Chapter 594: Economic Downturn

The once-in-a-decade circuit breaker caused the US internet to explode. At the beginning, most people thought this was a normal technical adjustment and didn't pay too much attention.

But when the stock market began to plummet in all directions and got out of control, everyone realized that things were big.

Almost everyone's stocks were depreciating, and at the same time, they were selling off the depreciating stocks in their hands to stop losses. Under such a vicious cycle, a circuit breaker occurred.

The trading of the stock market was forcibly interrupted. It seemed to calm down slightly, but everyone knew that this was just a beginning.

Miss Luo Quan, having nothing to do, also paid attention to the stock market.

This time, the stocks that fell the hardest were some oil companies, with losses calculated in the tens of billions.

And like giants such as Apple, Amazon, and Walmart, although they didn't fall as hard as oil companies, because the company size was large, even if they fell by a few percentage points, the converted amount was quite terrifying.

All walks of life were affected by this circuit breaker, but what was more worrying wasn't the circuit breaker, but whether a financial crisis would really happen next.

If such a situation really appeared, it wouldn't be just the US; it would be a disaster for the whole world.

Don't look at how China safely survived the last financial crisis; there was a price for that.

After eating a large batch of US national debt, China's economy actually received a great impact, but the country successfully transferred these impacts by developing real estate.

So when the 2008 financial crisis happened, China's economy didn't collapse, but since then, the original domestic housing prices that weren't outrageous started to soar at the speed of sitting on a rocket.

In ten years, it had multiplied several times, but wages hadn't increased much, which led to many young people talking about housing changing color, and all the grand ambitions finally became being able to save enough money to buy a house.

If there was another financial crisis, who knew what kind of situation would appear? So Miss Luo Quan was relatively concerned about such major events concerning the world and had been searching for the latest situation on Twitter and Reddit.

The latest news obtained currently was that the problem wasn't particularly big, and the Federal Reserve was already preparing to regulate it.

If it really couldn't be controlled, then just print money and distribute it to the public. Anyway, the US was currently deploying troops globally, and no matter how much money was printed, it could be shared with countries all over the world.

Very shameless, and also made people very helpless.

The night passed, and the day came.

Under the attention of the whole world, the US stock market opened again.

This time, stock investors were prepared. As soon as the stock market opened, they sold the stocks in their hands, leading to another plummet in stock prices.

This circuit breaker was faster than yesterday, taking less than three hours, making melon-eating masses around the world call it outrageous.

A circuit breaker in the US was actually a rare thing in history. It happened twice in the last century, and in this century, it only happened once before yesterday.

Some people might not necessarily encounter a circuit breaker once in their lifetime, but it appeared twice in a row yesterday and today, and it might even happen again tomorrow.

It had to be said that everyone had witnessed history this time.

The good news was that two consecutive circuit breakers didn't cause too much impact on Miss Luo Quan's family.

The real estate of the Albert Group belonged to the real industry, and most of it was concentrated in Europe, which hadn't been affected yet.

As for some investments made by the company in other areas, they were just small troubles, and it wouldn't be worth much money even if they were all lost.

As for Father's shipping company, it had long been delisted and hadn't even started operating yet. Even if it had a circuit breaker for a month, it wouldn't have much to do with him.

The company Miss Luo Quan invested in was the same. It was estimated that Nikola was burying his head in research and development, and he might not even know about the circuit breaker.

Therefore, although Wall Street, which controlled the lifeline of the US economy, was now in a gloomy mood, the crew on the outskirts of the gambling city hadn't been affected too much.

After the self-heating hot pot arrived, Miss Luo Quan excitedly called all the employees and recommended this specialty food from her hometown to them.

"Everyone, this self-heating hot pot is a unique delicacy from my hometown. Eating a meal of this in winter guarantees that you will feel warm all afternoon." Miss Luo Quan said while taking out a lunch-box-sized self-heating hot pot from the box.

To be honest, she hadn't eaten self-heating hot pot either, but she hadn't eaten pork but had seen pigs run. Many food-area up-hosts on Bilibili had eaten this kind of product.

And the brand she bought was the one with the most praise. There was definitely a gap with freshly cooked hot pot, but the base used was authentic Yuzhou old hot pot base, and the taste was absolutely top-notch.

