novelSusiti Chapter 120 The Vigilant Old Vanderbilt and the Short-Selling Railroad
Chapter 120 The Vigilant Old Vanderbilt and the Short-Selling Railroad
Chapter 120 The Vigilant Old Vanderbilt and the Short-Selling Railroad
New York, Broadway.
The share price chart of Newland Light Metals is displayed in the most prominent position on the mining exchange, and every day people gather in front of it, craning their necks to look at the numbers.
The company's stock price rose from $20 per share to $58.70 in just two months after it was listed on the exchange.
Its rapid rise is among the fastest among the many stocks on the mining exchange.
Right now, the whole of New York is talking about this company.
From cafes to cigar shops, from clubs to barbershops, from stock exchange halls to shoe-shining stalls on the street, everyone was talking about aluminum and that man named Strauss.
"Jason, I told you this was an opportunity, a very precious opportunity, and you foolishly missed it."
At a dinner party with friends, Cornelius Jeremiah Vanderbilt swirled his wine glass, his face flushed, and spoke with great enthusiasm.
He has had more enjoyable two months than he has in the previous twenty years combined.
The profits from stocks and funds have reached $20,000, the first money he has earned on his own, rather than money given to him by his father and brother.
"Who knew this stock would rise so quickly?"
Across the table, a young man named Jason said dejectedly, "It's all my stockbroker's fault. He kept telling me to be cautious and wait and see."
Cornelius Jeremiah said smugly, "It's not too late to buy now, but you won't make as much as I did."
.
Another friend asked, "Cornellils, how's that fund you mentioned going?"
Cornelius Jeremiah boasted, "The first month's $1,000 has been deposited into my account, not a penny short."
I asked other gentlemen who bought funds, and they also received their money on time.
"What, are you interested?"
My friend nodded and said, "Of course I'm tempted. I can earn a thousand dollars a month, while I only have two hundred dollars of pocket money each month."
The other young people nearby nodded in agreement, saying, "Yeah, you have such a great talent for investing, we'd like to chip in and buy two spots so we can benefit from your success."
"no problem!"
Cornelius Jeremiah readily agreed, clearly pleased with his friends' flattery. "I'll go see Mr. Dutch tomorrow and get this sorted out for you."
His friends, upon hearing this, took turns toasting and praising him, quickly getting Cornelius Jeremiah drunk.
The servants who followed helped Cornelius Jeremiah into the carriage and took him back to Vanderbilt Estate on Staten Island.
He woke up the next day at noon, washed up, and went downstairs for lunch.
Inside the restaurant, a long mahogany dining table was covered with a snow-white tablecloth, and the rest of the family, except for him, had already taken their seats.
Cornelius Jeremiah took his seat, cut his steak, and chatted with his sisters about the latest market trends on Wall Street.
He spoke with great enthusiasm, completely oblivious to the increasingly furrowed brow of old Vanderbilt.
That's enough.
Old Vanderbilt slammed his knife and fork on the table, his tone displeased.
Everyone stopped what they were doing.
He raised his head, his iron-gray eyes staring straight at his second son.
"Cornellils, I had someone investigate those two companies you invested in. I think it's a bad investment. Dump them and get your money back."
Cornelius Jeremiah was startled, but he still mustered his courage and stammered, "Father, why? Have you found out what's wrong?"
"Newland Light Metals has complete mining rights documents, with certification from the California state government. The factory is under construction, and orders are increasing."
Each of Western Gold Mining Company's five gold mines has detailed mining records and grade reports; the fund's subscription contracts are legal and compliant; and the interest payment records are clear and accurate.
Old Vanderbilt spoke calmly and slowly: "It is precisely because I have not found anything that I am more worried."
Cornelius Jeremiah's expression stiffened: "Father, I don't understand what you mean."
Old Vanderbilt sighed and said, "I've lived for almost sixty years, and I've seen bubbles in every industry—shipping, railroads, real estate, cotton."
Before every bubble bursts, everything seems perfect. The ledgers are spotless, the contracts are neatly arranged, interest payments are made on time, and the stock price rises day by day.
