Chapter 65
There was one truth about hedge funds; they did anything to earn profit, even if they had to beat down one particular country to death. This resulted in misunderstandings, and the public considered them as mad boss monsters that trampled upon anything in their search for money.
However, people forgot that profit basically started from protecting their own funds. Hedge funds had to defend themselves simultaneously as they attacked others. In addition, they had to plan for what would happen if they lost, since they couldn’t see the future. Therefore, their portfolios weren’t blindly aggressive, as it was more important not to lose money than to win more. If someone looked at all the hedge funds’ portfolios in the era, with their different investment strategies, they would discover that the average profits of hedge funds that had over a billion dollars was twenty percent per year. In other words, if a fund started off with one billion dollars, they would gain two hundred million dollars after one year.
What about our situation? Last year, we had obtained two miracles in Bangkok. During the first miracle we had earned a 70,000% profit, and 17,800% in the second miracle. Thus, our starting fund of four hundred thousand dollars had become two hundred eighty million, and those millions had turned into fifty billion. The hedge funds that had attacked Asia had ended up sending money to our pockets.
Following that, Jonathan and I had tried to maximize profits during the Hong Kong shock by betting against major banks worldwide. We had ended up earning a profit of thirty percent. In total, we had made fifteen billion dollars after combining the amounts we had won from all the bets we had with the world banks. This was a 1.3 times increase of our original investment of fifty billion dollars.
In general, at least one main director, one senior manager and three assistant traders were needed to manage a billion-dollar hedge fund desk team. Furthermore, these people all had to be elites. So, how many would we need to run a fifty billion dollar team? The larger the fund, the harder it was to operate. That was why successful hedge fund founders decreased the amounts they managed after achieving some success. Could a hedge fund that yielded a hundred percent profit on one billion dollars do the same with ten billion dollars? If so, would they be able to do the same with an additional ten billion dollars added on? I could swear to god that was impossible. Talking about numbers made most people's heads spin, but that was the reality.
There was one last question to consider. Although historical numbers were changing, I had known the Hong Kong shock would occur ahead of time. Taking everything into consideration, was the thirty percent profit rate Jonathan and I had with a starting fund of fifty billion dollars large or small?
***
After a month-long war, the accounts that carried out the special operations had been annihilated. I had assigned these tasks, knowing full well that they wouldn’t survive from the beginning. It would have been a miracle if even one of them had ended up profitable. We had had absolute divine protection in Bangkok, but I couldn’t predict anything this time. The only duty of the special forces was ‘reenacting the miracle of Bangkok.’
I had placed five million dollars in each account, and a total of one hundred million dollars had been spent. In the end, one had managed to profit, and that account’s name was Unicorn.
「Account name: Unicorn Corporation」
「Account value: ＄579,500,000」
「Valuation profit and loss: + ＄574,500,000」
「Estimated Profit: + 11590 %」
Unicorn had joined the war with five million, but had returned with more than five hundred and seventy million dollars in spoils. This was a hundred-sixteen times greater than the original value. The plan had resulted in massive success for this account, and I gathered data on all the others to calculate the total profit rate. Their sizes were different, as some were clustered on a large scale.
“Approximately three hundred percent profit. Nine billion dollars…”
Twelve billion in gross profit, minus three billion in costs. I cried out in joy and remembered that this had been possible only because all the conditions had been exquisitely met. First, Russia had gone bankrupt. Second, the global hedge funds had gathered in a zero-sum fight to the point where the term ‘war’ was used, and third, the investment amount had been three billion.
Last year, it had been overwhelming for the two of us to manage the detailed transactions for fifty billion dollars. We had lost track of time, and I never wanted to experience it again. As I looked at my calculations, it reminded me I had come back in time. I hadn't felt this way when I hit the god’s jackpot in Bangkok, as there had been no war.
In the past, I had lost over one hundred million dollars for my company. This particular defeat had been even more disastrous as Korea and the entire world was in an economic boom at the time. I had been blind to victory since U.S. stock prices had been peaking every day. It was a miracle I had not been sued. My credentials as a financial manager had gotten me love calls from Korean banks after I returned to Seoul, but I didn’t go back to work. Instead, I spent time with my father.
<Jonathan: Sun!>
Jonathan called me, and our conversation, as always, started with him calling my name.
<Jonathan: We finished the calculations!>
I could tell what numbers would be from the tone of his voice.
<Jonathan: The profit is four hundred fifty percent, ninety billion dollars in total. Brian did it.>
Jonathan had gone through the fifty billion dollar episode with me last year, so the excitement in his voice was the same as when we had our first miracle in Thailand.
<Seon-Hu: There will be so many millionaires.>
<Jonathan: They got the golden rope, Sun. It’s the rope from the Sun up in the sky.>
Those employed by us would become rich even if we placed the contract to the minimum in the field. I had limited their profit bonus of twenty percent, the industry’s average, to one percent for the special hedge fund Black Swan.
According to Jonathan, many of the former Onider Associates’ managers left their seats even before they heard the details of the contract. It was natural as Wall Street managers worked on a strict performance-based system. They were on Wall Street, not Yeoui-do. In fact, even associates who had an annual salary of two hundred thousand dollars often earned ten to twenty times that due to their performance bonuses. There were more than five thousand such people in the southernmost part of Manhattan, and the elite managers of the former Onider Associates belonged to that group. I used to be the same in the past.