As for the ingredients, considering that foreigners might not be able to eat things like tripe, duck intestines, and blood curd, Miss Luo Quan didn't buy them. She chose beef rolls, pork rolls, and the like, and then matched them with some vegetables.

"Friendly reminder, this taste is very spicy, very, very spicy. If your stomach is not good, you don't need to force yourself to try it. It's better to choose self-heating fast food." Before distributing, Miss Luo Quan solemnly reminded all the colleagues who hadn't eaten hot pot.

Whether it was Sichuan cuisine or hot pot, it was basically not as good as Jiangxi in pure spiciness.

But besides spicy, Sichuan cuisine and hot pot also carried the same level of numbness.

In the case of two flavors combined, it was that when you first started eating, because it was too numb, it temporarily made the lips and tongue feel this intense spicy taste.

And science proved that slight pain could make the senses excited and produce addiction, which was also the reason why many people became more and more excited as they ate spicy food.

And after eating until excited, the numb taste gradually faded, and the spicy taste struck. The consequences were very serious. It was not an exaggeration to say that it was like spitting fire in the mouth.

And there would be very uncomfortable sequelae the next day, so those with relatively light tastes were not recommended to try hot pot.

The crew employees, seeing the director say so, originally quite curious, immediately became hesitant.

Eating a hot meal in the ice and snow was of course good, but getting acute gastroenteritis would be a loss that outweighed the gain.

Most people in the crew didn't have regular diets. The director filmed excitedly, and once she filmed, it would be for several hours. If she didn't open her mouth, no one could think of resting.

Over time, everyone would have some stomach problems more or less. After all, not every director could eat at mealtime like Miss Luo Quan, and she could buy delicacies from her hometown to share with the crew.

Although they really wanted to give the director this face and try hot pot, considering the actual situation, many people didn't force themselves. In the end, only forty or so warriors dared to stand up and try hot pot, most of whom were boys.

Yu Miss Luo Quan was the most active among them, directly taking a beef hot pot with the Chinese characters "Extra Spicy" from his sister's hand.

This was originally prepared for Miss Luo Quan to eat, but it was taken by Yu Miss Luo Quan.

"This is the highest level of spiciness. Think about it before eating." Miss Luo Quan saw her brother dismantling the outer packaging quickly and kindly reminded him.

"It doesn't matter, at most it's just diarrhea," Yu Miss Luo Quan said indifferently.

Angela was picking and choosing in the box and finally took out a box of "Clear Soup Pork + Potato Slices."

On Yu Miss Luo Quan's side, he soon poured water into the self-heating bag, and the boxed hot pot soon became boiling.

After waiting for five minutes, Yu Miss Luo Quan carefully opened the bag, and a burst of heat sprayed out directly.

"I'm going, this thing is enough to be used as a hand-held heater." Yu Miss Luo Quan let out a strange cry and opened the lid of the hot pot.

Appearing in front of him was first the bright red chili oil, and then a fragrance wrapped in spicy flavor rushed to his face.

Yu Miss Luo Quan took a breath and immediately coughed. This was choked before eating.

"Are you okay? If not, don't force it." Miss Luo Quan also opened the box and prepared to eat. Seeing that her brother seemed to have encountered a small trouble, she said with a laugh.

"It's... fine, this is a mistake." Yu Miss Luo Quan grabbed a bottle of ice water and said: "I didn't expect the smell to be so pungent. Just taking a breath is so spicy."

"Drinking water won't be of much use after it's spicy. You have to drink milk. Milk can secrete a substance to protect your mucosa, which is very helpful for reducing the stimulation of chili." Miss Luo Quan said, throwing a bottle of pure milk to her brother.

These little tips were all summarized from her frequent eating of spicy food.

Pure milk was a good thing. Drinking a cup of hot milk before going to bed at night could help sleep, and drinking a cup in the morning was beneficial to physical health.

Eating spicy food could drink milk, and drinking alcohol could also drink milk, both of which had a protective effect on the stomach.

The only pity was that many Chinese people had lactose intolerance, and drinking pure milk easily caused diarrhea.

"Talk about it later, let me see how spicy this thing is." Yu Miss Luo Quan took the milk and put it aside, picked up a spoon, scooped it up with soup and meat, and stuffed it into his mouth.

