Ripped From the Headlines
16th October
2006 – The Ivory Coast
This
work of adult fiction, loosely based on characters portrayed by
Russell Crowe, includes adult language and experiences; you have been
warned.
No copyright infringement on the original work is intended.
No offense to
any person, living or dead, is intended.
© Reagan Kavanagh & Diana Walker 2006.
Dallas – 17th
October 2006
REAGAN
“I
don’t believe it.”
You could hear the horror in Dee’s
voice.
“Believe
it, Girlfriend. If
you want to get in before the price goes
sky high, you’d better get online NOW.”
“I
can’t store 50 pounds of chocolate
without it going bad.”
“Sure you
can. The chocolate
candy makers in Switzerland
have 100-pound blocks stacked up on the floor until they use it, and
it’s at
room temperature.”
“But, but
…See’s had to close down their Dallas shop because they
couldn’t get it shipped from California
without it
turning white. Well,
I suppose I could
go out and buy the semi-sweet morsels and hoard them.”
“I was
thinking more along the lines of
buying short-term chocolate futures before the price sky rockets and
then
selling high.”
“Oh
…I was thinking of my taste buds.”
“Yeah,
it’s hard to be rational when you’re
in love.”
“Oh, shut
up.”
“Seriously,
the price has jumped 17¢ a
pound since yesterday. I’ve
already
talked to my broker, and he’s buying until it hits the
20¢ mark, at which point
I’ve told him to hold until it hits whatever he thinks will
be the top price. Then
he’s dumping it.”
“You’re
holding the world’s chocolate
addicts hostage.”
“Yes, I am.
It’s not my addiction; it’s
theirs.”
“And I was
feeling bad about hoarding.”
“Charity
begins at home. Take
care of yourself.”
“OK,
I’ll diversify. I’ll
run to Sam’s and buy a couple of cases
of Snickers bars. Then
I’ll run to the
market and buy out their supply of semi-sweet morsels.
That should keep Terry safe for a while.”
“Thank you!
You’ll drive the price up even higher for me
before I sell!”
“Fuck
you.”
“That’s
Max’s job. Fortunately,
he’s no fonder of chocolate than
I am.”
“Africa is
Max’s territory …why didn’t he warn
us?”
“It
hasn’t made the spoken news
yet. I saw it on
the local station’s
news crawl last night and called my broker at home.”
“Max should
have known.”
“Why should
he have known? Chocolate
has nothing to do with
counter-terrorism.”
“This is
obviously a kidnap attempt; that’s
his main business. They’re
holding the
world’s supply of chocolate for ransom!”
“Not all of
it. The Ivory Coast
only supplies 40% of
the world’s demand.”
“This is a
ransom attempt.”
“All I know
is that with Halloween in two
weeks and the holiday season around the corner, the timing is perfect
for me to
enjoy a windfall.”
“And the
rest of the world to be held by
the short hairs!”
“Stop
whining. It
isn’t becoming.”
“I’m
not whining.”
“What would
you call it?”
“Voicing
extreme concern.”
“Sounds
like whining to me.”
“Oh, shut
up! Have you called
Dino? He might as
well pad the firm’s purse a
little.”
“It
won’t be much, but this is one of the
few sure things I’ve ever seen.
Might as
well take advantage of it while it lasts.
The last time something like this happened was the Cuban
sugar embargo. My
mom was still talking about that when I
was little, and it happened when she was a kid in 1959.
She said it really screwed up my grandmum’s
Christmas baking.”
“Some
liberal I am …I haven’t even asked
what their grievances are. I
imagine
their supply chain deals with their government buying at fixed price
with price
mandated, and the additional profit gets tacked on closer to the end
consumer.”
“From what
I’ve read this morning, that’s
about the size of it.”
“You know
what’s depressing? I
didn’t even have to do any research to know
how that problem started. You’d
think
after all these years, we’d be dealing with different
economic problems.”
“Some
aspects of Malthusian economics are
still valid …and Adam Smith wasn’t totally
wrong.”
“Well,
there is something to be said for
guaranteed prices. The
Ivory
Coast
farmers still make a living even when their cocoa crop exceeds
predictions.”
“The
question is whether or not they make a
decent living.”
DINO
I stuck my head in
Terry’s office.
“Had a call
from Reags, and just got off
the phone with our brokers. I
put us
into short-term commodities and chocolate futures.”
“What?
Why?”
“She saw a
crawl on the news last night and
called her broker at home …she put in her and
Max’s order last night.
We won’t make the killing those two will, but
we’ll still do fine.”
“What the
fuck are you talking about?”
“The
chocolate farmers in the Ivory Coast
are
on strike …and they control 40% of the world’s
supply. Holidays
are coming, and the demand is going
to sky rocket.”
“What did
you buy at? And how
much?”
“Fifty-seven
cents a pound – that’s up 17¢
from Monday – and I bought $50,000.
I
think we can double it. It
will bump
everyone’s quarterly bonuses up a little.”
He rubbed his face and looked at me.
“Oh, fuck.
My life is either going to be pure, bloody Hell or a lot
more costly in
the near future.”
“Not to
worry. Dee’s
already laying in her supply. Of
course,
you get to ration her.”
“As I said,
my life is going to be Hell.”
