IWSF – Ch 218

Oh Byeong-jun, Graduate of Korea University’s Department of Business Administration.

He successfully broke through the tough job market and landed a position at CS Retail. He had secured his dream job at a major company, but his work life wasn’t exactly enjoyable. The work was hard and there was a lot of it. Spending the whole day traveling between retail stores was exhausting.

As a new employee, his salary was only around 3.3 million won. After paying rent and living expenses, even if he was frugal, saving 2 million won a month was difficult.

He graduated from a top university and got a job at a major corporation.

This seemed like a successful life, but for some reason, he couldn’t see what lay ahead. He had saved diligently for about two and a half years, skimping on food and clothes, but he had only saved 50 million won.

On the other hand, housing prices in Seoul had risen so much that it was impossible to buy a place no matter how hard you saved.

It got to the point where the only way to own a home in Seoul was to inherit it from your parents.

‘Will I even be able to get married like this?’

Since the end of last year, the cryptocurrency craze had swept through universities and even companies. His workplace, CS Retail, was no exception.

Although upper management had issued instructions not to invest in stocks or cryptocurrencies during work hours, it couldn’t quell the investment fever.

Everyone was constantly checking market prices on their smartphones during breaks, rejoicing or sighing.

Up until this point, Oh Byeong-jun hadn’t paid much attention to cryptocurrency investment. His thinking changed after attending a year-end gathering.

It was a combined year-end party and reunion with seniors and juniors from his university band, but the conversation topic was entirely cryptocurrency, not music.

Those in STEM fields were passionately arguing:

“The Federal Reserve can issue as many dollars as they want, but Bantcoin has a fixed supply.”

“Traditional currencies lose value over time due to inflation, but cryptocurrencies, due to their scarcity, can only keep going up in value.”

“Someday, cryptocurrencies built with blockchain technology will replace existing currencies.”

“Just like the internet changed the world, blockchain will change the world. And buying coins is investing in that blockchain technology.”

“No telling how much more it’ll go up over time. Now’s the perfect opportunity to buy.”

Blockchain, distributed ledger, protocol, hard fork, soft fork, SegWit, and so on. Unintelligible terms flew around.

Oh Byeong-jun was lost in thought.

‘I understand that blockchain is a groundbreaking new technology, but what does that have to do with coin prices going up?’

Actually, the really interesting stories were something else entirely.

“There are quite a few people around us who hit it big with coins.”

“Did you see that current affairs program recently? That guy bought Stuncoin before its ICO, and made 60 billion won with it.”

“You know Seongjin? He invested 10 million won in the early days and has made 800 million won so far. He’s planning to cash out everything when he has enough to buy a building in Gangnam.”

“Mincheol made a ton of money too. He just bought a Mercedes-Benz E-Class.”

Oh Byeong-jun was shocked.

“Didn’t Senior Seongjin fail to get a job?”

“Yeah. He was just lazing around at home because he couldn’t find a job, and then his coin investment hit the jackpot. He breathed a sigh of relief, saying it would have been a disaster if he had gotten a job early.”

“…….”

Some people work their tails off all day and barely earn a few hundred, while others make 800 million won from coins at home?

There were countless other success stories.

Someone bought Roople, someone else bought Royda, and another bought Stellmanta. At this point, he started to feel foolish for working hard and saving diligently without looking elsewhere.

“Think about it. Coins are the last chance for people like us, from underprivileged backgrounds, to turn our lives around.”

“Is there even one person who lost everything investing in coins?”

“It’s not like some coins go down and others go up, they’re all just going up. The important thing is finding the ones that will go up more.”

Finally, a senior who was the president of their club in college chimed in.

“Even Kang Jin-hoo from your department, remember him? Would he be so rich now if it weren’t for Bantcoin?”

Oh Byeong-jun remembered a junior he had seen in college. Everyone knew that the initial investment for OTK Company came from Bantcoin.

On his way home after the gathering, Oh Byeong-jun installed the Banthem app on his smartphone and looked at the exchanges. He also joined the Bantcoin website and group chat rooms to gather information.