"Wait a minute..." Miss Luo Quan wanted to stop him, but it was a step late.

Eating hot pot was eating the food inside. She didn't dare to drink this red soup. Yu Miss Luo Quan drank a spoonful directly. How could this be?

Sure enough, after a spoonful of red soup went down, Yu Miss Luo Quan's face changed from white to red, and his lips began to congest rapidly.

"Oh, my God." Yu Miss Luo Quan now knew what his sister meant by "extra spicy." This mouthful of soup was like a flame, burning all the way to his stomach along the esophagus.

At this moment, a part of his mouth had temporarily lost consciousness, as if he had bitten something slightly smaller than a pea. After biting it, it was like being injected with anesthesia.

"You are really awesome, drinking red soup mixed with peppercorns. I haven't tried this way of eating." Miss Luo Quan quickly opened a bottle of milk and let her brother drink a few sips.

Fortunately, there was only one mouthful, not particularly much.

"Uh..." Yu Miss Luo Quan's face was like drinking three catties of Erguotou, a bit dizzy, and speaking became difficult.

"This hot pot... the taste is indeed top-notch." After slightly slowing down, Yu Miss Luo Quan found that his back had already felt sweat.

It was indeed a bit uncomfortable at first, but after eating, his taste buds also became excited under the stimulation of pain.

Soon he scooped again, but this time he scooped beef...

Ten minutes later, Yu Miss Luo Quan put down the spoon and let out a full burp full of spicy flavor.

This meal made him eat comfortably, and he was sweating profusely.

It wasn't just Yu Miss Luo Quan who had the same idea. Other employees who ate hot pot also showed quite satisfied expressions, but they weren't as brave. Not many ate mild spicy.

After eating, Miss Luo Quan went to the medical team and asked them to prepare medicine for gastroenteritis, saying that it might be used at night.

Fortunately, everyone's stomach was still strong. Since they dared to eat hot pot, they still had this confidence, so there were no patients.

However, how many people's walking posture became strange when they went to the toilet the next day was unknown. Anyway, Yu Miss Luo Quan couldn't sit down for the next day, either standing or lying on his stomach.

Five days passed in the blink of an eye. The crew followed the original plan and successfully filmed all the snow scenes.

Then the main force returned to Hollywood to prepare for the next stage of filming.

Special effects were the highlight of this movie. Many plots had to be completed in green screens, and there would be quite a lot of non-

In any film, performance without physical props is one of the most difficult tasks; the imagination and on-the-spot improvisation of the actors and the director determine what the final presentation of the scene will look like.

Generally, big-budget special effects films spend a long time polishing this aspect because many actions need to be changed, and there are simply too many things to adjust regarding character positioning, eye contact, and movement.

However, the staff did not know that Miss Luo Quan had long had a standard answer for how to shoot these special effects scenes; what was originally the most difficult part of film shooting did not seem very difficult to her at all.

In the remaining three days in Las Vegas, the U. S. stock market experienced another circuit breaker, the financial market had completely shut down, and news of retail investors and capitalists jumping off buildings became more frequent.

At this dangerous moment, the Federal Reserve finally began printing money.

Green dollars poured out of the printing presses in a steady stream; these pieces of paper, which were originally not worth much, became dollars worth more than gold after being printed with Franklin's face and watermarks.

This is the ultimate manifestation of American power and hegemony; they can print money at will and make the whole world pay for it because the dollar is the world's reserve currency and is also tied to the strategic resource of oil.

After the printing presses started running, the circuit breakers that had lasted for three days finally did not happen again; although the market was still falling, the magnitude was much smaller.

And on the fifth day, the curve even showed a brief rebound.

However, this did not last long, and the decline remained the main theme of the stock market.

The evaporated capital would not return so easily, the people at the bottom were truly going bankrupt, and most of the banknotes printed by the Federal Reserve could not reach their hands; after all, American relief stations never lacked food.

But an economic downturn was certainly unavoidable; however, having said that, ever since the 2008 financial crisis, the U. S. economy has been in reverse, so what difference does it make if it goes down or not?

But at least it looks like a financial crisis won't happen; at the very least, there are no signs of it right now.

PS: Thanks to book friend Zi Ming for the 5,000 book coin tip, thank you very much!