Chapter 443 Flash Crash

At 08:30 local time in the federal capital, in the securities trading hall of Boqi Heavy Industry, the traders and analysts who had already taken their positions were preparing to officially start today's "fight" in the market as usual.

Jack Winston, the chief trader of Boqi Heavy Industry, hovered his hands above the virtual keyboard, and his fingertips elegantly touched the clusters of volume lights, as if a pianist was playing his repertoire.

Few traders would use the adjective "elegant" to describe their work, but Jack Winston is one of them.

He is full of talent in this area. He became the chief trader of Boqi Heavy Industry at a young age, and he does have some capital to be proud of. The fight in the financial market seems to him like a chess game, and he is the "chess player" sitting firmly on the Diaoyutai.

He stared at the virtual screen in front of him, which was showing the stock price of Boqi Heavy Industry and the large amount of data and information he needed. Everything seemed calm as usual.

At least so far.

Just as he took the refreshing hot drink handed over by his assistant and was about to see if the traders newly promoted from below had adapted to the intense rhythm of the headquarters, a flashing red eye-catching window suddenly popped up in the lower right corner of the screen.

That was the "alarm pop-up window" of the market early warning system of Boqi Heavy Industry.

The alarm without any signs made Jack's heart jump suddenly. He quickly switched to the technical analysis interface and saw a huge sell order suddenly appear on the market depth chart, like an inexplicable black hole swallowing up the buying power.

He almost reflexively evaluated the scale and speed of the sell order, and then calculated in his mind the market chain reaction that such a large sell order might cause.

"Put it on the main screen and enlarge it!"

Jack said through the voice control system, while using his training to keep his voice calm. As the chief trader, his emotions and every move will affect others in the hall, so keeping calm under any circumstances is also one of the important skills.

But even he himself did not expect that this forced calmness would not last too long.

As Jack Winston issued the order, the details of the sell orders on the technical analysis interface were magnified, and soon showed large sell-offs from multiple unknown accounts.

The chief trader of Boqi Heavy Industry noticed that although the sources of these sell orders were scattered, it was still clear that this was a carefully planned sell-off, and the huge amount was enough to disrupt the trading order of Boqi Heavy Industry's related stocks.

Jack's mind was racing, and he remembered the crisis management principles that his mentor, the former chief trader who had just retired, had repeatedly emphasized in countless simulation training and actual combat in the past. But even so, at this moment, he still couldn't suppress a surge of uneasiness in his heart.

This uneasiness eventually made him press a red button, and suddenly the entire trading hall sounded an alarm, and an emergency call appeared on the screen in front of him.

"Contact the group headquarters. Well, high-level threats, we may be in big trouble."

--

Boqi Heavy Industry Headquarters, Crisis Response Center.

After receiving the news, Calhoun, the helmsman of this federal heavy industry giant, came to the encrypted conference room of the crisis response center with other senior executives of the company.

In fact, he had been awakened from a deep sleep four hours ago, and then received the bad news about "our army's defeat".

After that, he had been attending an emergency online meeting held by Mrs. Paris of the Nutao Group. The other senior executives attending the meeting were as confused as him at this time. No one expected that this armed conflict would have such a result.

In order to organize this "expedition", the various companies under the military-industrial complex not only sent out their fleets in full force, but also sent most of their main forces over - including those precious heavy cruisers and battleships.

But overnight, these fleets, which were the "foundation" of each company, were lost, so when many people heard the news, their first reaction was to doubt whether the news was wrong.

However, as more and more news came back, including the battle reports sent back by the 23rd and 24th fleets provided by the Federal Navy, the fact that the joint fleet suffered a great defeat was directly placed in front of them.

And this fact, for many companies in the military-industrial complex, including the Nutao Group, Boqi Heavy Industry, and Deep Space Mining, directly brought them to an extremely dangerous situation.

In this situation, the danger is not only from the Atlas Group.

If these fleets as "muscles" are lost, the federal government may be secretly "sharpening its knives" at this moment, intending to take the opportunity to completely get rid of the interference of the military-industrial complex or even stage a "backlash" drama.

This is also the main reason why Mrs. Paris urgently summoned everyone. They must stay together and think of countermeasures as soon as possible.

But no one expected that the Atlas Group's counterattack would come so quickly.