Everyone who invested was making money, and they were posting proof of their profits. The returns were unbelievable. If you only posted a 100% profit, you’d be mocked for not making more.

‘Is making money this easy?’

Oh Byeong-jun carefully chose a cryptocurrency.

The coin he selected was Roople.

Unlike other coins with distributed ledger systems, Roople operates on a private blockchain led by the Roople company. It was created from the beginning with the goal of replacing financial transactions, so transaction processing was significantly faster than other coins, especially for interbank transfers.

Each coin had differences in its issuing purpose, method, and quantity, but that wasn’t a very important issue.

The only important thing was this: how much more will it go up in the future?

Unlike the stock market, cryptocurrency exchanges are open 24 hours a day, even on weekends. As long as the servers don’t go down, you can trade anytime.

Oh Byeong-jun invested 5 million won and bought Roople at 1200 won. He planned to start with a small investment and gradually increase the amount.

But just a few days after investing, something amazing happened.

News broke that Roople was collaborating with major banks on money transfers, and it instantly surged by 100%. He made over 5 million won in just a few days.

‘I should have bought more!’

Before his regret could fully form, the price even broke through 3000 won, and his profit increased to 10 million won.

He worked overtime until he was bone-tired, and his salary was only 3.3 million won, but coins were jumping by millions of won in a single day.

Moreover, there was an abundance of good news on the horizon.

Roople had already partnered with several banks, and it seemed like it would completely replace the international money transfer system within a few years.

Thinking this, he felt anxious. If it went up any further, it would be harder to buy.

As the price headed towards 4000 won, it briefly paused and dropped to 3400 won. Oh Byeong-jun quickly liquidated his remaining 45 million won and bought more.

‘Please, just go to 5000 won.’

As he hoped, a few days later, Roople broke through 4000 won and rose to become the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, surpassing Ethereum and trailing only Bantcoin.

Oh Byeong-jun threw his arms up and cheered.

“Yes!”

Bubbles make everyone happy.

The developers who created and issued the cryptocurrencies, the investors who bought them, and the operators who ran the exchanges. No one was losing money; everyone was making it.

But this situation couldn’t last forever. This was easy to understand with a little thought.

For prices to keep rising, liquidity had to be endlessly supplied. Someone had to buy the coin someone else bought for 1000 won for 1500 won, and then the next person had to buy it for 2000 won.

It had the form of a Ponzi scheme.

Of course, it’s hard to definitively say that cryptocurrencies themselves have no value. But they weren’t immediately replacing existing fiat currencies or creating any added value.

Eventually, the moment someone couldn’t find someone to buy it at a higher price… that is, the moment the inflow of funds stopped, it was bound to crash.

However, no one thought deeply about that point.

Even if it was a bubble, it didn’t matter. Everyone was confident that they would be able to escape at the last moment.

But… not long after the new year began, several negative events happened simultaneously.

The biggest problem was the news that the presidential transition committee had formed a cryptocurrency task force and was considering a complete shutdown of exchanges. Also, in the US, investigations into exchanges for price manipulation and illegal transactions had begun, and Checkcoin, Japan’s largest exchange, had been hacked and 60 billion yen worth of cryptocurrency had been stolen.

When these facts became known, the coins that had been rising endlessly began to plummet. Korea, where prices were already about 30% higher, experienced a much steeper drop than other countries.

From this point on, Oh Byeong-jun wasn’t in his right mind.

He couldn’t sleep and stayed up all night. He couldn’t put his smartphone down, even when eating or going to the bathroom.

‘Should I sell now?’

But it looked like it would rebound any minute.

He couldn’t focus on work, and even at the office, he kept checking exchange rates every minute. Contrary to his desperate wishes, Roople continued to fall.

The chart looked like a waterfall cascading down. In an instant, he lost all his previous profits and even started losing his initial investment.

Unlike stocks, cryptocurrencies have no daily price limits, and there are no safety measures like circuit breakers or sidecars.

When prices were soaring, this was an advantage, but when they crashed, it was a different story.

