and then hung up the phone.

Gun-Ho said to her, “Please get ready to leave for the Seoul Station. You are coming with me. And, tell Chan-Ho Eom to bring the car to the building entrance.”

“Yes, sir.”

Gun-Ho and Secretary Yeon-Soo Oh arrived at the coffeehouse in the Seoul Station early. About 30 minutes later, Mr. Adam Castler entered the coffeehouse.

“Hi, boss.”

Mr. Adam Castler grinned as he was waving his hand at Gun-Ho. He then sat at the table feeling curious about what was going on, because Gun-Ho looked serious.

“What’s the matter, sir?”

“Why don’t you catch your breath first? We can talk after we make an order for coffee or tea.”

Three people at the table ordered three cups of black tea. Gun-Ho said after taking a sip of his tea, “Dyeon Korea’s stock price has steeply increased recently, and we subsequently received a trading warning. You are aware of it, aren’t you?”

“Yes, sir. I was told about it by the internal auditor and also by Interpreter Myeong-Joon Chae as well.”

“KOSDAQ Market Division issued a trading warning— not a trading caution— with an order to remove our stock from the stock market for ten days.”

“I am aware of that too, sir.”

“Despite the ten days without trading, as soon as the warning was lifted, the stock price hit the upper limit again. Today was relatively a bit slow, but we don’t know what would happen tomorrow. The stock price is currently 46,000 won. The stock market is going crazy.”

“I’ve noticed that it’s not normal, I mean what is currently going on with the stock. I already made a report about it to the head office, sir.”

“It is usually not a good sign when a business has its stock price moving irrationally. We could be put under the government’s investigation or get an audit. We should get ready for those possibilities.”

“What should we do, sir?”

Vice President Adam Castler looked at Gun-Ho’s face with an anxious look on his face.