Chapter 352: 24 Hours of Despair
"The whole meeting will begin in fifteen minutes."

At 16:45, a notification was sent out in the proprietary business work group of Juntai Securities. Qi Tian and He Qinshan stared at the computer screen for a long time.

Today the market index closed up 2%. Even though it opened 5% higher in the morning after officially entering the market to rescue the market, this is not a market trend worthy of holding a meeting to celebrate.

The result of putting all the positive factors into effect is that the market opened high and then fell all the way until closing.

So what about tomorrow? The rescue operation will not be successful and it is almost foreseeable that the market will continue to fall sharply.

"Lao Qi, do you think Mr. Xie is..."

He Qinshan hadn’t finished his words when the market buying list data was updated and Grapefruit Capital did not appear.

This means that after Xie Jingxing shouted "See you today, stock market" through major official media, he didn't spend a dime to rush into the market and fight side by side with the rescue funds!
Thinking about how it was not worth it to curse for him in the afternoon, Qi Tian felt mixed emotions and couldn't tell what he felt. He twisted his hands together and forced a smile: "That's 3000 billion in cash. It will take time to mobilize it. It's normal that it can't come in today."

"Yes, we don't have much cash flow in our account. He never bothers to tell lies. He will definitely come in tomorrow... the day after tomorrow, or this week!" He Qinshan nodded vigorously to convince himself.

Qi Tian suddenly felt very tired. He slumped over the desk as if his spine had been pulled out, and said in a low voice, "Listen to the leader's arrangements at the meeting later, and don't be the first to take action."

It was not their concern if friendly forces took the opportunity to dump the stocks to get out of their predicament, but at the same time, the leaders only gave the amount of funds that must be injected into the market, but as for where the funds would come from, they had not yet received the funds.

The company cannot produce a large amount of cash on its books in a short period of time, so Qi Tian and He Qinshan plan to propose at the after-market meeting that they sell some long-term holdings in the bond market tomorrow to raise cash to support the stock market.

Maybe we should wait a little longer. On the one hand, we can't distinguish between friendly forces and enemies on the field, and on the other hand, the reinforcements outside the field have not arrived yet. Why should Juntai rush forward alone and fall into the encirclement of short sellers?

…………

17:30, CITIC Securities board meeting.

"I reiterate that saving the market is saving ourselves. We must not hesitate at this time and must concentrate our firepower and fire all our ammunition as quickly as possible!"

The man with the square face had a firm and solemn expression and spoke in a sonorous and powerful tone. The atmosphere at the scene was completely the opposite. It was depressing and silent, and there was no response at all.

An independent director in the corner slowly put down his water cup and coughed lightly: "I think it is debatable."

"Discuss? The time has come when society needs us. What else is there to discuss? Don't forget your principles!" The square-faced man slammed the table.

The independent director leaned back, causing the chair to squeak, and flirted with a pen. “My first principle as an independent director hired by CITIC Securities is to protect the interests of shareholders. I am paid by shareholders, so don’t yell at me.”

"The use of funds provided by the company for this rescue operation and the subsequent profit and loss information will be disclosed to the shareholders. We have no regrets. Some people should not go astray and think that we have abandoned the interests of shareholders in order to rescue the market." The square-faced man looked around and warned.

"Shh."

A middle-aged female supervisor stood up and said, "Since you said that you are worthy of the interests of shareholders, then may I ask if Xie Jingxing's funds are in place? How do you explain the securities firms in the market who took the opportunity to dump stocks to get rid of their losses?"

"What are you staring at Xie Jingxing for? If we don't both go up, who will go first?"

"You talk about principles, so do we; you talk about the market, so do we; if you can't win over the market and start talking about principles, you are a gangster!"

The middle-aged woman's words were piercing: "Let me tell you, I am a professor at Tsinghua University who has taught and educated people all my life. I came to CITIC Securities to be a supervisor with a salary of 5 yuan. I am not listening to you using principles to pressure me!"

"I'm sorry for my reputation in this life because you caused the shareholders to lose money. If you destroy my reputation, I will fight to the end with you who has impure motives."

"Who do you say has impure motives? I warn you that you must speak with reason and facts!" The square-faced man looked cold and embarrassed.

The middle-aged woman turned her head and looked around the room: "Don't think I don't know. Some people have shady relationships with certain private equity funds. If you want to save the market, then save the market. Don't..."

"You bitch, you are unreasonable. This is not the place for you to act wildly in the meeting. Get her out of here!"

"I'm leaving on my own without any need for you to stop me. I'm putting this on hold. As long as Xie Jingxing's money doesn't enter the market, I will abstain from voting forever!"

…………

21:20, Grapefruit Capital office.

"It's safe with us here. Assistant Song, can you ask your colleague to briefly describe the whole process so that we can take notes?" The leader in a white shirt said in a gentle voice.