At 8:45 local time in the federal capital, everyone who attended this emergency meeting learned about the stock market through their own channels at almost the same time.

Then everyone looked at David Calhoun, whose face turned pale after receiving the news. The latter apologized to Mrs. Paris while maintaining his expression and hurriedly left the online meeting.

Although the news received by David Calhoun and others all said that there were ‘unknown forces’ shorting Boqi Heavy Industries.

But even if everyone thought with their appendixes, they could think that this was a counterattack from Atlas.

In the meeting room of the Boqi Heavy Industries Crisis Response Center, the atmosphere was extremely tense at this time, and even the air seemed to be solidified into a heavy piece of lead.

The data flashing on several virtual screens was like an invisible storm, and a large number of sell orders from unknown sources were like dark clouds pressing down, and the stock price curve of Boqi Heavy Industries was declining at a speed visible to the naked eye.

On several other screens, there were news about the defeat of the joint fleet, the quality gate of Boqi Heavy Industries, the death of the whistleblower, and related real-time public opinion monitoring.

Of course, the live broadcast of the ‘Eye of Reality’ that just started suddenly was indispensable. With the help of the broadcast screen of the ‘mouthpiece’ of the Atlas Group, the senior executives of Boqi Heavy Industries even saw the wreckage of the warship with the company’s logo printed on it before the relevant news was sent back through their own channels.

After seeing this scene, everyone present quickly realized that the "Eye of Truth" or Atlas Group deliberately released this picture in order to cooperate with the attack being launched in the stock market.

"Everyone, we have no time to waste. I can conclude that this is a counterattack from Atlas!"

David Calhoun on the main seat said decisively. Although his mental state at the moment was not good after hearing a series of bad news, his voice was still steady and powerful.

After hearing his words, the chief financial officer of Boqi Heavy Industry also continued to speak:

"And they obviously prepared a long time in advance. Not to mention the exposed "black materials", the large number of stocks in their hands alone cannot be dealt with overnight, but we don't even know how many "chips" they still have in hand now."

The words of the chief financial officer are the same as what the other executives present are thinking. No one thought that Atlas's counterattack would come so quickly before. Or they never thought that Atlas could still fight back.

After all, in their previous expectations, this isolated company would only be completely defeated by the military-industrial complex that was "clenched into a fist".

But now, the Atlas Group not only attacked them in the capital market, but also dealt them a fatal blow in the public opinion field.

"So we must respond immediately!"

David Calhoun said in a deep voice: "Let the External Propaganda Department cooperate with the Public Relations Department to issue an official statement denying these accusations and stating that we will take action to hold these opinion makers accountable through the law."

Law

To be honest, when David Calhoun said the word "law", many executives almost laughed.

Because for them, the various laws promulgated by the federal government are basically not binding, and these executives have long forgotten how many years ago they last had awe for the "law".

David Calhoun obviously knew what these executives were thinking, but he was not angry, but explained lightly: "This is to make our shareholders, investors and brokers in the market continue to have confidence in us, understand?"

Executives familiar with David Calhoun, after hearing his tone, quickly realized that the big boss was a little angry, so they did not dare to say anything more, and nodded in agreement.

"Start the emergency fund and open the authorization to traders, so that they must find a way to stabilize the stock price! At the same time, inform our allies of the situation and tell them that if they still stand by and watch at this time, Boqi Heavy Industry's today will be their tomorrow!"

Soon, Boqi Heavy Industry and its most determined allies in the military-industrial complex took action, and these allies obviously understood the principle of "lips and teeth are cold".

Moreover, the military-industrial complex had previously thought of directly suppressing the Atlas Group, which would allow the other party to recover and launch a counterattack. No one thought that this was just a minor fight, and it was even very likely that they were going to fight to the death with the military-industrial complex.

After many companies took action one after another, a large amount of off-market reserve funds flowed into the market through various public and secret channels, and under the operation of traders, they were invested in this battle without gunpowder.

——

In the securities trading hall of Boqi Heavy Industry, the atmosphere at this moment is completely different from before the opening. Everyone is operating nervously. They are constantly buying their own company's stocks and trying to stabilize the stock price.

On the screen next to it, the press conference held urgently by Boqi Heavy Industry is being broadcast live. With the efforts of the public relations team, a large number of securities trading centers, brokerage forums, financial news channels and various media in the Federation are also broadcasting.

