Since the open border agreement was enacted, the merchant fleets of Federation flooded into Qingshan Arena. After closure of more than a decade, the crowded and poor capital, the present day Qingshan Town, finally welcomed its long awaited prosperity.
But the harmonious trade only lasted for two days.
On the third day, the trucks from a few major chambers of commerce of Federation suddenly appeared in the Qingshan market. They put out giant signs in front of a few stores with the words “fire sale” written on them.
At the same time, the salespeople in front of the store began to yell at the top of their lungs.
“Cheap nutrient supply! Multiple versions available. Massive fire sale! Cheaper than the market price by 30%, don’t miss out on this opportunity!”
“Our store is selling it at a 40% discount! Is there anywhere cheaper than us? Come buy! If you miss the opportunity, you’ll have to wait till next year!”
“Buy, buy, buy. Since this is a necessity anyways with a long shelf life, it is not bad to store it at home. Where are we going to see such a massive sale again?”
The residents seeing the opportunity all gathered around. With the shouting and yelling, they took out the crystals from their pockets and grabbed the cheap nutrient supply.
The unexpected sale made all the store owners stare at their empty stores, completely dumbfounded.
Fire sale as well?
But the merchants from Federation were all selling near cost! Some merchants even discovered that the price was lower than their cost. Rather than selling their own nutrient supply, it was better to purchase from Federation’s store.
Nobody thought that the common necessity could cause a massive shockwave.
People had ideas.
The major retailers of nutrient supply in Qingshan gathered together to discuss about purchasing the nutrient supply from the merchants of Federation, and then slowly wait for the excessive nutrient supply to be consumed by the market before letting the market price become rational.
While the imagination was great, the reality soon proved to be cruel.
The retailers took out 100,000 crystals to purchase away all the nutrient supply from the merchants of Federation. But before they could catch a break, a massive batch of nutrient supply was hauled into Qinghsan again.
The massive dumping still persisted.
Only in two days, based on estimate, the average nutrient supply held by the residents of Qingshan reached 600, it was enough for the survivors to eat for over half a year. And now, even the merchants of Federation couldn’t dump any longer. The market was flooded, the local residents, due to the purchase frenzy, no longer had any crystals in their hands.
After the frenzy, it was depression.
To the current situation of Qingshan, Gears Chamber of Commerce was extremely pleased. As the supporter hidden behind the curtain for the Federation President, they were the ones that facilitated the peace with NAC as well as the open border agreement, and the perpetrator of the nutrient supply dump.
“Mr. Jia Ming, I will congratulate you in advance in becoming the president of the entire Hongchen area.”
“Hahaha, you’re flattering me. Without your help, Mr. Liu, I wouldn’t receive such an honor.”
Around the dinner table, Jia Ming continuously toasted with the merchant called Mr. Liu. Although he was the honorable president, he knew that half of the reasons why he stepped onto this position was because of the work of the man in front of him. Therefore, in front of wealthy man, he didn’t act like a president at all.
“NAC conquered the capital, but they wouldn’t have ever thought that their fruit would end up in our hands. Hehe, how satirical.” Liu Hong sunk into the chair, swirled the wineglass in his hand, and said casually.
“What’s your next step?” The president asked.
“The market in Qingshan is a complete mess now. We only need to wait for the local merchants to go bankrupt. Then, we’ll purchase their dumped assets from the bottom,” The small eyes narrowed into two lines as Liu Hong said malevolently.
“Do you need my cooperation?”
“No, we just need to follow our plan,” Liu Hong said, slowly.
…
Were those nutrient supplies really okay?
Of course they were okay.
Regardless how they were inspected, the nutrient supply was a proper product and not second grade.
Most of the survivor gatherings with size would all inspect the product in an event where a massive amount of product enter the market. Since some of the D-grade nutrient supply was made with the flesh of mutants and zombies, without the examination of toxicity, who would dare eat it? And the possibility of raiders pretending to be merchants to poison the survivors was also a possibility.
But because of the massive dump of the merchants of Federation, Qinghsan’s inspection personnel tightened the examination of nutrient supply entering the market to prevent any poisonous products from entering the market.
If it were the leaders of small survivor gatherings, they would laugh in their dreams with how cheap the nutrient supply was.
But to the leaders of the more prominent locations, excessive nutrient supply would not only make people “full”, they would make people “bloated”…
“There are currently three nutrient supply retailers with a partnership with our cooperation that have gone bankrupt. If the nutrient supply price continues to remain low, with consideration of the margin, we must close the 100 acres mutated fruit plantation in Golden River Farm… Of course, I won’t do that. But there are smaller shareholders demanding us do that,” Zhao Chenwu said.
“What do they want to do?” Jiang Chen furrowed his brows.
“Use nutrient supply to disrupt our market. Not only nutrient supply but because of the massive dump, our merchant business’ sale slid by 28%, and the other non-related industries also experience downward pressure in revenue,” Zhao Chenwu said.
“Using nutrient supply to ‘raid’ the currency from the consumers’ hands and forcefully extracting the buying power from the market. Not only is nutrient supply affected, the instant noodles, compressed crackers, canned food, and other replaceable products also experienced dramatic influence. Weapons, ammunition, and even clothes are impacted…”
“Not only that, inside the Sixth Street bank exchange, the price of land sales of Golden River Farm also slid down. Since… if Federation has such cheap nutrient supply, the raw ingredient mutated fruits are also effected.”
“Chain reaction? …it is impacting the Sixth Street six hundreds kilometers away,” Jiang Chen thought, “But I don’t understand, how they can supply the market with this much nutrient supply. Are they not afraid of going bankrupt with the dumping strategy?”
“They could use the crystals they obtained from the dump to purchase the depreciated land. In this case, they not only would not lose any money, they could gain massively.”
Jiang Chen understood with Zhao Chenwu’s explanation.
No wonder he was the devious merchant, this guy instantly read through the conspiracy of the merchants of Federation.
The amount of crystals flowing the Hongchen market decreased would result in the purchasing power of crystals to forcibly increase. And nutrient supply’s dump would result in the arable land depreciating, it would allow them to purchase more lands from farmers or bankrupted merchants.
Finally, they will gain a monopoly of the mutated fruits in Hongchen and in turn monopolize the nutrient supply market.
By that time, the price of nutrient supply would be determined by the merchants of Federation.
Since Jiang Chen already knew their intention, he would not let their plan come to fruition. With an idea in his mind, a smile appeared on his face.
“Gain massively? Hehe, I will make sure they lose everything.”
“Looks like you have a plan already, I won’t offer my strategy then.” Zhao Chenwu had a grin on his face too.
“Of course there is a strategy, but I need your cooperation.”
“At the command of the General, at any time!”