Song Anli bluntly said: "Leader, the market is in a state of panic right now. It is not convenient to spread this matter. Please help keep it confidential."

"Don't worry, there will be absolutely no problem. Plainclothes officers will be here to take over immediately."

The white-shirted leader made repeated assurances, and then explained: "Our comrades on the front line really didn't understand the situation at first, please understand."

"That's good. Mr. Xie is in a meeting right now. He asked me to express my gratitude to you. Thank you for your hard work."

Song Anli softened her tone, and the leader in the white shirt said a few polite words. As there was really nothing more to say, he took his leave first.

Just now, a retail investor who felt that he was cheated by Xie Jingxing ran to the downstairs of Xiyou’s office to wait, and when he couldn’t find Xie Jingxing, he followed other Xiyou employees. Fortunately, the employee just went to a nearby convenience store to buy oden as a midnight snack, and was reminded by the lobby security on the way back to the company, so he immediately reported the case to the police.

There was no need to call the police. The street patrolman arrived and pinned the retail investor down in two or three minutes. All they found on his body was a small screwdriver, and it had a telescopic head!
Apart from crying and cursing Xie Jingxing for being a beast and asking him to return my hard-earned money, he was dragged into the car and taken back to the police station without any resistance.

Under normal circumstances, if I had to make a special trip for this kind of bad luck, I would have been afraid of wasting gas money, but now I have to take it very seriously, and it can be regarded as a remedy after the fact rather than a work worthy of recognition.

The leader in white shirt had a lot of grievances in his heart, but he couldn't say it out loud. Now countless eyes were on Chairman Xie, and if he made a mistake by accident, he would be in big trouble.

"Sent away."

On the other side, Song Anli walked into the independent office and closed the door. Tang Man only looked up at her and continued to lower her head to review various documents and signatures.

Xie Jingxing shook his sore hands: "I didn't anticipate enough. Tell my colleagues to be more careful at critical moments."

"No one could have imagined it would be like this. Even when life and death are at stake, they are still held back by mutual distrust. So it's a good thing for us to enter the market later." Song Anli came closer and poured him a glass of water.

The media reviewed the headlines of the reports before they spoke out. As expected, if the rescue efforts were real, as long as the market rebounded sharply on Monday as expected and the panic was alleviated, no one would care about grapefruit entering the market that day.

But what the hell, CITIC rushed into the market with its own money, and Juntai and other leading brokerages followed closely behind. No one can say that they didn't try their best to hold on.

But the overall market trend was to open high and then fall back, and Xie Jingxing immediately became the target of public criticism.

"Try to speed up the process and urge the bank. If it doesn't work, we will enter the market first with our own funds." He took a sip of water and made the decision.

Tang Man paused slightly and raised her head. Song Anli pursed her lips, and they looked at each other without responding.

Just as Xie Jingxing was about to say something, the screen of the phone on his desk lit up and a WeChat message flashed across it.

【Thank you, are you busy? 】

It was just six short words sent by Qi Tian. Until the light of the message dimmed and finally went out, Xie Jingxing did not touch the phone. He turned his chair with his back to the desk and faced the window.

The computer screen behind him showed the verbal abuse heaped upon him by countless retail investors on the Internet; two hours ago, he had asked all employees in the company to turn off their cell phones, and by this time, everyone's phone probably had countless inquiries piled up in it.

The attention from colleagues, family, friends, and everyone inside and outside the city.

Now that he has entered the besieged city, he has fallen into the quagmire of game of mutual distrust.

"Let's urge the bank again."

Xie Jingxing retracted his decision, and Tang Man and the others breathed a sigh of relief, hoping that the market would be better tomorrow. …………

Tuesday, 8:47.

"Is the news confirmed? I understand."

Xu Xiang, who had a messy haircut and a thin body, hung up the phone, pushed up his glasses and said, "Say hello to our media friends and tell them that the Securities Investment Fund is urgently borrowing 800 billion yuan from ICBC and CCB."

"800 billion, is that the 800 billion registered capital they used to increase capital and expand shares on Sunday?!" The deputies who have worked together for many years have a tacit understanding.

Xu Xiang couldn't help but smile with a hint of sarcasm: "The central bank's promise to provide unlimited liquidity support to securities funds was a bluff. They didn't even provide the first 800 billion yuan."

"Not only is Xie Jingxing's 3000 billion out of the question, the entire market has believed it wrongly. The public must know the truth." He concluded seriously.

The deputy laughed out loud: "Xie is a good braggart. He should have stayed in the venture capital industry. Why did he have to come to the stock market to show off and not be able to tell the difference between the big and small kings?"

"Okay, let's go say hello to the media and continue shorting."

Xu Xiang didn't seem to care. His deputy left in a hurry and he stood alone in front of the computer waiting quietly.

At 9:15, the stock market call auction began.

"call!"

Uniform and meaningless exclamations came from the public office area. Xu Xiang suddenly turned half way around and looked back, and then there was complete silence.

