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The former Soviet ruble was once one of the most influential currencies in the world.

Any financial scholar studying world currency history would inevitably spend a significant amount of time and effort reviewing and learning the entirety of the "ruble scam." As a quantitative economics master's student, Elena naturally wouldn't miss this part.

Compared to so-called fortune tellers, she possessed more than just the outcome itself. More importantly, thanks to her diligent study habits in class, Elena was probably the only person in this era who saw through all the masterminds behind the scenes.

Due to the Soviet Union's sudden collapse, without any preparation or market regulation, all former Soviet countries entered a process of financial liberalization market economy reform almost overnight. The ruble transitioned directly from its original fixed exchange rate to a dual exchange rate system without any buffer, and the US dollar officially entered the arena.

Then, as decided by the summit of the Group of Seven, led by the United States, the kind and generous people of the free world would, in the following years, continuously provide long-term aid loans ranging from 20 to 30 billion US dollars annually to Russia, Ukraine, and other countries – for any field that could stabilize the market finance, except for investment in the real industry.

As a "testament to friendship," and to better guide the use of these funds, the American economist Jeffrey Sachs proposed an ingenious economic reform plan, the "Five Hundred Day Privatization Plan," also known as "shock therapy" in later generations.

According to the rosy prospects he described to the Yeltsin government and the Russian people, this was an incredibly fair and great decision.

The former Soviet Union's original state-owned enterprises would be equally divided among everyone. Every former Soviet citizen would receive an additional amount of 100,000 to 150,000 rubles in state-owned assets without doing anything – of course, in the form of state-owned enterprise shareholding reform and securitization.

Stimulated by this windfall, the former Soviet people quickly forgot about the bear that fell in the snowy night last year, waving the "huge wealth" denominated in Soviet rubles in their hands, and plunged into a nationwide carnival.

At the same time, the capital that had been waiting around for a long time swarmed in.

Gringotts, the United States, overseas private institutions... By attracting deposits with high interest rates and bribing officials in various countries with huge sums of money, they massively ate up the ruble deposits and securitized state-owned enterprises wandering on the former Soviet land.

Just as Elena had once done, they absorbed and seized the ruble's market share while borrowing rubles from the financial institutions of the former Soviet countries through various means, promising high interest rates that would never be repaid – and then, when the time was right, they would join hands to destroy the ruble's exchange rate and complete the most classic empty-glove white wolf trick in currency history.

Of course, all of this was once, or perhaps in the minds of the Gringotts goblins, the story that should happen in the future.

Two months after the "shock therapy" started, at the end of February after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the breeze caused by the butterfly flapping its wings in this world finally formed a chilling blizzard.

...

London, Diagon Alley, Gringotts Wizarding Bank.

In the venture capital department deep underground, the backup archive that had been ordered closed by Elder Leos was opened again. Deputy Director Boggart shuttled through the files flying all over the sky, calculating something while muttering, with a somewhat manic expression.

As more and more files were opened by this middle-aged goblin, the expression on his face became more and more terrifying. The exquisite suit buttons had been rudely torn open. After a long time, Boggart finally found the end of his predetermined time in the mountain of documents - January 1, 1991. On this day, no large exchange business occurred.

"...Heh, hehe..."

Boggart glanced at the empty archive location, lowered his head and looked at the value calculated in his hand. The entire goblin seemed to have aged several decades in an instant, staring blankly at the white papers scattered all over the ground, his eyes instantly losing their brilliance.

As the deputy director of Gringotts' venture capital department, mainly responsible for risk calculation and internal audit, even if he did not have the authority to directly view the overall financial statements of Gringotts Wizarding Bank, he could deduce the current liquid cash range held by Gringotts, as well as foreign exchange reserves and debt ratio, through various values and evaluation coefficients.

Several months had passed. Due to the mortgage agreement with Hogwarts, Gringotts Wizarding Bank's "Galleon cash flow" should have entered a tight money situation long ago, otherwise there would be a serious risk of capital chain breakage.

