World Cup-Related Stocks
World Cup-related stocks.
Korea's defeat.
The stock market read it a little differently.
"Means fewer nights ordering chicken and watching the World Cup. Won't make much real difference to sales, but still."
At least, that was how the psychology moved.
If you couldn't understand it, you needed to rewire your brain — that was the world of investing.
That's what makes it fun.
It was why investors and ordinary people could never be the same.
But if it could really go that far on something so small—
"Does this even make sense?"
"No, I don't care how much of a casino the Korean market is…"
"How the hell did you even know to buy anti-Japan theme stocks?!"
Anyone could get rich off stocks.
You just needed a few more screws loose in your head.
They don't even know basic common sense like this.
The stock club.
He had no choice but to reflect on how carelessly he'd been running it.
Korea hadn't been the only one playing last night.
There had been another Asian nation.
Japan.
They had recorded the exact same 0–1 defeat against Poland.
People can accept it when our country loses.
The opponent was strong to begin with. Just looking at the FIFA rankings, the gap was enormous.
But there was one thing they could never tolerate.
Japan winning.
"So that's why it went up?"
"The market's attention shifted from Korea's defeat over to anti-Japan sentiment."
"Holy shiiit~!!"
Hite Soju had gone down too. The club members who'd shorted it had pocketed a decent profit.
And still, it made their stomachs ache.
Other people's rice cakes always looked bigger — that was the law.
"But why is Korean Ballpoint Pen going up?"
"Because it's an anti-Japan theme stock."
"Why?"
"It's the brand the President likes to use."
Hye-ri drifted over and tossed out the question.
Like most theme stocks, there was a story attached.
Not long ago, during the inter-Korean summit, the pen the President had used became a topic of conversation.
Well, he is a commoner's president.
His usual frugality had shown through. For a head of state, it was almost too modest. Using a Monami — the kind students carried around?
Supporters from both camps had gone back and forth in heated debate.
"The President hates Japan, so…"
"All the countless citizens who follow the President will start using domestic products!"
"You've got to be able to spin that much if you're going to trade stocks."
That was what had done it.
Japanese brands like Jetstream and Hi-Tec held roughly seventy percent of Korea's ballpoint pen market.
You could call it a pen good enough in quality to replace them.
The President used it? Brand value got reassessed. On top of that, it had acquired a rock-solid anti-Japan identity.
"~♪♬"
For the record, Hye-ri had just bought it. She'd already taken her profits and only come over to ask, just in case.
Whistling, she walked out of the club room in its full chaotic glory.
A sly little thing, that one.
"I should've bought anti-Japan stocks too…"
"You didn't make much off the sell-out-the-country stocks."
"That was your short, man."
Stock futures only worked on large-caps. And large-caps, by nature, didn't move much.
Even if they drop, it's maybe five percent.
They rolled right back up again. Large-caps had plenty of bargain hunters looking for short-term spreads, so even if the long-term picture was different, you couldn't eat big in the short term.
Low volatility was a sad thing for gamblers.
"Should we buy anti-Japan stocks next time?"
"But Japan is seriously… they've been looking pretty solid lately."
"You Japan-obsessed bastard?!"
"Be honest, Japan's strong. Their next opponent is Senegal at twenty-seventh."
There were real gamblers mixed in too. Toto specialists who'd drifted over from other clubs had encyclopedic knowledge of the soccer teams.
Approaching things systematically wasn't bad. In stock terms, it was market research. Do it with sports betting and it was gambling; do it with stocks and it became investing. That was all.
"Hey, PaprikaTV's looking interesting too."
"Why?"
"Out of nowhere?"
"I don't know if they lost their minds, but they snagged the broadcast rights this time… I threw a little in just in case and made ten percent."
"World Cup broadcast rights?!"
The stock gamblers weren't about to fall behind either. Market catalysts came in more flavors than just wins and losses. You just jammed the pieces together until they fit.
That was stocks. You took a plausible catalyst and herded investors' capital toward it.
He'd confirmed it — World Cup sentiment was alive and well. Large-caps might be boring, but junk stocks could make excellent short-term hunting grounds.
"……."
That was how you survived in the Korean stock market.
Rachel, visiting the club room for the first time in a while, stood there looking rather shocked.
"Do you always invest like this?"
"Just an ordinary day."
"What about growth-stock investing, or…"
"The kids who did that stuff are all dead."
You couldn't survive in barren Korea. She, who'd lived carefree in the warm embrace of the land of a thousand trillion, wouldn't understand.
The damp murk of the underworld, that is.
It was a hundred and eighty degrees from the investing she knew. The club room itself looked completely different from three months ago.
"Hah… hah… hah…"
"Gamble, gamble, gamble, gamble, gamble."
