Chapter 445: Repeating the Same Mistake

"Chairman, as of today's market close, Amazon's market capitalization has fallen below the $500 billion mark!"
"..."
The atmosphere in the Amazon Group's conference room was heavy.
Chairman Bezos, the once-powerful tech tycoon, felt a throbbing pain in his temples.
He irritably wiped his face; his once-spirited face was now etched with exhaustion, and even his breath carried a sense of dejection.
"Damn it, why is the stock price plummeting like a freefall?! What's going on?!"
A senior executive reported nervously:
"The bad news for Asia recently has been coming in like a tidal wave, one after another.
There are two main aspects: First, our performance is terrible. We just announced layoffs of 15,000 people, and market confidence has collapsed.
Second, our shipping routes to Africa have been hijacked by pirates again. Our cargo ships are stuck at sea, and the supply chain is about to be cut off.
Oh, and right… Fang Huan and Jiang Jin, those two bastards, have also taken advantage of our misfortune, unilaterally cutting off our chip supply to BWS."
However, these are just the visible battles. The real fatal blow to Asia came from another invisible force lurking in the shadows.
“Currently, what's also devastating to the stock price is the deluge of rumors on social media.”
“You mean… those garbage posts that son of a bitch Smarck is making on Twitter?” Bezos gritted his teeth.
“Yes, Chairman.” Cold sweat beaded on the executive's forehead. “He's spreading rumors everywhere, saying you've already sold off all your shares.”
You have to admit, some things are undeniably true.
Smarck, this man hailed as a “world-class internet celebrity” and “king of trash talk,” is a prodigy when it comes to manipulating public opinion.
This guy has been on a roll lately, posting articles every day to badmouth Amazon.
He claims with absolute certainty that “Amazon is finished,” and vividly describes how Bezos, under the guise of entering the space industry, had already cashed out all his shares and run away.
The most fatal flaw was that this guy had fans all over the world. No matter how outrageous his words were, a huge group of people would believe them, blindly forwarding them as if they'd witnessed it firsthand.
This directly caused a massive upheaval in the financial world, forcing countless investors to sell at a loss and leave the market.
"Has that lunatic taken the wrong medication? Why is he suddenly acting like a mad dog, attacking me like a rabid dog?"
Bezos was so angry he wanted to smash something.
"Chairman, there have been rumors circulating that Fanghuan Investment and Smarck have a close relationship…
There are even whispers that Smarck is actually working for Fanghuan Investment."
"Him? That arrogant, narcissistic madman? Working as someone else's dog?" Bezos scoffed. "What a joke!"
He knew Smarck's true nature perfectly well.
That guy's dictionary doesn't even contain the phrase "subordinate to others." Even if you believed he'd be naked every day, you wouldn't believe he'd work for someone else.
"But judging from the current situation, it's an undeniable fact that Smark is joining forces with Fanghuan Investment to strangle us."
An executive analyzed bitterly,
"The effect was that he was responsible for spouting nonsense on Twitter, constantly creating panic and driving our stock price down to its breaking point;
Fanghuan Investment, on the other hand, was like a giant beast lurking in the abyss, taking the opportunity to open its jaws and frantically devour our low-priced circulating shares."
"Issue a public announcement immediately to clarify! When did I sell all my shares?!" Bezos roared.
"But Chairman... it's true that you've been continuously selling shares and injecting the funds into your 'Blue Origin' space project."
"So what? I still hold more than 10% of the shares!"
"Dude, who cares about that these days?" the executive thought to himself, but spoke tactfully.
"The general public doesn't care about these minor details; they only care about the fact that you're actually selling shares.
When you stepped down as CEO and became Chairman, you promised the world you'd lead Amazon to new heights.
Now, everyone sees it as you breaking your promise and jumping ship first."
Bezos selling shares for his space dream isn't exactly news.
But nobody cared before because Amazon was at its peak, rock solid.
Now it's different. The empire is crumbling, and any straw could be the final blow.
"Smarck and Fanghuan Investment, those two bastards, they timed their attack precisely when we were at our weakest!
Besides, Smarck's 'SpaceT' and your 'Blue Origin' are direct competitors."
He's been working tirelessly to nip you, the new competitor, in the bud!
"So, Fanghuan Investment is deliberately helping him?"
"It's probably a mutually beneficial arrangement, each getting what they need!" the executive analyzed.
"Fanghuan Investment's goal is to swallow up our Asia Pacific Group;
And Smark wants to get you completely kicked out of the aerospace race!"
Currently, Blue Origin is still in the early stages of burning through cash and doesn't pose a substantial threat to SpaceT.
But everyone can see that in a few years, things might change.
After all, they've already reached several future cooperation agreements with NASA.
That's why Smark was so impatient; he wanted to chop this future giant down while it was still a sapling!
"If this continues, we're afraid we'll repeat the mistakes of FaceWeb!" an executive said despairingly.
"Do you remember? Before FaceWeb was acquired by Fang Huan Investment, what happened was so similar to what we're going through now?
First, a deluge of negative news, then a precipitous drop in stock price, and finally, forced massive layoffs and restructuring…
This script is practically a copy-paste!"
History seemed to be repeating itself in a chilling way.
Declining performance, a wave of layoffs, then a mysterious external force aggressively shorting the stock, causing it to plummet.
Aaron was sliding step by step into the abyss where FaceWeb had once fallen.
“Even those asset management companies that never interfered in operations before, like Vanguard and BlackRock, whose major shareholders have recently started putting frequent pressure on the board.”
This was the final straw.
If even these Wall Street giants, who only cared about dividends and never interfered in operations, started meddling, it meant morale was crumbling and the empire was about to collapse.
“Alas, if only I had known this would happen…”
A wave of helpless regret washed over Bezos.
In the past, whenever the name “Fanghuan Investment” reached his ears, he always scoffed and dismissed it.
Just a small company rising from the East; no matter how much trouble it caused, how much of a stir could it make?
Before his world-class technological behemoth, it was nothing more than a small boat.
But who could have imagined that, while he was dozing off right under his nose, this small boat had quietly grown into a colossal beast capable of stirring up storms across the seas!
He even began to have a chilling suspicion that a madman like Smark had seen through all of this long ago, which was why he had so early abandoned his ridiculous pride and obediently clung to this incredibly powerful leg.