The Overly Competent Junior Employee

“Professor, good morning.”

“Ah, good morning to you too. Any calls?”

Jo Hyun-seok commuted to his office in Seoul on days without lectures. It was a business he had set up due to frequent invitations for personal lectures at various companies and organizations.

“After you left early yesterday, Shilla Securities called with an offer to hold a lecture for their VIP clients.”

“Shilla? What about the fee?”

“I quoted them the fee you’ve set, and Shilla said they’d match it.”

“Good. Contact them again today and ask about the time and topic.”

“Yes, I’ll relay that message.”

Jo Hyun-seok gave instructions to his employee and entered his office.

“Let’s see what we have here.”

Although Jo Hyun-seok didn’t invest in stocks himself, his work hours matched the stock market cycle.

He had to check all market issues because there were fans waiting for his comments on today’s market.

“The entire U.S. market fell yesterday.”

Jo Hyun-seok curled up the corners of his mouth as he checked the monitor.

The global stock market was inevitably influenced by the U.S.

This influence was even more pronounced in Korea.

“It’s an individual company issue, but…”

Last night’s U.S. stock market decline was due to concerns about poor sales performance of a giant company, unrelated to economic issues.

But such things were inconsequential to Jo Hyun-seok.

“It’s not like I haven’t massaged things like this before.”

The recent issue with the securities firm employee had been quite helpful.

At first, he wanted to teach that impudent Yoon Dokyung a lesson, but it turned into noise marketing, bringing more people to his Facebook page.

Perhaps because of this, Jo Hyun-seok’s face was glowing with vitality.

“Let’s see, I’ll massage it a bit to say that the sales decline is related to inflation after all…”

Like a cult leader delivering an oracle to his followers, Jo Hyun-seok carefully chose each word as he began to write.

“And finally, advertise the book that just came out…”

This was the most important task.

Posting something on his social media that seemed to hint at an answer without revealing it outright.

Making uncertain readers buy his book.

This was Jo Hyun-seok’s specialty.

“Alright. Shall we post it?”

Ding-

As soon as he posted, comment notifications started pouring in as if they had been waiting.

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“Let’s see…”

Self-employed Lee Shin-hyung was going through his repetitive morning routine.

“Oh! It’s up!”

Although he had withdrawn all the money he had invested in the stock market, he hadn’t left entirely.

He thought of it as temporarily taking shelter in a hut to avoid a passing shower.

[Economic recession accelerating… Stock market likely to struggle for a while.]

“So you’re saying it’ll fall again today?”

For Lee Shin-hyung, the posts on Jo Hyun-seok’s social media had become like oracles. It was almost a natural progression, given that the stocks fell further right after he sold them based on Jo Hyun-seok’s words.

[We must read the flow of economic recession amid the fall of individual companies.]

“Hmm, so you think this is the reason the U.S. market fell yesterday.”

Lee Shin-hyung, carefully reading the post on Jo Hyun-seok’s social media, nodded.

He thought Jo Hyun-seok indeed had a different perspective from others and was someone who cared for retail investors like himself.

“He didn’t write how we should respond…”

This was the most frustrating part, even though he had been reading Jo Hyun-seok’s posts every morning.

Jo Hyun-seok only talked about future situations without giving any substantial hints about how to respond.

-Professor! I’ve read the response methods you wrote in your recent book. I’ll follow them exactly!

-I’ve read your book, Professor. It made me rethink my investment direction. Thank you every morning.

“Book?”

Half of the comments were praising the book’s content.

Lee Shin-hyung, reading the comments on Jo Hyun-seok’s social media, pondered for a moment before accessing an online bookstore and searching for Jo Hyun-seok.

“26,000 won is quite expensive…”

It was rather pricey for a book that wasn’t even as thick as a textbook.

“Oh well, if it has the answers, I should buy it even if it costs 100,000 won.”

With that thought, Lee Shin-hyung ordered the book.

