Chapter 78: Ambush

After chatting about life ideals at the school gate, Di Ye and Su Zhaonian took a taxi home. Upon entering, they found Di Yan and Lu Hanming there, accompanying his parents and Huang Ya as they studied the floor plans for Fengyue Garden.

"Little brother, Xiao Ya says you earned 1.5 million from the Dongying stock market today?"

"Just about. Sister, congratulations on your official promotion to bureau chief!"

"Compared to you earning over a million in a single day, what does my bureau chief position even amount to?"

On February 27, affected by the bankruptcy of Barings Bank, the Nikkei Index plummeted at the opening, with a maximum drop of over 4.5%. Di Ye repeated his old trick, using the same method he had used to short the Nikkei Index in Pengcheng before the Spring Festival. Aside from the 3 million transferred to Huang Zongshan, he had Xu Chaobo finance another 2 million, totaling 5 million, and shorted it with 10x leverage. After deducting the high financing interest, he ultimately earned about 2 million.

After the trade was completed, Di Ye had Huang Zongshan keep 500,000 in Pengcheng as a reserve and transfer the rest to Huang Ya as funds for buying a house. Stimulated by this "windfall," Di Yongchang and Zhang Xiuzhi were very supportive of buying a large house in Fengyue Garden to prepare for future marriage and children.

Di Ye joined in the excitement, took another look at the floor plans he had seen yesterday, and insisted on buying a villa. He explained, "Yuncheng has been developing very quickly in recent years, and land within the second ring road is becoming increasingly scarce. The government won't allow these kinds of detached villas to be built anymore. Scarcity makes things valuable; buying now only costs 3,000-something per square meter, but in a few years, it will probably be 5,000 or 6,000 per square meter."

Zhang Xiuzhi now listened to him on everything, nodding repeatedly as she said, "Buying a villa is good. We can grow our own vegetables in the yard; it not only saves money but also gives peace of mind."

Di Yongchang had similar living habits to Huang Ya and liked to be frugal, so he was still hesitant. Di Ye then added a reason he couldn't refuse, saying, "Dad, our family isn't short on money and can afford the excess birth penalty. Xiao Ya will have at least two children in the future, and a villa has many rooms, which will make it convenient to hire a nanny."

Huang Ya's face turned slightly red, and she lowered her head without a word. Di Yongchang had no relatives in Yuncheng and was particularly eager for many children and grandchildren to ensure the family's prosperity. Hearing this, he was immediately swayed and made the final decision: "That makes sense, then let's buy a villa."

Di Yan watched with envy and said, "Little brother, when you earn money again next time, help me buy a house in Fengyue Garden too. I don't need a villa, just a larger ordinary house will do. Hanming and I will pay you back slowly later."

The apartment in the Youdian Residential Quarter was allocated by Di Yan's workplace. Lu Hanming had a carefree personality and didn't take many things to heart, but he was particularly sensitive about housing and always felt like he was living under someone else's roof. Hearing this, his expression became a bit unnatural.

Di Ye glanced at him and said with a smile, "Sister, I don't need to buy your house. Brother-in-law will be able to buy one himself in a year at most, and he will definitely be able to buy a villa."

"What will he use to buy it?"

"He'll use those thousands of telephone magnetic cards at home to buy it."

Di Ye handed a villa floor plan to Lu Hanming and said, "Brother-in-law, I'm going to Jinling the day after tomorrow. If you have time, come with me. We can buy some magnetic cards with serial numbers before CNT-04 and those commemorative coins I mentioned last time. I estimate that by May or June, the prices of these things will start to rise."

Lu Hanming was overjoyed, the gloom on his face swept away, and he asked, "How much can they rise?"

"It's hard to say right now. Telephone cards might rise a bit slower, but once commemorative coins are hyped up, they will rise very quickly."

Di Yan had never been interested in things like telephone cards and commemorative coins, but now that she heard they could earn enough money for a house, she immediately changed her attitude and pressed, "Little brother, how do you know these things will rise in a few months?"

The night Di Ye returned from Pujiang, he had said at Di Yan's house that the stage for speculation had already been set, referring to that article which used the 327 Treasury Bond Incident to advocate for internet construction.

In that article, Di Ye listed 10 major problems exposed by the 327 Treasury Bond Incident, several of which were far-fetched and not solvable only by the internet.

For example, the problem of untimely dissemination of decision-making information could be completely solved by the method of releasing news and documents simultaneously, which is what happened historically—after the 327 Treasury Bond Incident, all decisions related to finance had to be released this way.

However, there was one problem that could only be solved after the internet was highly developed, and that was the regulation of hot money. But "highly developed" had not even been fully realized in 2023, let alone in the 90s.