Until the day it started to plummet.
Cornelius Jeremiah looked directly at his father and said, "No."
"What did you say?"
"I said no, Father."
The restaurant fell silent for a moment, and the atmosphere plummeted to freezing point.
The daughters and sons-in-law kept their heads down, not daring to breathe.
William Henry's surprised gaze fell on his younger brother; it was the first time he had ever seen his brother rebel against their father.
Cornelius Jeremiah slowly stood up, picked up his coat, and walked toward the door without looking back: "I will prove you wrong, Father."
In an office near the mining exchange, Dutch saw off yet another client who came to inquire about the fund. Ever since the news of the fund's first month's profit sharing was leaked, more and more people had been coming to them to buy the fund.
"Another greedy guy has taken the bait."
Dutch sat back on his sofa, thinking to himself, "Hosea, how's it going on your end?"
Hosea replied, "Six people came this morning and at noon, two fewer than you."
"That's $140,000."
Strauss chuckled and said, "Your fund snowballs much faster than stocks."
"The collapse is happening much faster than the stock market."
Dutch put his feet on the table and sank into the sofa. "Alright, let's not talk about that anymore. Let's talk about a few railway companies."
"Hosea, are you ready over there?"
Hosea said, "Alright, the short selling of New York Central Railroad and Erie Railroad stocks has begun, with a principal of $250,000 and leverage of four times without alerting the two companies."
"A bit timid, Hoshia," Strauss laughed. "Those jackals on Wall Street are playing with ten times leverage these days."
Hosea chuckled: "So most of those gamblers went bankrupt and lost everything."
Dutch nodded: "Okay, then my men will be dispatched."
Meanwhile, deep in the Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania.
The mountains rise and fall steeply, and the valleys crisscross. In this sparsely populated place, a railway runs through the mountains.
This is the Erie Railroad, running from Philadelphia to Port Erie in the Great Lakes region, one of the busiest freight rail lines in the eastern United States. Thousands of trains loaded with coal, timber, and grain traveled along this railroad every day.
The most crucial nodes along this railway line are the numerous railway bridges nestled within the mountains. Among these, the Stahl Viaduct and the Falls Viaduct are the most important.
Once destroyed, it will take at least six months to rebuild.
noon.
Four engineer assassins were currently in the shadows beneath the Stahl Viaduct, observing the massive stone arch bridge.
The bridge is 317 meters long and 33.5 meters high, with 17 stone arches. It took the Erie Railroad more than a year and cost more than $300,000 to build.
"Each person receives three packets of bitter acid explosives and detonators; keep them safe so they don't fall."
The lead engineer, a suicide squad member, divided the items and instructed, "I don't need to tell you where to put them; you can all figure out the bridge's weak points by taking a look."
"Set off!"
The four men packed up their belongings and began placing the explosives.
Explosives were placed at every critical support point, from the arch's base to its roof. Sticky resin held the explosives tightly to the stone walls, and long fuses connected each bundle of explosives.
"withdraw!"
Three minutes later, a dozen muffled explosions echoed from the depths of the canyon, like a series of rumbles of thunder rolling across the sky.
Huge granite slabs broke and shattered, crashing down into the valley below. One stone arch after another collapsed, and within seconds, only the two end piers remained standing forlornly on the cliff face.
At the same moment, fifteen miles away.
The wooden waterfall viaduct was destroyed even faster, breaking into more than a dozen pieces, which, along with the railway tracks and sleepers laid on it, plunged into the ravine below.
evening.
Erie Railroad Company, dispatch room.
On the long table in front of dispatcher George Miller, there was a printed timetable and several telegram report forms being filled out.
According to the timetable, Freight Train No. 47, bound for Port Erie, was supposed to pass through Richmond Station at 5 p.m.
But it's already six o'clock, and there's still no sign of train number 47 at Richmond station.
George Miller went to the telegraph machine and began sending telegrams to various stations, inquiring that they send people to investigate. He also directed the trains behind him to slow down until the missing train was found.