Then he logged back into Jo Hyun-seok’s social media and started writing a comment.

-Professor, I just ordered your book today! Thank you always for your insightful words.

A satisfied smile spread across Lee Shin-hyung’s face as he posted the comment.

Ding-

[Regular trading hours have begun.]

As Lee Shin-hyung was checking the comments on Jo Hyun-seok’s social media, he quickly switched to checking the market when he heard the opening bell on his HTS.

“Huh?”

Lee Shin-hyung let out a surprised gasp as he checked the stock prices of his watchlist through HTS and began moving his mouse frantically.

“It’s going to fall, right?”

Muttering to himself with a deeply furrowed brow, Lee Shin-hyung bit his nails as he focused on the monitor screen.

10 minutes… 20 minutes…

Bang-

Finally, Lee Shin-hyung slammed both fists on his desk.

“Why is it up 5%?!”

The stock he had sold at a loss started surging by 10%, and the stock market index was also rising by over 2%.

An index rise like this meant that almost all stocks were rising.

“No, this must be a trap for retail investors…”

Lee Shin-hyung thought that the stock market couldn’t rise in a situation like this, that this rise was foreign investors and institutions luring in individual investors.

“Professor Jo also said the market wouldn’t be good today…”

As his thoughts reached this point, Lee Shin-hyung accessed Jo Hyun-seok’s social media.

-Professor, what’s going on? The index is rising…

-As expected lol, you should take this guy’s words as reference but not blindly believe them.

-Thanks for breakfast! Well fed and off I go.

Jo Hyun-seok’s social media comment section had already turned into chaos, and Lee Shin-hyung chewed on his lips as he brought up the HTS screen again.

[+7%……]

[+8%……]

As the price of the stock he had sold at a loss continued to rise, Lee Shin-hyung couldn’t take his eyes off the HTS, his expression one of utter dejection.

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“Everyone looks in good spirits today.”

Two days later, at Yuseong Investment Securities’ Seongnam Branch.

Smiles adorned the faces of all the PBs attending this morning’s pre-market meeting, and a sense of ease that had been hard to find lately was visible.

“It’s because the market has been so good.”

When Choi Woojin answered Branch Manager Ryu Tae-hwa’s comment, everyone nodded and smiled brightly.

PBs were, in a way, very simple people.

When the market was bad, they wore faces as if bearing all the world’s worries and sighed heavily, but after just two good days in the market, their faces were glowing as if nothing had ever happened.

“Well then, shall we hear about the reasons for this?”

As Ryu Tae-hwa asked with a smile, all eyes turned to Dokyung.

It had become Dokyung’s role to discuss the previous day’s market conditions at every morning meeting.

Everyone in the branch trusted Dokyung’s market analysis.

“We can point to several reasons for this rebound.”

Dokyung said this as he displayed the materials he had prepared on the screen.

“The first factor is that investment sentiment has revived as assessments emerged that our market had fallen excessively.”

Although the economic outlook wasn’t good, foreign capital was flowing into the stock market as foreign institutions evaluated that the Korean stock market had fallen too much.

“Secondly, foreign funds rebalancing their holdings and taking aggressive positions in our market boosted everyone’s investment sentiment.”

As soon as news broke that foreign asset management companies were restructuring their fund holdings and increasing their buying rather than selling, individual investors and domestic institutions also started buying.

“The third is an economic issue. It seems that agflation will ease considerably.”

Agflation was a combination of agriculture and inflation, referring to the phenomenon of rising prices due to increases in agricultural product prices.

“There’s news that Indonesia is quickly resuming palm oil exports due to excess inventory, and Russia’s spring weather has been so good that wheat crop yields are at unprecedented record levels, raising production forecasts.”

“Is Russian wheat being exported?”

“Yes, it’s being traded in their national currency, the ruble. Not just Russia, but the U.S., Australia, Brazil, and others are having bumper crop yields, so agricultural prices are likely to fall.”