-What happened while I was sleeping?
-WTF I checked the price in my sleep and thought it was a dream, but I woke up and it was real ㅜㅜ
-What the hell is this crash?
-We absolutely have to HODL.
-If the foreign big investors start buying the dip, it’ll moon again.
-Pay close attention to the futures market. The big players are just shaking things up for a bit.
-Now is the last chance to get on board.
-There aren’t any idiots who haven’t bought yet, right?
-Stuncoin, let’s go!

There had been various negative events in the cryptocurrency market before, and each time there had been a crash. Nevertheless, the overall trend had been consistently upward.

That’s why everyone thought this crash was just a temporary correction.

Roople stopped falling around 2600 won and started to attempt a slight rebound.

This changed his thinking. Seeing a coin that was 4500 won drop to 2600 won made it seem very cheap.

Maybe now was a good buying opportunity?

Oh Byeong-jun withdrew 40 million won from his line of credit and bought more Roople. Averaging down would lower his purchase price, and he could recover his principal much faster if it rebounded.

The opposite was that if it crashed further, he would be ruined…

Oh Byeong-jun cried out, praying desperately.

“Roople, let’s go!”

Golden Gate’s Korean branch immediately sold off its holdings, making a profit of over 100 million dollars.

And Senior Sang-yeop also continued to sell off the coins he held. K Company’s coin holdings were beyond what the domestic exchanges could handle.

Even if they had to give up the “Kimchi premium” (higher prices on Korean exchanges), they continuously sold on US and Japanese exchanges with high trading volume. Still, the upward trend didn’t stop.

Bubbles burn their brightest just when you think they’re about to burst.

On overseas exchanges, Bantcoin stopped just short of $20,000, but on Korean exchanges, it temporarily hit 28.8 million won.

Just when everyone was filled with anticipation that it would break 30 million won…

Various negative events hit, and it began to crash. In less than ten days, Bantcoin fell by more than half to 14 million won.

Even then, everyone on the Bantcoin message boards where cryptocurrency investors gathered was shouting “Let’s go!” in unison.

In the past, whenever there was an issue, cryptocurrencies had crashed, but they quickly recovered to their previous highs. That’s why everyone was in a mood of expecting a rebound this time as well.

The biggest victims of this crash were individuals who had jumped into the market late.

Just as individual stock investors prefer KOSDAQ, which has higher growth potential, over the KOSPI, which has already risen significantly, the same was true for cryptocurrency investment.

Most people bought altcoins like Padeks or Stellmanta, priced at a few hundred or a few thousand won, rather than Bantcoin, which was priced at over 20 million won.

In fact, the rate of increase for these coins far surpassed Bantcoin. The problem was that the opposite happened when they fell.

Bantcoin, at least, stopped falling at 14 million won and temporarily formed a support line, but altcoins continued to fall endlessly. Coins that had risen significantly returned all their gains, becoming half or even a third of their previous value.

I asked Taek-gyu, who was staring at the Bantcoin message board.

“What’s the atmosphere like over there?”

“It’s changed from ‘Let’s go’ to ‘Let’s go to the Han River.’ They’re recruiting members for a Han River gathering.”

“…….”

Generally, a “Han River gathering” means spreading out a mat in Han River Park and eating fried chicken and beer, but in this case, it means jumping into the Han River [to commit suicide].

Most of it is a joke, but people do actually jump sometimes. That’s why there are counseling hotlines installed on the Han River bridges.

The message board was a scene of utter chaos.

Watching it reminded me of when Mountain Hill went bankrupt. For reference, the Bantcoin price at that time was only 1.2 million won.

But now, even after the crash, it’s 14 million won. It makes you realize how ridiculously high it went up in the meantime.

Just as I was thinking that, Taek-gyu, who was still looking at the message board, said,

“Ah! There’s some good news in the midst of all this.”

“What is it?”

“The water temperature of the Han River has gone up a bit.”

“…….”

[TL/n: The names of the crypto coins maybe seems similar to stellar, ripple coin but they’ve written it like this for some reason. Just like Samsung was written as Seosung]