However, in recent days, the Gringotts Goblin Elder Council was still approving continuous expansion of capital investment, instead of using the deserved foreign exchange reserves of non-magical countries such as rubles to fill the gap.

If Boggart remembered correctly, the mortgage agreement signed by the Goblin Elder Council with Hogwarts, in addition to the 400 million Galleons, most of the remaining loan amount was paid in Muggle currencies such as US dollars and pounds – logically speaking, Gringotts would not directly bear this debt, but would extract a high commission and then go to the non-magical world for exchange.

Even, based on the principle of prudent value preservation, they should establish value preservation hedging in the ruble-Galleon-dollar exchange rate to ensure that their extracted commissions and loan interest rates would not be affected by market exchange rate fluctuations.

However…

Just a few hours ago, the young goblin Andy Serkis, who had once received Albus Dumbledore, told him that Gringotts' non-magical currency cash reserves had been exhausted as early as one week after the "war" began, and all their expenditures in the previous month were settled and exchanged directly in Galleons.

However, since the risk review warning was removed, no abnormalities would be displayed unless there were too many premiums.

Moreover, just Galleons would certainly not be enough. In addition, the Muggle banks and investment institutions that Gringotts Wizarding Bank had secretly controlled in the non-magical world had also invested capital in this crazy competition.

But, the most crucial thing is…

Click.

The door of the archive room, which was open to the outside, suddenly closed.

The noisy office area outside was instantly blocked by the thick magical protective door. A familiar old voice came from behind Boggart, who was sitting on the ground, with a hint of bone-chilling coldness.

"That's amazing, Boggart. You truly deserve to be the deputy hand-picked by Douglas."

Leos leaned on his cane, standing next to the closed archive door, and said in a complicated tone.

"Ever since you started investigating Gringotts' various funds, we guessed that you would definitely discover that matter, right? Discover that in the mortgage contract a few months ago, the Elder Council took risks for the sake of profit and omitted the exchange and hedging process."

"Why, and where do the Galleons we are using now come from..."

The goblin Boggart collapsed on the spot, not looking back, his voice extremely dry.

"You are the deputy director of the venture capital department. Do you still need me to answer these questions for you? The so-called total war naturally uses all of Gringotts' gold and the little pieces of paper in the Muggle vaults –"

Leos's old face, covered with wrinkles and spots, moved, squeezing out a distorted and ugly smile.

"As long as this turmoil ends, these costs can be smoothed out. And in fact, we will definitely become the final winners - and those traitors and American Muggles are doing the same, otherwise they would have withdrawn from the playground long ago."

"Elder, this will cause problems! This does not conform to..."

Boggart opened his mouth, making a weak groan like someone who had been rescued after drowning.

Leos snorted coldly and thumped his cane heavily.

"Does not conform to what? Boggart, I think you and Douglas have been influenced too deeply by those stupid Muggles and wizards. You blindly learn Muggle financial concepts, and even forget the traditions of us goblins!"

"The rightful owner of anything is its creator, not the buyer. Since we minted the Galleons, then all the Galleons should rightfully belong to us goblins. The gold circulating outside is just temporarily borrowed by the wizards – at such an important juncture, I will not let a weakling like you ruin Gringotts' battle."

"Notify the venture capital department that Deputy Director Boggart is unwell and needs to rest for a period of time."

A hint of coldness flashed in Leos's eyes, and he waved his hand decisively.

The goblins in scarlet uniforms standing beside the goblin elder walked up silently and stood in front of Boggart.

The scene that happened in the Gringotts venture capital department director's office several weeks ago was replayed once again in this backup archive room filled with documents, as if a strange spell had been cast.

And just in the investment department office area, separated by a door, hundreds of goblins were still enthusiastically carrying out various investment plans. Copies of the former Soviet state-owned enterprise bonds were registered into the warehouse by the Gringotts goblins. The astronomical number of ruble deposits was constantly jumping up every second. All the goblins were eager to harvest bear meat one day…

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