In fact, wheat prices in the U.S. futures market were falling by over 10%. Everyone expected that if food prices stabilized, other prices would follow suit.

Investor sentiment was reviving with this good news amidst difficult circumstances.

“I understand most of Yoon Dokyung-ssi’s clients are positioned in oil refinery stocks. Is that okay?”

When Ryu Tae-hwa asked worriedly, Dokyung nodded with a smile.

“Yes, oil demand is expected to continue rising. With summer heat increasing demand for power generation oil, along with growing demand for automobile, aviation, and ship fuel.”

“But oil prices seem to be faltering.”

“Oil prices are expected to maintain at current levels. Unless oil-producing countries choose to increase production or the war ends, oil prices are likely to rise as winter approaches.”

“Still, since our clients are positioned there, please keep a closer eye on it than usual.”

“Yes, I’m already focusing all my attention on that.”

Ryu Tae-hwa nodded with a satisfied smile at Dokyung’s answer.

“Alright, hoping for another uneventful day in the market, let’s end the meeting here. Everyone, let’s do our best.”

As Ryu Tae-hwa concluded the meeting, everyone stood up and began leaving the conference room.

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“Oh, it’s rising again today?”

Jo Hyun-seok had come to work earlier than usual and was waiting for the market to open, but as soon as it did, the index was rising frightfully.

Money that had left the stock market was returning following the suddenly positive outlook.

“This… this can’t be happening…”

While this wasn’t the first time such a situation had occurred, Jo Hyun-seok felt increasingly uneasy recently.

In the past, he hadn’t paid much attention when the stock market rose despite his negative forecasts, but lately, due to his spat with the securities firm employee, his statements had become too extreme.

People who would normally ignore him were starting to pay attention to his words, and new people were coming to his social media saying they believed him.

“Please…”

As the mood in the U.S. market improved the previous day, the stock market had started rising sharply over the past few days, as if mocking the recent downturn.

From Jo Hyun-seok’s perspective, all he could do now was pray.

Ding- Ding-

Even as Jo Hyun-seok worried, notifications kept ringing incessantly.

It was undoubtedly comment notifications from people coming to his social media to curse at him.

On the first day of the rise, people left comments dismissing it, but from the next day, they started doubting his words, and the day after that, comments criticizing him began to appear.

Jo Hyun-seok had intentionally been avoiding social media, not even posting the daily updates he used to.

“If only it would fall…”

And he prayed more desperately than anyone for the stock market to fall.

If it just fell, this current fluctuation would be nothing.

Knock knock-

As the door opened with a knock and his secretary entered the room, the on-edge Jo Hyun-seok shouted angrily.

“I told you not to come in when the market’s opening!”

“I’m sorry… but there’s an urgent message to deliver.”

“Urgent message?”

“Yes, Shilla Securities has informed us that they’re canceling tomorrow’s lecture…”

“What?”

Jo Hyun-seok sprang up from his seat at the secretary’s words.

“Why?”

“They said they don’t want to pour cold water on the good market mood…”

“These bastards! Are they calling me cold water?”

Securities firms that had been clamoring to have him were now starting to cancel lectures.

“And…”

As the secretary spoke as if there was more to say, Jo Hyun-seok furrowed his brow deeply and looked at her.

“Sungjin Bookstore has notified us that they’re returning all remaining book inventory.”

“What did you say?!”

Sungjin Bookstore was Korea’s number one bookstore chain and naturally had received many copies of his book.

Their decision to return the books meant that Jo Hyun-seok himself would have to bear all the losses.

“Why?”

“They say customers who bought the book keep returning it. On top of that, so many copies are coming into the used bookstores Sungjin operates… they say it’s difficult to sell new copies.”

“How many?”

“Pardon?”

“How many are being returned?!”

“It looks like it will be between 10,000 to 15,000 copies. If Sungjin Bookstore returns them, other bookstores will likely…”

“Hah…”

Jo Hyun-seok let out a hollow laugh and slumped into his chair, utterly deflated.