I Became the Youngest Daughter of a Chaebol Family-Chapter 107: Travel Training (2)

"So basically, you don’t want to gamble anymore and just want a stable life? Yoo Seon-jun, you’ve gone totally soft."

I grumbled irritably.

Seriously, I even gave up Seo Joo-eun and handed over the dirty jobs with blood on them. Because of that, I had to reassign all the thugs she used to control to someone else.

Do you know how hard it is to find reliable people?

“Hey, you’ll probably change your mind after having a /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ kid.”

“Hmph. Sure you would.”

Well, babies are cute. And his kid takes after his mother, not Seon-jun at all.

Still, I have no intention of having one myself.

‘...’

No, if I’m being honest, it’s not like I never wanted to. One of my old bucket list items was to have twenty children and build a golden throne for myself in the galactic era.

But I didn’t want to be responsible for someone else. Especially since I turned out to be an even more irresponsible person than my dad.

“So? What now? Let’s at least hear it.”

Seon-jun leaned back on the couch, half-reclined, and asked seriously.

“It’s not actual gambling this time. I just need someone to take care of something stock- and business-related. It’s a task that needs doing in France.”

“I figured it’d be something like that. Not thrilled about it... but hey, if you ask, I’ll do it.”

“That’s good to hear. But what’s with the lack of energy? It’s not like I’d kill you if you say no.”

When I tilted my head at him, Seon-jun gave me a look. The kind that said, You seriously don’t get it?

“Forget me. Just take care of my wife, will you? You know... We never even got to have a proper wedding.”

It looked like my cousin was still carrying guilt about his wife. They hadn’t even registered their marriage yet, afraid of public perception.

Being the eldest son, he probably felt pressured to marry into a “respectable” family. In a few years, anyone who says crap like that—I’ll personally bury them. But for now, I had to let it go.

‘...Which just makes me feel guiltier. He only married Joo-eun because of me.’

I sighed inwardly.

Human relationships really are the hardest. I get it... but still.

“Fine, I got it. Don’t worry about that. I’m not petty enough to hold something like that over your head. We’re... family, right?”

Saying that word made my stomach churn. I hated this kind of thing.

“...Yeah. Thanks.”

After mentally reviewing my plans, I figured this much would be fine. Even without Seo Joo-eun at Daehwa Securities, nothing critical would fall apart.

In fact, if I wanted better control over BBB in Europe, it was smarter to place someone close to me there. That region was still outside my influence.

Having made peace with the idea, I offered a proposal to Yoo Seon-jun.

“How about moving to Europe for a while? You’ll probably have to stay in France for a bit. I’ll assign Joo-eun as your secretary... You know, maybe even make a second baby.”

—Poke poke.

I jabbed his side playfully. Seon-jun swatted my arm away and glanced through the documents on the table.

“...Mm.”

—Rustle.

After flipping through the last page, he looked up and asked,

“But if CL really collapses like you said, wouldn’t it be enough to just bet on a short position?”

“I’ll do that too. But I need a precise estimate of their insolvency first... So I want a famous bank executive like you to check it on-site. And... this is a kind of rehearsal.”

He paused and asked again,

“A rehearsal for what?”

I gave him a sweet smile but said nothing.

That’s a secret.

***

There’s one key takeaway from the Crédit Lyonnais incident.

When the government uses taxpayer money to bail out huge corporations, it causes major political chaos...

But if they don’t bail them out, the economic snowball rolls out of control.

‘Hmm, I guess that’s two lessons.’

Anyway, let’s change the topic a bit.

During the 2008 global financial crisis, the U.S. actually got lucky. Japan made catastrophic decisions during its bubble collapse and couldn’t recover for decades. France, this time around, was too slow to bail things out—most of the taxpayer money they threw in was wasted.

It’s actually a very political issue. You’ve got neoliberalism, which argues everything should be left to the market, versus Keynesianism, known from FDR’s New Deal during the Great Depression. (Strictly speaking, they’re not exactly the same, but you get the point.)

