RPAGF Chapter 222 Hard Landing
Chapter 222 Hard Landing
Early February 1990. Tokyo.
Nikkei Average: 30,120 points
At the intersection of Shinjuku West Exit, the continuous winter rain has stopped.
The municipal water truck had just passed by in the early morning, its high-pressure water guns spraying powerful jets of water that washed over the black and white zebra crossing.
More than two weeks ago, there was a glaring pool of blood spreading out in a radial pattern here. Now, the asphalt road has been washed clean, and even has a cool, reflective sheen from being washed with water.
A giant electronic screen above the intersection is playing a joint press conference held by the Metropolitan Police Department and the Ministry of Finance.
"Regarding the incident in which four people fell to their deaths at the Keio Plaza Hotel in late last month, the Metropolitan Police Department has completed a comprehensive on-site investigation and social relations investigation."
The Metropolitan Police Department spokesperson, dressed in a crisp dark blue uniform, placed his hands flat on the podium.
"All the deceased were burdened with enormous debts. Investigations revealed that some individuals were suspected of illegally embezzling company funds, while others were deeply mired in illegal high-interest loans. The essence of this incident was a mass suicide triggered by the extreme greed and moral depravity of a few speculators who illegally misappropriated funds and blindly invested, ultimately leading to the collapse of their personal financial chains."
The spokesperson bowed slightly, finished reading his prepared remarks, and then gave his seat to the official from the Ministry of Finance standing next to him.
The Ministry of Finance official adjusted the height of the microphone.
"Recently, the exit of a few highly leveraged speculators has sparked some unfounded speculation. The Ministry of Finance hereby solemnly reiterates to the entire nation that Japan's real economy remains strong, and the fundamentals of land prices are extremely robust. The recent technical correction in the stock market is a healthy phenomenon of market self-correction, and the fundamentals have not deteriorated in any way."
The bureaucrat's powerful voice echoed through the bustling streets of Shinjuku via external speakers.
Passersby, bundled up in their winter coats, hurried past the area beneath the screen. Most glanced up briefly before continuing on their way to their respective office buildings.
Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo.
The heating in the office of the head of the credit department at the Mitsui Bank headquarters was on full blast.
Minister Nakanishi sat in a large leather office chair, a cup of slightly warm black coffee in his hand. His gaze, peering through the gaps in the blinds, fell on the press conference being broadcast on the exterior wall of the building opposite.
He took a sip of coffee and gently set the cup down. His right index finger tapped twice on a list of high-risk clients highlighted in red.
The name "Matsuura Construction" is listed at the top.
The official spokesperson's reassuring words echoed on the screen. Zhongxi frowned, a hint of impatience flashing in his eyes.
The Kansai nouveau riche from Matsuura committed suicide by jumping off a building. This extreme and newsworthy manner of death caused quite a stir in society, adding a lot of unnecessary public opinion trouble to Mitsui Bank's subsequent bad debt recovery work.
As Matsuura Construction's second-largest bank, the credit department had assessed the company's default risk two weeks prior and formulated a comprehensive asset divestiture plan. In Marunouchi today, Nakanishi has many clients like Matsuura—highly leveraged and at risk of financial collapse at any moment—in his drawers.
However, they were all generally within the established risk control procedures, except that Matsuura was a bit special this time.
Honestly, couldn't this guy just find a quiet place to die? He's just causing trouble for everyone...
Zhongxi picked up the internal phone on the table.
"Received from the Ministry of Justice and the Asset Preservation Division."
The call was answered quickly.
"I am Nakanishi, and I am now initiating the mandatory takeover plan for Matsuura Construction."
"Chiba Bank, as their main bank, must be facing a barrage of media and demanding payment from building material suppliers right now. While they're still dealing with this chaos, you should immediately take the mortgage contract to the court and apply for asset preservation. Seize all the land in the port area that Matsuura mortgaged to us and all related accounts."
The section chief on the other end of the phone hesitated.
"Minister, the Ministry of Finance just said on television that it wants to maintain stable credit. If we're the first to forcibly take action now, wouldn't that be...?"
"Do as I say." Nakanishi interrupted his subordinate. "Matsuura caused this trouble himself; we can't let Mitsui's assets go down with it. Take back what's rightfully ours. Be quick; keep the Chiba Bank people out of the most valuable land."
Zhongxi hung up the phone and gently placed the receiver back on its base.
He picked up the client list highlighted in red, pulled out the page with the Matsuura Construction section, and placed it in the "Executed" folder on the edge of his desktop.
