<h4>Chapter 987 It“s Begun!</h4>


    on thest thursday in may, the sky above manhattan was covered in ayer of clouds, as if it was about to rain.


    in order to avoid the rain, ben subconsciously began walking faster.


    this was wall street. if the global financial markets were a human brain, this was the prefrontal cortex.


    ben was a gifted person who graduated from harvard. he was a sessful investment banker working for goldman sachs...


    he went into the building, up the elevator, and walked into his office with his briefcase.


    his colleague was already in his office, waiting for him. his colleague asked, “did you watch the morning news?”


    ben: “not yet, did something happen?”


    carell: “no, nothing happened, which is weird. you should know that our department of justice announced that they have collected enough evidence to prove that the acquisition from six years ago was illegal. i’ve been paying attention to the news about star sky technology and china. but i haven’t been able to see anything.”


    ben ced his briefcase on his desk and sat down.


    he opened hisputer and shook his head.


    “this is unusual, i think this is getting more serious. i can’t think of a reason why china would choose to back down. i’ve always said that it is a bad idea to conduct an antitrust investigation on star sky technology. now the white house ns on using the department of justice to undo a patent acquisition that happened six years ago! this is asinine! they’re too naive!”


    if this were five years ago, this would have beenpletely different.


    back then, they could have stepped on star sky technology like an ant.


    but with the current international situation, things were different.


    especially because of the failure of the ares program, as well as the unveiling of the ilhcrc, more and more countries had begun to recognize that china had gradually be the new super-country of the world.


    the white house should have realized that the cross-regional nuclear fusion power grid spreading across southeast asia hadpletely eliminated america’s influence in the region.


    due to factors such as the sessful mars rescue, china had won over the internationalmunity, and more and more small countries had opened their doors to the cross-regional power grid and the economic growth that came with it.


    therefore, trying to attack a chinese enterprise was not a good idea.


    of course...


    the white house might have had no other choice.


    but that was not something ben cared about.


    carell twisted the pen in his hand and spoke.


    “that’s something the politicians have to worry about. this is happening, and it is not going to stop. i just want to know what china’s countermeasures are?”


    he paused for a second and shrugged before saying, “this concerns our operational strategies, as well as whether or not we can have a rxing weekend.”


    “it is very difficult to predict china’s moves since they’re dominating us in at least two industries. in theory, they have at least two options.” ben thought for a second and said, “but i prefer that they give the white house a buffer time and introduce countermeasures next monday...”


    “which field do you think they’re going to act on?”


    “i don’t know, anything is possible. but i think we should take back our positions and withdraw some funds to bnce our risk. especially in west cost public utilitypanies and powerpanies that we have positions in... as well as exxonmobil and te. but i don’t think we’re long them right now, so we should be fine.”


    carell snapped his fingers.


    “good idea, i was thinking the same thing.”


    ben wondered if carell really thought of the same idea.


    however, ben didn’t really care.


    the morning markets stayed rtively calm. just like the dark clouds outside the window, the calmness made people a little ufortable.


    ben was eating his sandwich as he stared at the news page on hisputer screen and took a sip of coffee.


    “carell.”


    “what’s up, my friend?”


    “don’t you think the morning markets are too stable?”


    “you’re saying this is the calm before the storm?”


    “i think so.” ben looked out the window and said, “we all know it’s going toe sooner orter.”


    carell said, “speaking of which, today is thursday.”


    ben looked at his colleague and asked, “yeah, why?”


    “there’s a new movieing out today.”


    ben: “...”


    i’m talking about the markets, and you’re thinking about f*cking movies?


    the news continued to y on theputer screen.


    after the news segment on a brazilian iron orepany increasing their production, the news anchor began to talk about umicore investing €1 billion into southeast asia, to fill the demand gap for lithium anode materials.


    ben, who turned his attention back onto theputer, noticed something strange.


    which was that, half of the news was rted to china.


    even if it wasn’t directly rted, it was at least partially rted.


    for example, the brazillian iron orepany announced an increase in production because of the booming infrastructure market in southeast asian driving up iron ore prices. ording to their analysts, the cross-regional power grids yed an extremely important role...


    as for why there was such a huge demand gap for lithium anode materials, it was obviously because of the lithium-air batteries. some people were even researching how to create a futures market for the pdms anode material.


    while he was thinking about whether or not the news would affect his investments, the news anchor suddenly received a piece of paper off camera.


    when the news anchor read the note, his expression changed instantly.


    even ben could see that the news anchor was shocked.


    this kind of thing happened from time to time on newsworks.


    usually, this meant there was a breaking piece of news.


    ben was carefully listening to the news when the words of the news anchor nearly made him fall out of his chair.


    “we have breaking news...


    “ording to our reporters in china, an hour ago, the chinese ministry of environmental protection began an investigation into east asia energy’s nuclear core project in california. ording to reliable sources, the project will be suspended for at least a month.”


    “sh*t.”


    ben stared at theputer screen as a sh of panic appeared in his eyes, and a drop of sweat slipped from his forehead.


    he was too ignorant.


    he had underestimated china’s determination.


    china’s counterattack was inevitable; even a homeless guy on the street could have predicted that.


    he just didn’t expect everything to happen so suddenly...


    a storm was brewing.