"Whisper, whisper, whisper, whisper, whisper."
Eyes half-rolled back in their sockets. You could spot future Shin Hyeon-hwans and Lee Geuns everywhere.
They've got the fundamentals of a gambler locked in.
To him, it was a heartwarming sight. Rachel's gaze held open disgust, as if she found the whole thing distasteful.
"You made them like this, didn't you?"
"I raised them excellently."
"You contaminated them."
"And that's why they survived."
The KOSPI right now was hopeless. Most retail investors were trapped in positions, groaning.
There are some among the club kids too.
What mattered was an unbreakable heart. In the world of stocks, that was the most important thing. Sighing alone didn't improve your skill. Sometimes you had to reverse-invest with boldness.
"I should've sold out the country too."
"If I just hadn't watched the 2002 World Cup, I wouldn't have bet on a win."
"Hyung, you were a boomer?"
Just like the investors who'd failed their patriotic bets. In investing, there was no need for patriotism.
The side that wins is our side.
You had to set private feelings aside. Investors grew by accumulating experience.
"It's vulgar. Just like you."
"Me?"
"You only do vulgar things. Those Japan-related stocks too."
The opposite view. He remembered clashing with her once around March as well.
It's not a wrong way of thinking either.
It was the reverse of Korea. In America, people who didn't do value investing got purged from the market. Put extremely, only the long-only addicts had survived.
But going forward, it wouldn't be so easy. Bullish and bearish. Only investors who could think both ways with cold clarity would open a new horizon.
"America has its junk stocks too, you know."
"Things rising over something this trivial…"
"This is the fastest country on earth."
The land of hurry-hurry. People who'd only ever lived in Korea had no idea how glacially slow the rest of the world was.
The psychology is fucking fast too.
Eat well and bounce before anyone else noticed. That was what a short-term spike trade was supposed to be.
He figured he ought to show Rachel that taste as well.
Faster than anyone, he stole her lips.
Chuuup!
A light kiss. The moment he tugged her slender wrist, her lips delivered themselves forward on their own.
Nice taste.
They were plump — there was a real satisfaction in the lip-collision. Even when she gave head, the suction pressure when she pursed them had been strong.
"?!!"
She hadn't reacted at all. Rachel covered her mouth a beat too late and stared at him with pure revulsion in her eyes.
See? You eat and bounce just like that.
He'd simply taught it in practice. Korean stocks felt roughly the same. What was the point of getting upset about it now?
She was already completely caught on his lips.
"Sex criminal."
"……."
"If anyone had seen that… what were you planning to do?"
There was something that bothered him more than that.
The club room. They'd recently moved to a bigger space, thanks to ETSD — once the largest club on campus — falling apart. They'd inherited the wide room that club used to occupy, but—
"Gamble, gamble, gamble, gamble, gamble."
"Whisper, whisper, whisper, whisper, whisper."
—that many more people came with it. Even if there'd been a blind spot, there might have been a witness.
Everyone's busy enjoying their wholesome gambling.
Legal gambling sanctioned by the state. Bold investments built on a thorough respect for the law. Nobody had the bandwidth to be watching this corner.
Rachel, though, seemed extremely bothered by it.
"You really don't have a shred of manners, do you?"
"Then why did you come here?"
"What?"
"You actually came because you wanted something else done to you."
That would be it. A body that had grown used to a certain achievement didn't shed the habit easily.
Even a well-behaved cat climbs onto the stove.
When women said no, no, it meant yes. A lesson you could learn from yamete kudasai.
"It's because of you."
"My fault again?"
"When you do things like that, my body… gets strange."
The wrist he was holding. Her pulse was thumping hard. She wouldn't know the mysteries of Eastern medicine like that.
"And there's more, isn't there."
"What?"
"Say what you actually want. Be honest."
He already knew everything. She wasn't trembling purely out of fear. She was reading the room. But once you'd spilled it once, there was nothing you couldn't say a second time.
She can't comfort herself alone, after all.
He'd thoroughly pounded it into her — the fact that she was a female.
"I have no interest in that kind of thing!"
"If you live clenched up that tight, your personality gets warped."
"Aren't you the one who went crazy from letting go of too much tension?"
"Oh."
She came back fairly sharp. The fact that her venom was still alive was one of Rachel's more charming points.
Makes corrupting her worthwhile.
A gaze full of loathing. He knew perfectly well that words alone would never persuade her.
"So we just need to fix that strangeness in your body, right?"
"Hmph! If it weren't for that, I wouldn't even have to see you."
"Fine. I'll fix it."
"H-how…"
"Come with me for a moment."
"?"
Persuading her with her body would be enough.