I completed another routine task today, though it was a little bit more troublesome.
……
The core strategic room on the fourth basement floor of the Saionji Industrial Headquarters.
A sense of oppression permeated the air.
The group's top executives were all present at the large, black lacquered glass conference table.
Saionji Satsuki sat quietly in a large, genuine leather swivel chair at the head of the long table. Today, she wore a soft, off-white turtleneck cashmere sweater. Her long, dark hair was simply tied back with an antique-style tortoiseshell hairpin. Her hands rested lightly on the armrests of the swivel chair, her clear black and white eyes calmly observing the people in front of her.
The head of the family, Shuichi Saionji, sat at the head of the table on the left. He wore a dark gray cashmere cardigan and placed his hands folded on the table.
Next to Shuichi was Tokuhiro Eguchi, president of Saionji Construction. He wore a dark black custom-made suit, and the sterling silver company emblem with the three-pointed star pattern on the left side, inlaid with black onyx, gleamed coldly under the overhead light. His thick arms were laid flat on the table, and his back was ramrod straight.
Next up is Tadashi Yanai, the head of retail for Uniqlo and S-Mart. His eyes are bloodshot from long hours of staying up late (because he was appointed to concurrently serve as the head of S-Mart, but he is not particularly good at this type of retail), but his expression remains solemn.
At the head of the table on the right, the group's chief financial officer, Executive Director Endo, sat upright.
Beside Endo, Masato Saionji, president of the Saionji Information System (SIS), wore gold-rimmed glasses and stared calmly at the table.
Security Minister Iwao Dojima, like a black iron tower, sat upright and silent at the end of the long table, just like a soldier.
The executives were urgently summoned here. As is customary, it was not yet time for the monthly routine meeting.
Therefore, everyone is speculating that the young lady is about to announce another earth-shattering plan.
Everyone kept their lips tightly shut, quietly awaiting the instructions that were about to be given.
Executive Director Endo placed his briefcase flat on the table, breaking the silence in the room.
He took a fax with the Metropolitan Police Department's internal markings from his black briefcase and placed it flat on the table with both hands.
"Young Miss, Master of the Family."
Endo's voice was particularly clear in the quiet strategic room.
"Regarding the recent public outcry over the fatal fall at the Keio Plaza Hotel, the Metropolitan Police Department's internal debt investigation report has been delivered. The official characterization is that it was a self-destructive act stemming from personal moral depravity."
"Currently, the social reaction is not significant, and the public has generally accepted the official explanation."
"No clear opinion has been given from the financial sector, or rather, the impact of this incident on the financial sector is minimal, only the circumstances are somewhat egregious."
Endo turned to the second page of the fax.
"Furthermore, in the asset liquidation appendix of this list of the deceased, there is a rather tricky but also valuable part. It concerns President Matsuura, one of the deceased."
"With Matsuura's death, Matsuura Construction is currently leaderless, and its financial chain has completely broken. He left behind a staggering 2 billion yen in high-interest bad debts at Chiba Bank. However, in the prime locations of Minato and Shibuya wards, Matsuura Construction still owns seven properties in excellent locations and projects under construction (referring to truly valuable properties, not the 'valuable' assets of the bubble era)."
Out of professional instinct, Endo's gaze shifted back and forth between Eguchi Tokuhiro and Satsuki.
"Chiba Bank's risk assessment department is currently in disarray. Miss, should we take advantage of this chaos and initiate the acquisition process for these non-performing assets?"
When Eguchi Tokuhiro heard "construction projects underway in the port area," his eyes lit up. He leaned forward slightly, clearly very interested in this lucrative opportunity.
Satsuki leaned back in her leather chair, her gaze sweeping over the fax.
"This matter need not be considered for the time being, Executive Director Endo."
Her voice was gentle.
Endo nodded, closing the document in his hand with a calm expression: "I understand. Then this part of the assets will not be included in the watch list for the time being."
Satsuki sat up.
"Chiba Bank and the Ministry of Finance are still in a phase of extreme blind confidence." Satsuki rested her hands on the armrests of her swivel chair, her gaze sweeping across the long table. "Even if the market is correcting, as long as land prices haven't started to fall, the filter of the land myth will remain firmly in their eyes."
"In their balance sheet, the seven plots of land left by Matsuura are still valued at tens of billions. They might even think that confiscating these plots and auctioning them off would be more than enough to cover the two billion bad debt, and they could also make a fortune from it."
Satsuki leaned forward slightly.
