Chapter 196: Black Saturday

January 25th.

The twenty-sixth day of the twelfth lunar month.

As the end of the year approached, Tianqi Group had officially gone on holiday. Liu Xuewei did not return home, but instead came from Tianjing to Baohe City, where she was picked up by Su Xin and his parents to return to their old home in the countryside.

Su Xin took Liu Xuewei for a simple stroll around the village, greeted a few close friends, and took the opportunity to introduce his girlfriend.

This could also be considered a formal recognition of Liu Xuewei's status in front of friends and relatives.

At this time, Su Jiazhai was becoming increasingly lively as the villagers returned one after another from other places; wherever they walked, people greeted them warmly.

On the plaza at the east end of the village.

Su Xin and a few childhood friends arrived at a long stone bench and sat down.

Liu Xuewei walked to the other side, sat on a small stool, and chatted with Zhang Chunhua and the others.

"Xin, you're really getting more and more awesome now. Your Tianqi Group actually managed to crush the entire Sakura Country."

Su Kang had a look of amazement on his face.

The others nearby also sighed with emotion one after another.

"A few days ago, those media outlets were all saying that Tianqi Group was going to fail, and some even said you were going to go bankrupt. I was worried for several days."

"Who knew the situation would change so fast these past two days? The wind direction reversed all of a sudden."

"I see people online saying that Sakura Country's currency has collapsed, the stock market has crashed, and an economic crisis has occurred. Many people are lining up to jump off buildings."

"That's for sure. I even saw a video where several people jumped off a building one after another, smashed into each other, and turned into a mangled mess. Their flesh and blood were all mixed together; it looked really terrifying."

"But that's what they deserve."

"After all, those are Sakura Country people."

"They even tried to assassinate Xin before. To be able to do such a thing is just too shameless. Their current fate is the retribution they deserve."

At this moment, another person said:

"It's not just them who are shameless; Yingjiang Country is actually very shameless too. I saw many people online saying that Yingjiang Country intentionally set many people up, letting quite a few retail investors and financial groups rush into the foreign exchange market, only for Yingjiang Country to follow Xin and sell off, treating all those people as bag holders."

"Of course, Xin was already suppressing the Sakura Coin, so no one can say anything, but Yingjiang Country's act of intentionally pitting people against each other is just too shameless."

"Some people say that you and Yingjiang Country actually joined forces a long time ago, and that this operation was planned together by you two. Is this true?"

They were all young people who loved chasing hot topics. Furthermore, this hot topic was not only sensational globally but also related to their good friend Su Xin, so they had kept a close watch on it from the very beginning.

Even though a few of them didn't understand finance at all, they had specifically looked up some relevant information and learned some basic common knowledge.

Therefore, from the vast amount of information on the internet, they could roughly understand the context of the matter.

Precisely because of this, they were also very curious about the inside story.

Including on the internet, countless netizens were also concerned: exactly how much money does Tianqi Group have? How much did they earn from this currency war? Are they really cooperating with Yingjiang Country?

Su Xin shook his head: "Of course not."

Seeing that he clearly didn't want to say more on this topic, Su Kang hurriedly changed the subject:

"Let's not talk about this. It's rare for Xin to come back, and it's rare for us all to be gathered together. Why don't we go to the city to sing and drink?"

The other few also echoed the sentiment one after another.

"That works."

"Chao Ge hasn't been back for the past two years. It's rare for us to be this complete this year, so let's go have some fun together."

"I agree too. Xin, what about you?"

Seeing that everyone had agreed, Su Xin was also somewhat moved; after all, it had indeed been a long time since he had gathered with these fellow villagers and friends.

However, looking at Liu Xuewei on the other side, he still gave a bitter smile:

"Let's talk about it tomorrow. My girlfriend only just arrived today, and my parents specifically took time off to come back, saying they wanted to host her properly."

Su Kang clapped his hands and said: "That doesn't matter! My house has professional karaoke equipment. Let's just go to my courtyard; we can eat, drink, and sing right there in the courtyard. How about it?"

"Good."

Su Xin readily agreed: "Then why don't we just move the equipment to my house? My courtyard is a bit more spacious, and it can seat everyone no matter how many people there are."

"It just so happens my parents have already prepared food, so everyone can drink together tonight."

"That's even better."

The group quickly reached an agreement.

Su Xin went over to discuss it with his mother and Liu Xuewei.

That evening.

In Su Xin's courtyard, everyone drank happily and sang loudly, with laughter and joy continuing incessantly.

The pleasant singing carried far into the air, as if shrouding the entire Su Jiazhai in an ocean of joy.

In stark contrast to the joy at Su Jiazhai, the entire Sakura Country at this moment seemed to be shrouded in a bleak, dark cloud.

Starting from yesterday afternoon, the Sakura Coin had been continuously depreciating under the continuous sell-offs from multiple parties.

By today, the value of the Sakura Coin had fallen to its lowest point in nearly twenty years.

And it was still continuing to trend downward.

Under such circumstances, some major import-oriented foreign trade companies directly announced bankruptcy.

They used other currencies to purchase goods, but the income from selling products within Sakura Country was all in Sakura Coin. Now that the Sakura Coin had depreciated significantly, the money they made wasn't even enough to cover costs; it was equivalent to saying that all the products they had sold previously were at a loss.

Furthermore, given the current trend of the Sakura Coin, even if they had sufficient Sakura Coin, they couldn't exchange it for other currencies because not many people dared to accept Sakura Coin anymore.

Facing such a situation, many foreign trade companies couldn't even pay the invoices of their suppliers.

Yet, the more it was like this, the more the suppliers worried about payment issues and kept chasing them for money.

Consequently, some foreign trade companies with tight capital chains went directly bankrupt, and even those companies with more abundant funds were in a difficult situation.

At the same time, due to the sharp depreciation of the Sakura Coin, the prices of various imported raw materials and end products also rose accordingly, which caused the cost of living in Sakura Country to climb sharply.

This made the public miserable, forcing them to grit their teeth to get by and cut back on expenses.

This in turn brought about a series of dire consequences such as reduced consumption, a sluggish market, and inflation.

Such a depressed market also caused panic among investors, with much capital scrambling to flow out, and various assets in Sakura Country were also viewed bearishly by many.

What is a chain reaction?

This is it!

It is fortunate that today is Saturday and the market happens to be closed; otherwise, the compounded stock market crash would leave the people of Sakura Country unable to even cry.

Yet even so, many people successively headed to rooftops during the first day of the Sakura Coin crash, then leaped off with abandon.

In just one day.

There were as many as dozens of reports of leaping incidents in the media or on the internet in Sakura Country.

The entire economy of Sakura Country underwent violent turmoil; many companies went bankrupt, countless people fell into despair, and complaints were heard everywhere.

This made many exclaim that Sakura Country had completely fallen into an economic crisis.

And this day is called Black Saturday by many people in Sakura Country.