A few hours later, the reply telegram arrived:
The Stahl Viaduct and the Falls Viaduct were deliberately destroyed, and the 47th freight train plunged into the valley and exploded, killing all the passengers and crew.
Despite the Erie Railroad's efforts to cover it up, the news reached New York by sunrise the following day.
Inside the New York Stock Exchange, several stockbrokers who had received advance notice were initially shocked, but then began selling their Erie Railroad shares without hesitation.
A railway company's most important line was blown up, and the pillar supporting its soaring stock price was broken.
At this point, the best course of action is to sell before everyone else, even at the cost of others' lives!
"My God, what madman did this?" exclaimed a stockbroker named Porter. "The Erie Railroad will definitely fight them to the death."
"Not just Erie Railroad, I want to fight them to the death!"
Charlie, who held thousands of shares of Erie Railroad, was furious. Although he started selling immediately after receiving the news, he couldn't sell all of them because he held so many, and had to continue lowering the price to sell them.
"I've lost at least several thousand dollars in this wave!"
As time slowly passed, the stock price fell at an increasingly rapid pace.
When the market opened in the morning, Erie Railway's stock price was $75 per share, but by noon it had dropped to $71.
And this is just the beginning.
Jacob Little sat in his Wall Street office, with Erie Railroad's stock price chart and a thick stack of trading records spread out on the table in front of him.
This veteran speculator, known as the Wolf of Wall Street, is over fifty years old with gray hair. He made the judgment in just two hours.
Someone had already started shorting the Erie Railroad before news of the accident even broke. Their methods were extremely sophisticated, proceeding in stages and transactions; unless someone like them deliberately looked into the details, no one would notice anything unusual.
"It's a pity I found out too late, otherwise I would have bought up all the shares on the market and let you do the work for me."
Little sighed, his tone full of regret. "But eating the corpses of the Erie Railroad is a worthwhile deal nonetheless."
He pushed open the door and gave instructions to the traders outside.
"Sell off all the Erie Railroad stock we have, and at the same time spread the news that the Stahl Viaduct and the Falls Viaduct were deliberately destroyed."
"When the stock price drops to around $30, buy as much as you can!"
Meanwhile, at Vanderbilt Estate on Staten Island.
Vanderbilt Sr. made the same judgment as Jacob Little.
He sat in a high-backed chair in his study, with a stock chart of the Erie Railroad spread out in front of him. His eldest son, William Henry, stood beside him, holding the latest price list he had just retrieved from the telegraph office.
"The stock price has now fallen below $70."
William Henry quickly read out the numbers from the telegram, saying, "It is expected to fall below the sixty-dollar mark by the close of trading tonight."
"This is a golden opportunity," old Vanderbilt chuckled.
He has been investigating the Erie Railroad for a long time.
The company was poorly managed, heavily indebted, and riddled with internal factions; its annual profits weren't even enough to cover interest payments. His original plan was to manually drive down the stock price, then acquire all outstanding shares at a suitable level to gain control and integrate the railway line into the railway network he was building.
Who would have thought that someone would lend him a hand behind the scenes.
"William."
"Father."
"Use all available resources to suppress Yili's stock price. When it reaches $30, buy as much as you can!"
William Henry hesitated for a moment: "Father, what if the stock price continues to fall?"
Old Vanderbilt raised his eyelids and glanced at his eldest son.
"Then keep buying!"
Inside an office on the third floor of the Broadway Building.
Dutch and Hosea were sitting facing each other on the sofa, with a bottle of bourbon whiskey that was already mostly drunk on the small round table between them.
Hosea said, "I've done the calculations. After deducting transaction fees and leverage interest, our net profit will be over $450,000 by the settlement date."
Dutch sighed, "It's a pity that the short positions couldn't be any higher. If they were, the wolves on Wall Street would start to get alert."
Strauss took a sip of his drink and squinted. "Take your time. There are still several railroads around. The New York Central Railroad, the Michigan Central Railroad, and the Fondilak Railroad."
"If we do this to each company, we can make a total of two million dollars, enough to keep our scam going for another month."
""
The three men clinked glasses and drank it all in one gulp.