"Brilliant!"

"Hooray, we are the fucking kings of the market!"

"Fuck you, are the fireworks pretty?!"

At 9:30, the public office area erupted with beast-like roars and screams, and all the traders were venting their adrenaline that was soaring to the sky.

This time, Xu Xiang ignored him. He hunched over slightly, his body trembling, his face flushed and his expression distorted as he stared at the computer screen.

The market opened 8% lower, which is not enough to describe as a crash. It was a real plunge of 400 points in one second, and hundreds of billions of long funds evaporated in an instant.

This is the price of deceiving the market, this is the price of trading against me!
"Securities firms don't trust each other. Today, they can't pull up the blue chips of the two oil companies. Go short and beat the bulls in the market."

Xu Xiang seemed to be high on drugs. He turned and strode towards the public office area, looking at a group of traders who were as enthusiastic as if they were in a group sex orgy: "Have you ever seen someone dying?"

"When a person is injured, they scream and struggle desperately, but when they are about to bleed to death, they become very quiet and don't even have the strength to make a sound."

He shook his head and his hair trembled: "The current market is like a dying person who will not resist. All the short sellers can come in and fight to tear off a few pieces of meat, so hurry up and eat the most delicious piece of meat."

"I, Xu Xiang, don't care about the title of the so-called No. 1 private equity investor. The investment income will speak for me and tell everyone that they are all rubbish when it comes to manipulating market sentiment."

Xu Xiang held his head high and looked arrogant. Before Xie Jingxing came, he was the king of the market. After Xie Jingxing came, he was still the king. Fuck 3000 billion!
"The bond market has fallen." A trader warned loudly.

The deputy rushed into the office and whispered in Xu Xiang's ear: "CITIC Securities is in a hurry and is selling its bond holdings to divert cash flow to the stock market."

"That would bring down the bond market as well," he answered without hesitation.

…………

10:07, Wall Street.

"Oh-oh, this is horrible, how did they do it?"

On the trading floor of Goldman Sachs headquarters, young Indian traders sat in front of their computers, raising their eyebrows in amazement.

The violent use of administrative power to rescue the market, including but not limited to the central bank directly providing money to rescue the market and exchanges prohibiting short selling, has stunned the entire European and American financial industry.

The most outrageous thing is that a private investment tycoon suddenly came up with 3000 billion yuan to save himself. The black box operation was written on his face, and everyone has been watching and eating melons these days.

I thought this was the limit, but it still couldn’t save the market. It opened high yesterday and then fell back, and today it opened 8% lower, causing the intraday market risks to completely spill over and spread…

"F**K! F**K!"

From the opposite workstation came angry curses and the sound of a keyboard being smashed. The keyboard buttons flew over the head and landed at the feet.

The Indian trader was not surprised and picked up the space bar and threw it back. The guy opposite was a foreign exchange trader and it seemed that he held a lot of RMB positions.

During the trading session, the bond markets in mainland China and Hong Kong Island both fell sharply to varying degrees. Although it is not clear what happened exactly, it is obviously related to the stock market crash. If the bond market is dragged down, currency, commodity futures, etc. will be in danger.

The general judgment is that this is a financial crisis. If you stay here any longer, you will die. If you can't escape, then run away.

"Everyone, listen to me!"

The MD boss who was sitting at the end of the workstation stood up, clapped his hands and issued an impromptu order: "The latest news is that their artificial heroes are fake. The entire mainland market is out of money and liquidity has been completely lost."

"So from now on, sell all assets related to the mainland."

The young boss with a hooked nose paced around his territory and casually pushed down a head that wanted to express an opinion: "Don't tell me that the market is stampeding and we can't sell it."

"If you can't sell stocks, sell dim sum bonds. If you can't sell dim sum bonds, sell CNY. If you can't sell CNY, sell commodities."

He raised his voice and said, "Believe me, if you don't want to stay and experience the disaster with them, you should start clearing out your inventory now."

"In exchange for cash flow, consider how to help them fall into the abyss faster, so that you still have the opportunity to make up for the losses caused by the sell-off by short selling."

The young boss frowned and finally complained: "This time Morgan is ahead of us. Let's catch up and show them who is the boss."

With the nuclear button pressed, all overseas markets of the domestic financial industry entered a state of plunge. It was the most dangerous day since the stock market crash, and the financial crisis was imminent.

…………

16:45, Grapefruit Capital office.

"Hey?"

"Let's go now and come to the capital for a meeting."

"I am a bit tired."

"Tomorrow will be the last day the market will fall. Your money will be in your account tomorrow night. I promise!" Yu Nian said in a deep voice on the other end of the phone.

Xie Jingxing hung up the phone in silence, looked at the desperate situation of an 8% drop on the computer for a while, picked up his coat and went straight to the airport.

I will eat you alive, I promise - he said in his heart.

(End of this chapter)