However, we managed to calm them down after mentioning that they wouldn’t be responsible for Jonathan’s directions and any resultant losses for Black Swan, which held Jonathan’s and my personal funds and the American pension funds. In any case, that one percent profit bonus meant nine hundred million dollars right now.
<Seon-Hu: You said that there were exactly a hundred players who participated this time, right?>
<Jonathan: A hundred and one, including Brian. How did you find him? He’s born to do this.>
They would receive bonuses based on their positions, which came out to be around nine million per person on average. It would be a trivial amount compared to the jackpot they just hit. Actually, excluding the corporate tax for investment profits…
Jonathan mentioned that point.
<Jonathan: The problem is the corporate taxes. Even with all the avoidance measures suggested by the accountants, it doesn’t go below twenty percent. We might have to pay eighteen billion for tax.>
<Seon-Hu: You're a patriot.>
<Jonathan: If I had known this would happen…>
I could tell what Jonathan was thinking, but someone needed to be visible outside of the offshore accounts. Not everyone could wander around tax havens.
<Jonathan: How is Gillian’s firm doing? Did they finish the calculations?>
<Seon-Hu: Not yet.>
<Jonathan: I’m sure Brian is the winner. I wish you were here with us. People here are completely…out of their minds.>
<Seon-Hu: Wait, I got an email.>
<Jonathan: From Gillian?>
I responded while checking the email.
<Seon-Hu: You guys lost.>
***
Jessica rushed into Gillian’s office as soon as she received the file from the general accounting department.
“We have final calculations!” Jessica shouted.
“Open it,” Gillian said.
He had to stand up because she had stiffened after seeing the documents. She handed over the file with a dazed expression.
「Total profit rate: + 615%」
「Profit: ＄92,250,000,000」
The total was greater than one hundred billion dollars, including the original investment fund of fifteen billion dollars. An astronomical amount was in the company’s account.
“A…amazing! I kind of expected it, but not to this extent!” Jessica almost cried from joy.
Gillian replied, “There’s no need to make a fuss.”
Jessica looked at him with admiring eyes as he stayed calm in the face of such huge numbers. She felt something else from him other than calmness.
“I don’t understand you. Why are you not satisfied?” she asked boldly.
He answered bluntly, “This is not enough.”
“You’re too greedy. You made a mark in financial history, and no one has ever yielded such profit,” she grimaced.
Jonathan was an exception, as his profit rate had been made while the investment was under three hundred thousand. While that was astounding…
Gillian continued in an annoyed tone.
“I did after spending the entire fifteen billion dollars on the attack.”
“Are you saying that it was speculation, not investment? I don’t think so. The purpose of both speculation and investment is seeking profit, but in that way…” she stopped.
“Keep going,” he said.
Jessica shut her mouth tight.
How dare you try to teach a historical figure??she thought to herself and blushed.
Gillian slowly began to talk. His voice came out with a heavily subdued sigh.
“Speculation and investment are done with responsibility as our collateral since we lose money when estimates go wrong. There’s no more definite responsibility than money, so it should be managed with the utmost care. However, were we responsible for anything? We weren’t.”
Gillian began tightening his hand that was holding a pen, and the pen shook.
“We were promised that we would still retain control of the funds with our positions intact if we based all of our actions on the proposal and even if we lost all the money.”
“So we could make an aggressive strategy,” Jessica responded.
“Insanely so,” Gillian pointed out.
“Yes, it was insanely aggressive,” she answered.
“Yes, we did that. But Jessica, there’s no investor who is generous when there is a loss. Moreover, our investors have more money and are more cost-conscious than anyone else. They have the right to be, because a one percent loss leads to billions of dollars disappearing. However, they said that we could lose it all without consequences,” he said somewhat bitterly.
“They gave us free rein because the investment proposal was perfect. No one could lose a single penny based on that,” he continued.
“...”
“We had to earn more, Jessica.”
Gillian rumpled his hair, and Jessica yelled at her boss in her mind.
How could we earn more than this? You could bring it up that much and control fifteen billion dollars at the same time!
Gillian was causing her to die of frustration.
“Have you looked in the mirror today and seen what kind of face you have? You look like you went through a fantastic experience and learned a lot. You think you’ve grown a lot from yesterday, and blah blah, right?” he said sarcastically.
She replied, “I won’t deny it because that’s true.”
“Whatever we learned from this war is useless. There’s nothing more contradictory than an irresponsible investment. However, if you still want to learn something useful…” he frowned.
“Yes?” she answered.
“Go back to the past and think from my perspective as the chief manager. How we could’ve increased the profit,” he said.
“Me? Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?” She looked confused.
He replied, “If you come up with a way to convince me, I’ll persuade the investors to give you free rein and a limit of a billion dollars.”
Jessica’s eyes widened. Gillian was offering her, a total newbie who prior to this only had experience in being a telephone clerk, the position of the chief trader in a desk team.
“Jessica,” he said.
“Yes?” she answered.
“Listen carefully to me. We could have made more money.”
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