Chapter 361: Accumulating Sand to Form a Tower

Inside Fanghuan Investment, an emergency meeting is underway regarding their expansion into the US market.
"Currently, the most popular securities trading app in the US market is an application called 'Robinhood,' which can be understood as the American version of 'Tonghuashun' (a popular Chinese stock trading platform).
During the pandemic, individual investor growth exploded, and this app, with its 'zero transaction fees' gimmick, has wildly attracted a massive number of young people.
Its business scope covers stocks, futures, ETFs, and even cryptocurrency trading."
"It can trade cryptocurrencies too?" Su Hao asked.
"Yes. But it's just small-scale, with a very limited range of currencies; it's not a significant player.
In the cryptocurrency arena, our Fanghuan Exchange is the absolute leader; it doesn't even have the qualifications to compete with us.
The problem is, if it continues this aggressive expansion strategy with zero transaction fees, constantly expanding its business…
In the future, no one can predict its user growth momentum; it could be extremely fierce."
In short, this is a highly threatening potential competitor.
"In the Bitcoin market, we're dominant, but once the battleground shifts to the US stock market, the situation reverses.
Their user base is incredibly solid, while our users are almost entirely there for Bitcoin."
"So, in the US stock market, we can't compete?"
"Yes, their user loyalty is extremely high. In a head-to-head battle, we have no chance.
Moreover, 'Robin Hood' already has ambitions to expand globally, so our cryptocurrency business may be threatened in the long run."
But even more fatal are the real barriers.
“The reason domestic securities apps allow users to trade US stocks is because they partner with overseas financial institutions, acting as ‘intermediaries.’
For a Chinese company to create its own securities app in North America, the restrictions are numerous and the difficulties are immense.
Various regulatory licenses can be incredibly taxing.”
“However… Mr. Su, what I’ve described above represents the predicament of ordinary domestic financial companies.”
The researcher’s tone shifted, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “Our Fanghuan is different!”
“Because we have the Fanghuan Exchange, a global super platform! It’s the largest Bitcoin trading app in the US by user base.
‘Robin Hood’ was able to transform its app to trade cryptocurrencies; similarly, we can upgrade the Fanghuan Exchange app to a platform for trading US stocks!”
But this requires approval from US regulatory agencies.
To achieve this, three major hurdles need to be overcome:
SEC broker-dealer license, FINRA membership, and SIPC membership.
These three formidable barriers, which have caused countless financial giants to stumble and retreat, are the very walls that prevent any outsider from invading the US stock market.
The application process alone takes at least three to five years, and the failure rate is extremely high.
"But Fang Huan has absolutely no need to worry about that."
Those seemingly insurmountable regulatory barriers, which are impenetrable for others, are like flat ground for Fang Huan.
"Because when we entered the US stock market, the US government gifted us this entire set of licenses to facilitate our operations!"
Back then, to help Fang Huan rescue the US stock market, the US government personally cleared all obstacles for them, giving them the green light from all regulators, even handing them the permit!
Who would have thought that this generous gift would come in handy here today!
However, even so, another wall of reality remains high.
"Even if we get the licenses, it's still too difficult for a non-US app to attract US users.
The domestic market has long been monopolized by local giants like 'Robin Hood'."
The conclusion is harsh: even if you overcome the "Wall of Sighs," if you can't attract new users, all your previous efforts will have been a waste of money.
After all, expanding into the US stock market requires recruiting a large number of new employees, plus operating costs—various expenses are not insignificant.
Therefore, the employees present all felt that this was too difficult and better not to do it.
But Su Hao's intuition continued to frantically remind and urge him to charge towards this seemingly impossible goal.
From a realistic perspective, there was simply no way to snatch users from "Robin Man"...
"Unless..." Li Huilin weakly raised her hand, "unless 'Robin Man' does something catastrophic, causing a mass exodus of users."
"The probability of that is too low," Liang Haiyuan shook his head, "about the same as winning the lottery jackpot."
"True..."
In other words, without a miracle, there was no chance.
However, Su Hao's eyes suddenly sharpened.
His intuition was never wrong.
'What if that "Robin Hood" really does end up destroying himself?'
***
Meanwhile, a storm was brewing at Game Station.
A 50% short-selling ratio was already outrageous, but the market quickly proved that imagination was still lacking.
70%...100%...ultimately, Game Station's short-selling ratio skyrocketed to an outrageous 140%!
A monstrous stock with a short-selling ratio exceeding 100% reappeared after ten years!
The short-selling army had assembled, a dark cloud looming, aiming its cannons at this dying prey, waiting for it to plummet below the horizon and plunge into an endless abyss.
The stock price indeed "lived up to expectations," falling all the way down and quickly breaking below $20.
Just as all the major short-selling players opened their bloodthirsty jaws, preparing to enjoy a gluttonous feast.
[The flame of GameStation has not been extinguished!]
A post quietly appeared on Reddit, North America's largest community forum for retail investors, comparable to China's "Baidu Tieba."
[GameStation is not dead! Our youth and memories are not dead either!!]
The post was full of sentiment, essentially saying that although GameStation is currently facing difficulties, it will surely rise from the ashes.
But this was just the prelude. The true core of this manifesto was the deafening roar at the end:
[Kill those short-selling sons of bitches! Hang them on the lampposts of Wall Street!]
The post claimed that if every member of the forum bought just one share, even a single share, it would create a massive, overwhelming torrent that would bury those arrogant short-selling giants!
In this vast community where hundreds of thousands of new posts are created every day, this post should have been like a pebble thrown into the ocean, instantly disappearing.
But this time, it stirred up a tidal wave!
It ignited the fire in countless hearts!
"—Holy crap, is this guy crazy? This is blatant stock price manipulation, he'll be locked up in jail! But… I love it! Count me in, let's do it!"
—"140% short selling?! What does that even mean? It means all the shares in circulation are being borrowed and sold, and it still isn't enough? Does that mean if we all work together, we can really send these short sellers to the rooftops?"
—"Sounds…fuckily exciting."
—"Oh? I'm just killing time anyway, why don't I throw in some pocket money and give it a try?"
Initially, this was just a casual remark, a joke, an online frenzy.
The poster himself probably didn't even expect to actually take down Wall Street with this.
But—
—“Holy crap! Look at the trading screen! Someone just placed a buy order for over a million US dollars!!!”
On the game station's trading interface, where only sell orders were present and buy orders were almost nonexistent, a buy order worth over a million US dollars suddenly exploded in the darkness like a signal flare!
That was the ten million RMB that Su Hao had ordered to be invested!
—“Holy crap! Someone really made a move?!”
—“What are we waiting for? The army is assembled, brothers, charge!”
An unknown, mysterious tycoon had actually seen the post and responded to the call, throwing in a million US dollars to fire the first shot of the uprising!
This news spread like wildfire, instantly igniting the entire community!
Countless retail investors who were originally just watching the show were instantly swept up in the fervor and joined this unprecedented holy war!
"—Screw it! It's only $20 a share, the price of a meal, buy it!"
—Holy crap, it went up! Up $1!"
—If it really drives the stock price sky-high, that would be hilarious. Although…it's unlikely, haha.
To be honest, most of the people who jumped in at this moment didn't really believe they could beat the Wall Street institutional short sellers.
It's more like spending $20 to buy a grand fireworks display, a tragic yet romantic charge for the little guy!
Worth it!
However, there's an ancient Eastern proverb:
Many grains of sand make a tower, many small contributions make a robe.
When countless tiny "grains of sand" come together, they can create…
a sandstorm powerful enough to bury Titan!