Take Korea’s IMF crisis, for example. The government hesitated to bail out corporations, partly because the country had handed over economic sovereignty to the IMF—one of the staunchest neoliberal institutions.

Of course, not having money played a role too.

To simplify: Neoliberalism says failing companies should be allowed to fail. That works in normal times by fostering healthy competition, but when bubbles burst, that mindset can trigger freefalls with no floor.

Even companies that shouldn’t collapse end up going under.

As I said earlier, in 2008 the U.S. broke its own rules and stepped in—ending the golden era of neoliberalism that had represented American power during the Cold War.

‘I wasn’t there myself, but I’ve heard the backlash was intense. People were furious that Wall Street was being bailed out with taxpayer money. Some believed the market should remain in the hands of the “invisible hand.”’

What that means is...

If the U.S. hadn’t admitted neoliberalism had failed, the 2008 financial crisis might not be known as the “Great Recession” or a “minor depression.”

Well, that’s a what-if.

If the collapse had been bigger, economists would’ve come up with a new name for it. But we’ll never know.

.

.

.

“...So, you’re saying you’ll expose CL’s corruption but wreck the French economy in the process? Why... exactly?”

Seo Joo-eun, now formally Yoo Seon-jun’s personal secretary after a whole mess of red tape, asked me. There was an easy answer right in front of her, but maybe after being out of the game for a year, she didn’t want to try guessing.

Really, she’d gone soft. To survive in finance, you have to be ruthless.

“It’s nothing complicated. I’ll make more on the short position if I do.”

I packed away all the earlier thoughts, shoved them neatly to a corner of my mind, and smiled brightly as I answered.

“Then public backlash will be massive. You’re burning taxpayer money and crashing the economy. What, are you trying to get the French Prime Minister replaced?”

Yoo Seon-jun sighed.

“That’s just a side effect. What do you want me to do if they’re incompetent?”

“...At this rate, you’ll extend neoliberalism’s shelf life in the U.S. by another ten years. You’re doing all this just to dodge regulation, aren’t you? I heard they were trying to pass a new law—was that your doing too?”

The U.S. president right now was Bill Clinton. Bush had tried hard, and I had some fondness for him because of the LA riots—but there was nothing I could do.

As much as I like changing history’s course, I draw the line at replacing presidents.

Besides, Clinton was one of the biggest neoliberal presidents in U.S. history. Eventually even the Democrats would turn on neoliberalism, but for now, they leaned toward laissez-faire policies.

That meant financial capital was starting to gain enormous power.

Still... the time wasn’t right yet.

“Oh, that? It got blocked. The repeal of Glass-Steagall still has a while to go. I was just testing the waters.”

“For a ‘test,’ you poured quite a lot into lobbying. Didn’t you actually give it your all but failed because you’re not tight with the other Wall Street banks?”

“Come on, oppa. Give me some credit. I never mess around when it comes to money.”

This is the problem with being too smart.

Yoo Seon-jun looked at me with suspicion, but honestly—even if he knew my plans, it wouldn’t change much.

It’s not like he’s a diehard humanitarian or anything. Once the plan succeeds, he’ll enjoy enormous power too, so he won’t stand in my way.

“For now, let’s buy put options on every French bank stock... and short French government bonds. We’ll wait to use insider info until after you get the full picture. Got it?”

“France will try to defend their bond prices since the Eurozone launch is coming up. What then?”

“Oh, then we attack the exchange rate first. You remember the pound short from last year, right? Let’s drag in the hedge funds to short the franc. We’ll take long positions to prop it up. The French government will try to defend the currency, but just in case, we’ll ‘help’ them a little. Once CL collapses, all the stocks they hold will flood the market. We need to wear down the hedge funds beforehand.”

“...You’re putting a disturbing amount of care into this. Fine, Ha-yeon. Just take it all for yourself.”

Yoo Seon-jun shook his head like he was already exhausted.

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