Chapter 62
Chapter 62
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 62
Chapter Title: Ponzi
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The pet rock fad gradually died down, but in that process, the demand for 'advertising' and 'marketing' overflowed.
Various merchant houses, companies, and individuals sought consulting on marketing.
This was only possible through our House Riddle's 'slave dispatch' network, so it wasn't the kind of business that latecomers could easily imitate.
As we expanded the influence of the advertising business like this,
a single advertising proposal landed on my desk. It was a plan for an ad recruiting private investors for a certain business.
"They're recruiting private investors."
"......Why go through us for this? Normally, you'd recruit through newspapers."
Investor recruitment ad.
A somewhat tricky topic for promotion via slaves.
This kind of thing usually uses newspaper ads.
In terms of mass appeal, advertising through slaves dispatched everywhere could be quite effective, but for 'private investment,' wasn't it more important to strongly appeal to a select few tycoons with the investment capacity?
What I did was essentially an expanded version of 'word-of-mouth marketing.'
Yet recruiting investors through word-of-mouth felt a bit awkward.
"The business owner did place an ad in newspapers too. They want as many investors from diverse strata as possible, so they're recruiting via various methods. Their goal is to gather more investors, even if in small amounts."
"......If that's the case, wouldn't issuing stocks be better?"
More investors meant
more people holding responsibility and rights over the business.
From the business owner's perspective, that was burdensome.
If they were going to take investments that way, there was the much simpler method of 'stock issuance' through a securities company.
"They seem reluctant to formally issue stocks and recruit investors through a securities company. Since the business is still small-scale and in its early stages, they don't think they'll get sufficient recognition for its potential value without enough profits yet."
"Well, people have different thoughts. So?"
"Kraus says the man is a con artist."
"Ah."
The top con artist, Kraus.
A highly capable man for whom the title 'Empire's Greatest Swindler' was not an exaggeration. He excelled at manipulating people's psychology and deceiving them to extract money.
So, if Kraus judged it a scam, I could trust that.
"Did you secure the investment proposal?"
"Yes."
What kind of bold con artist would dare try to run a scam using the 'House Riddle' network?
Daring to tarnish a noble's reputation meant he wasn't ordinary.
I smirked and read through the business proposal, but its contents felt oddly familiar.
"Stamp voucher arbitrage...... The business itself sounds plausible."
The business content itself was nothing special.
The Empire had conquered so much territory that postal formats weren't properly unified across regions.
To improve administrative efficiency and user convenience, they issued 'stamp vouchers'—securities that functioned like stamps.
In simple terms, they couldn't keep using the myriad existing stamps as-is,
nor could they recall them all now,
so they converted stamps into 'securities equivalent to stamps' to exempt postal fees.
However, the value of these stamp vouchers varied by region.
Since stamp values differed by region, it was natural that the value of vouchers exchangeable for those stamps would differ too.
"The Empire still runs on patchwork methods."
"Well, that's how they are."
In truth, this was all because the Empire handled local administration so haphazardly.
What could you expect from a militaristic nation?
Conquer first, then cover the aftermath with ad-hoc fixes, leaving even the most basic administrative formats ununified by region.
Anyway, the core of the business was to profit from these regional price differences in 'stamp vouchers.'
Buy low, sell high. The basics of trade.
Since the Empire guaranteed the vouchers' value, there was no risk of loss from price changes during transport.
Thus, the business itself seemed fairly solid, but......
Like all arbitrage schemes,
it wasn't the type that could scale indefinitely.
Once all the 'non-standard stamps' were incinerated,
securing more vouchers would become impossible, right?
Besides, the Empire created these ambiguous 'stamp vouchers' because directly recalling stamps was too hard. Stepping up to do it themselves lacked realism in many ways.
No sane tycoon would invest in such an absurd venture.
"Guaranteed quarterly fixed returns regardless of performance, no limit on participants, and additional dividends for recommending new investors...... Hm?"
And after reading the proposal to the end,
I couldn't help but let out an exclamation.
"This is a Ponzi scheme."
Ponzi scheme.
In simple terms, a scam that uses 'new investors' money' to periodically pay 'dividends' to existing investors.
It builds trust by endlessly paying dividends,
then uses that trust to recruit more investors and replenish funds before 'running off with the money' before bankruptcy. A classic pyramid scam.
The vicious part is that early investors actually make money, so they end up recommending it to others with good intentions.
Thus, when the scam collapses,
they face resentment from those they referred, shattering relationships.
Moreover, if they'd at least profited, that'd be fortunate.
Most early investors reinvest their earnings.
Having experienced money multiplying,
they'd feel like a fool not to reinvest for even more multiplication.
"Why is this appearing here?"
It was bizarre.
What was bizarre was the sudden emergence of such an advanced scam technique in this era.
The world's greatest con artist was Kraus.
That's why Kraus immediately recognized this proposal as a 'scam.'
But without Kraus-level senses,
it was impossible to judge this a 'scam' by conventional wisdom.
Sure, the proposal sounded plausible but was a business doomed to fail,
but there's a difference between a 'failed business' and a 'deliberate scam.'
"It's a scam, then?"
"Yes. And a particularly vicious one at that......"
A scam that properly pays investors 'dividends.' A scam that lets people make money.
Without prior knowledge, you couldn't even imagine it.
Who would suspect a scam when money keeps rolling in steadily?
Besides, this type of scam grows exponentially worse as word spreads.
This world lacks proper communication means,
so normally, word-of-mouth would be limited by region, but......
What if there was an organized way to spread word-of-mouth across the Empire?
"......Ah. Right. It's because of me."
Only then did I realize why this 'anachronistic scam' had suddenly appeared.
I was the one who handed them the tool for the scam.
I taught them the value of network marketing, experimented with 'referral recruitment' in the process, and advertised selling those tools across the Empire. All me.
Word-of-mouth can sell even a mere rock for a high price.
Then, how much more for 'money' itself?
There are people who don't like rocks,
but no one who doesn't like money.
"Feels a bit dirty......"
Well, advancing an era naturally breeds con artists adapted to the change.
Bad guys are usually the smarter ones.
That's why I secured the 'Empire's Greatest Swindler' in advance.
Better to make him an ally than leave him as a nuisance—
nothing more useful.
Yes. It was inevitable.
Yet, despite that, it really pissed me off.
"......"
If we hadn't detected this scam early,
if I hadn't had Kraus,
and Torsso had just approved this ad,
leading to countless victims.
Then, the ones facing the most resentment would have been my slaves.
No way the victims would leave alone the slaves who spread the word across the Empire.
Even if they were 'House Riddle property' and untouchable,
my plan to improve perceptions of slaves would have shattered completely.
This lowly con artist dared to
use the tool I created to reform slave perceptions for his own whims,
nearly ruining my plans.
And.
I wasn't broad-minded enough to brush it off as 'good we caught it early.'
"Torsso."
"Yes."
"Drag that con artist bastard in front of me."
"Understood."
"Right now."
"Understood."