The direct confrontation in the market, the hedging in the public opinion field, and the help from allies seem to have slowly stabilized the stock price of Boqi Heavy Industry.

Just when many traders were secretly speculating whether this meant that the crisis would be resolved with the company's response, the situation took another sharp turn for the worse.

A series of red numbers flashed across the main screen, indicating a waterfall-like drop in stock prices. The entire market seemed to have lost its mind at this moment.

In the trading hall, the piercing alarm sounded again, and this round of alarms sounded even more terrifying than the alarms issued by Chief Trader Jack Winston before.

Every trader's face turned pale. They felt a little helpless and didn't know what they should do.

"Flash crash."

Jack uttered a special noun somewhat weakly, and this noun refers to the situation that all traders are most reluctant to face.

This refers to the extreme price fluctuations in the financial market in a very short period of time, usually manifested as the market price of a certain security, commodity or index suddenly falling sharply within a few minutes or seconds.

After that, it may rebound quickly, but it may also continue to be sluggish, or even collapse to the bottom and finally trigger the circuit breaker mechanism.

However, it is "unfortunate" that Federal Securities cancelled the "circuit breaker mechanism" twelve years ago. At that time, there was a conspiracy theory that the military-industrial complex was behind the major rule changes.

Because soon after the circuit breaker mechanism was cancelled, many companies that did not join the military-industrial complex were crushed one by one in the securities market.

But no matter what the truth of history is, or what will happen without the circuit breaker mechanism, Jack Winston, the chief trader of Boqi Heavy Industry, can't care so much now.

He quickly calmed himself down and quickly activated the highest-level crisis response procedure of the securities trading department.

A series of instructions flowed out of his mouth like water and were quickly executed by the trading team. The algorithmic trading system of Boqi Heavy Industry was also activated to the highest level, and the server array equipped with the algorithmic trading system also entered the overclocking operation state under the settings of the technicians.

After the further improvement of computing power, the trading system began to try to stabilize the market again and absorb the panic selling in the market by calculating the optimal buying and selling points.

High-frequency trading strategies were also enabled without restrictions at this moment. The trading system captured market opportunities within milliseconds, although it was a battle that was almost impossible to win when facing the new generation of trading systems developed by Lilith.

At this moment, regardless of position and camp, the trading department of Boqi Heavy Industry, led by Jack Winston, showed their professionalism and tenacity. Everyone was racing against time and trying their best to save the situation that was about to fall into the abyss.

But this battle in the capital market still showed its cruel and bloody side without any hesitation.

The battle started at the opening, coupled with the fermentation of negative news, has reached the peak of panic in the market. Any efforts seem insignificant, and the power of the flash crash is beyond the imagination of all of them.

The stock price of Boqi Heavy Industry fell like a free fall, the market liquidity almost disappeared, and all the efforts to save it seemed pale and powerless.

When the time came to 16:00 in the afternoon, the first trading day of this week finally ushered in the closing time.

After a day of fighting and multiple large-scale "counterattacks", the closing stock price of Boqi Heavy Industry still fell to the lowest point in history. The company's market value evaporated more than half in one day, and an unprecedented financial crisis appeared in front of them without any signs.

In the meeting room of the crisis response center of Boqi Heavy Industry, there was only a dead silence after the closing bell slowly fell. David Calhoun clenched his fists, and unwillingness and fatigue flashed in his eyes.

After seeing the stock price and market value of the company at the closing, many other executives in the meeting room wondered if they were in a nightmare, but the "estimated dividend for this year" cut in half on their personal terminals told them that all this was true.

After a long time, David Calhoun came back to his senses. Looking at the executives in front of him who were still in shock, he couldn't help but shook his head slightly.

However, he didn't say anything sarcastic, but intended to let these executives come back to their senses and discuss the self-rescue plan that was urgently needed.

Originally, he also planned to warn Mrs. Paris and other major members of the military-industrial complex, because the aggressive Atlas Group's counterattack was definitely not limited to Boqi Heavy Industry.

But in the end, he still didn't do it, and temporarily ignored the messages sent by some other corporate executives. After all, in his opinion, there was such a big commotion now, even if he didn't say anything, other people should have a sense of crisis.

As for those companies that didn't have a sense of crisis and even needed to be reminded by themselves?

Hum. Just come down and sit at a table with Boqi Heavy Industry.