The issue of hot money was not something Di Ye thought of, but something summarized by Li Yang, deputy director of the Institute of Finance and Trade Economics at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, in May 1995. It caused a sensation at the time, and the *Pujiang Securities News* and *China Securities News* spent over two months organizing and publishing dozens of articles to study and discuss it, letting the general public know the concept of "hot money" for the first time.

Because the 327 Treasury Bond Incident involved a huge amount of money and had a very bad influence, Li Yang, as a top domestic financial expert, had always paid close attention to it. As long as Di Ye's article, which "coincided" with his thinking, was published in the newspapers, it would trigger a chain reaction two months in advance.

"Sister, the domestic market for stamp, commemorative coin, and telephone card collecting is very small, totaling only about a billion or so. Affected by the 327 Treasury Bond Incident, the state will increase its regulation of the futures market in the coming months. At that time, at least tens of billions in hot money will be withdrawn and dispersed elsewhere. As long as 10% enters the stamp, coin, and card market, it will be enough to double the current market size."

"That's only a doubling."

"There are thousands of varieties in the stamp, coin, and card market; how could it be evenly distributed? Hot money will only go to speculate on things with gimmicks. Among them, commemorative coins have fewer varieties and lower issuance, making them the easiest to hype. For example, the commemorative coins I asked brother-in-law to collect were all issued in the 80s, with an issuance of only two or three million. No one knows how many have been preserved now. If you hype them a little, the price can increase more than ten times."

Di Yan was greatly tempted and asked, "How much money do you plan to take to Jinling to buy these things?"

Seeing her like this, Lu Hanming felt there was a chance and hurriedly said, "Xiao Ye gave me 50,000 last time, and there's about 30,000 left now."

"I'll go to the bank tomorrow and withdraw 50,000 for you. Consider this business a partnership between you and little brother, and split the profits fifty-fifty."

"Okay. But I'm the deputy editor-in-chief and main contributor for *Viewing Era*, so I can't get away the day after tomorrow. I'll go to Jinling alone after I finish my work."

"That works too."

After Di Yan and her husband left, Di Ye returned to his bedroom, summoned Xiao Honghua, and began typing his thesis. Around 9 o'clock, Huang Ya came in after watching an episode of a TV series with Zhang Xiuzhi and said, "I'll find an excuse in a few days to take Sister Yan to see the villas in Fengyue Garden, then buy two. We'll live in one, and transfer the other to brother-in-law once he earns the money. That way, the whole family can live together in the future. What do you think?"

"That's fine."

Di Ye agreed casually and continued typing for a while. Then, feeling something was amiss, he turned to look at Huang Ya and found her sitting in the chair next to him, staring blankly at a book with a smile on her lips.

"What are you thinking about?"

"Do you really want me to have two children?"

Di Ye couldn't help but laugh. He reached out, pulled her over, held her in his arms, and gave her a kiss, saying, "I wouldn't object if you wanted to have three or four."

"Three or four is too many; they'd easily fight. Let's just have two, one boy and one girl, just like you and your sister—that would be nice."

"You make the call on this; I'll just do the work."

"Then you have to work twice as hard; I don't want Xia Fangfei to get ahead again..."

The two were intimate for a while and were just about to enter a romantic state when the Big Brother on the computer desk rang. Di Ye was greatly annoyed, grabbed it, pressed the answer button, and gave a grumpy "Hello." Then his expression turned serious, and he asked, "Are you sure it's her?"

"Sure. I even greeted her; there's absolutely no mistake."

"Good, I'll send you the 500 yuan tomorrow morning."

"Many thanks, Boss Di!"

After the person on the other end hung up, Di Ye put down the Big Brother and said to Huang Ya, "Ren Yinglian is back."

On the night of the twelfth day of the first lunar month, Ren Datou was stabbed to death in the detention center. The next day, Ren Yinglian disappeared. According to Fan Dazhi, Zhong Rongke had sent her off to Guangdong Province. Now, only ten-plus days had passed, and she had actually returned.

Ren Yinglian was a woman with no brains. As long as Zhong Rongke tricked her with a few words, she would blame Ren Datou's death on Di Ye. Moreover, she had been slapped in public by Huang Ya, so it could be said that the hatred was deep, and it was impossible for her to let it go easily.

Di Ye liked to study social engineering and was very vigilant, especially regarding people who held a grudge against him, so he had made arrangements early on, bribing the neighbors around Ren Yinglian's residence to help him keep an eye out and report any news.

"Di Ye, how do you plan to deal with her?"

"I don't need to deal with her; I'll just let her turn against Zhong Rongke."