"If you go to Chiba Bank with cash at this time, they won't give you a discount of even one yen. Instead, they'll see the Saionji family as a sucker who's eager to pay off Matsuura's debts and take over the property at a premium."
Jiang Kou instantly withdrew his previous eager expression, and awkwardly fiddled with the pen in his hand, pretending to take notes.
Miss probably didn't notice me, did she?
"Furthermore, we cannot regard the four bodies that were smashed on the asphalt road as a simple debt dispute."
Satsuki ignored Eguchi's overly eager expression and her voice gradually turned cold.
"We need to see what this event represents."
"The axle at the bottom of Japan's runaway economic train has begun to break."
She glanced at the Tibet Province press conference that was still playing on the television screen.
"The government is now desperately trying to cover up the truth and using the media to whitewash the incident. Bureaucrats in the Ministry of Finance are attempting to achieve a so-called 'soft landing' for the Japanese economy by slowly releasing market pressure and supplementing it with a slight tightening of credit."
"They attempted to make the train, which had lost its axle, glide slowly by inertia and eventually come to a smooth stop at the platform."
The air inside the strategic room began to grow heavy.
It's starting now; the young lady is about to get down to business.
All the executives held their breath. They had a vague feeling that what was about to be announced would completely overturn their existing business common sense.
Satsuki pulled her hands back, interlacing her fingers in front of her.
She slightly raised her chin, her cold gaze sweeping over every face on either side of the long table. A chilling sharpness gleamed in her clear, black-and-white eyes.
"The government wants to bring this train to a gradual stop."
"I want them to catch their breath."
"We want to achieve what is known as a 'soft landing'."
She paused for a second, emphasizing each word.
"But we can't give it to them."
"Not only should we not give it, we should also—give it a hard push."
"We want to accelerate the decline of the Japanese economy."
"Let it...land hard."
boom.
These words were like detonating a high-explosive bomb in a closed strategic room.
The air in the conference room suddenly felt noticeably heavy.
Executive Director Endo frowned slightly, his hands, which had been resting flat, unconsciously clenched together, his fingertips pressing firmly against the table. Tokuhiro Eguchi straightened his back even more, his expression instantly becoming extremely solemn. Tadashi Yanai's eyes also revealed an undisguised seriousness and doubt.
To force a hard landing for the national economy.
This accelerated the collapse of the entire Japanese financial market.
This move is so appalling that it has gone beyond the usual scope of profit-seeking by conglomerates and touched upon the forbidden zone of subverting the lifeline of the nation.
The air in the conference room became unusually heavy. The executives' breathing noticeably slowed, and immense doubt and tension churned in their hearts. However, due to their long-standing absolute awe of the young lady's power, no one dared to utter a word of disrespect or question her.
They tried their best to control their emotions, suppressing all their doubts, and finally focused their attention on Shuichi, who was sitting at the head of the table on the left.
As the head of the family, Xiu Yi sensed the almost overflowing confusion in the senior executives' hearts.
He picked up the water glass in front of him, took a sip, and moistened his slightly dry throat.
He then put the water glass back in its place and turned his gaze to his daughter beside him.
"Satsuki".
Shuichi's voice broke the silence, raising a question at the opportune moment.
"If the Japanese economy experiences a hard landing and suffers severe damage, all industries will be in ruins, a large number of companies will go bankrupt, and the general public will completely lose their ability to consume."
Xiu Yi's brows were furrowed.
"This will have a huge impact on our retail businesses, Uniqlo and S-Mart, our related convenience store system, and our commercial real estate holdings. Isn't doing this tantamount to shooting ourselves in the foot?"
The executives nodded in agreement. The patriarch's problem was their biggest concern at that moment.
With the nest overturned, how could the Saionji family's vast physical industries possibly survive?
Satsuki listened quietly to Shuichi's question.
She did not immediately respond.
She turned her head slightly and glanced at the core executives of the group on both sides of the long table, whose faces were full of curiosity and a hint of unease.
Are these elites in front of us short-sighted?
No. On the contrary, they are among the most far-sighted people of our time.
However, even the most farsighted people could not have predicted that after the government's so-called smooth soft landing, Japan would face decades of continuous decline.
Even if someone did perceive this, they lacked the decisiveness and courage to actively fuel the flames and accelerate the entire process of destruction.
Satsuki placed her hands on the armrests of the leather seat and slowly stood up. She strode towards the large white whiteboard at the front of the strategy room and uncapped the black marker with one hand.
Then let me completely overturn their common financial knowledge.