Chapter 245 - You Said You Were Poor
Translator: Lav
Editor: Seliniaki Ilikia
When Shi Lei left, he heard the woman speak to the man in excitement. “This is great! That tall, rich, and handsome guy will definitely invest in you!”
The man was obviously excited as well, but forced himself to look calm and suppressed his emotions. “I told you to learn horseback riding before, and you weren’t willing. I told you to buy the set of clothes and you also weren’t willing. Do you understand now? The majority of the members here are investors. We just b.u.mped into one, didn’t we?”
The woman shyly leaned into his arm. “Alright, I’m just out of date. Everything you said was right!”
“Of course. So I’m saying that we should buy this set of clothes, okay?”
“Okay, I’ll listen to you.” Both of them were extremely excited and didn’t care that Shi Lei hadn’t even mentioned whether or not he had the intention of investing in them. And they didn’t know if Shi Lei really was rich.
Shi Lei was just inspired to help, since he thought that there weren’t many couples nowadays who were so considerate of each other. The majority of them only thought about taking it for themselves and didn’t think to give a bit more. Another reason was because Shi Lei had the Golden Thumb Investment Card and still had one more chance to use it this week.
Recently, he had discovered that although buying stocks was a rather good method of investment with the help of the card, the profit wouldn’t be huge unless he had a lot of money to start with. It was just enough to cover daily necessities, but it wasn’t a good form of investment if he wanted to become rich as quickly as possible.
However, Shi Lei hadn’t really interacted with the real world and he couldn’t think of a more efficient form of investment. When he heard that the man was looking for investors, he thought that he could at least try.
As long as he knew what the man’s project was, Shi Lei could utilize the Golden Thumb Investment Card to check whether or not the investment would yield high profits. Although he didn’t have a lot of money at the moment, if the man was having difficulties and no one was willing to invest, he could only accept a few more jobs (Shi Lei a.s.sumed these jobs to be coding) to support himself while continuing to develop the app. If that was the case, then he wouldn’t be too picky about the demand of investors. He couldn’t even afford a car worth a few ten thousand yuan and it was clear he fought on his own, so Shi Lei’s 100,000 yuan may really be his first investment.
Shi Lei had some brief knowledge about venture capital, which he learned from some finance electives he took at Wudong University. The internet also provided many examples of it, so he knew that the requirement for funds wouldn’t be too high during a company’s angel investing stage, especially for a technology-based business. Angel investment didn’t have to be an one-time investment. It could be done over a period of time. Although only Shi Lei only had a little over 100,000 yuan, but what about in the future? He could earn more funds. Shi Lei had to rely on the Golden Thumb Investment Card, and if he found out that the man’s project was no good, then he would only lose his last chance to use the card this month. He could even give the man some advice within his ability and persuade him to give up on this project with no potential in success.
Shi Lei had gotten the man’s contact information, thus, he had an opportunity to interact with him in the next steps. He decided to wait until he received the profits from his investments in the stock market before talking to the man named Zhen Xu a bit more after this month’s calculation day. He didn’t need to know the details of the project, even though he was investing in Zhen Xu’s company. As long as he knew what the company’s full name was, he could use the Golden Thumb Investment Card to evaluate whether the company would profit.
Shi Lei didn’t forget that he had asked the Scepter about whether he could use the Black Card’s money to pay the company as an independent investor. The Scepter’s response was that investment projects above 100,000 yuan and below one million were acceptable. He could employ no more than five workers to work for him and their salaries together could only be a maximum of 25,000 yuan. Because Shi Lei hadn’t even reached 100,000 yuan yet, he hadn’t asked whether the company’s other consumptions could be paid with the sum as well.
Shi Lei decided to ask the Scepter if he could use the Black Card’s money to pay for the company’s other consumptions if he invested in a new company. Shi Lei a.s.sumed that he could, but only within a certain limit. The Black Card certainly wouldn’t let him use its money to invest without a limit.
No matter what, if Zhen Xu’s project was proven to have potential, then at least he wouldn’t have to fight alone and could hire a few people to help him. Shi Lei could even use the Black Card’s money to pay for a portion of it, so why not?
Horseback riding wasn’t important. The important thing was he had spent more than 10,000 yuan. It wasn’t much, but more importantly, Shi Lei had found a potential investment project in the process, so it was worth it.
Of course, Shi Lei knew that this kind of opportunity he b.u.mped into by luck may not turn out to be worthwhile. After all, if Zhen Xu’s project really had potential, then other investors wouldn’t even give him the chance to discuss the details.
But this at least gave Shi Lei another path he could. He believed that he would soon have more and more opportunities like this.
When he met up with Wei Xingyue, she had already changed into a set of cool riding attire. Her clothes were no longer a boring white. The other colors made her beauty more three-dimensional.
The clothes hugged her body tightly and revealed all her curves. Wei Xingyue did such handsome attire justice. Shi Lei couldn’t help but recall Song Miaomiao with her buzzcut and imagined how handsome she would look with those clothes on.
“What are you holding in your hand?” Shi Lei asked.
Wei Xingyue rolled her eyes. “It’s called a saddle!”
“Of course I know it’s a saddle. Why are you holding it?”
“This is my own saddle. Although every horse is allocated one, riding in another saddle isn’t suitable for me.”
Why didn’t Manager Jin tell me about this? The saddle looks rather expensive and it could’ve been another consumption, Shi Lei thought.
“How much was it?”
Wei Xingyue shoved the saddle into his hands. “You should act more like a gentleman,” she said, clearly dissatisfied. “Don’t you know to offer to hold my saddle for me? d.a.m.n, it’s so heavy.”
Shi Lei took the saddle from her. “How much was it?” he asked again.
“Mine’s pretty expensive because I had it custom-made and imported from Europe. I forgot how much it cost…Probably more than 100,000 yuan. Why do you care so much about the price? You have such poor taste!”
“For someone like you who has lived in a mansion your whole life and drives a car worth as much as an ordinary family’s entire lifetime’s income, of course you would treat money as mere dirt. Poor people like me don’t have such a luxury.”
“You are shameless enough to say that you’re poor?” Wei Xingyue stretched out her long leg and kicked him.
“If you’re going to talk, then talk. Don’t always resort to violence. Also, take your own saddle. I’m going to choose one too. That Manager Jin didn’t even tell me that I could buy one.” Shi Lei shoved the saddle back into Wei Xingyue’s arms and left.
“You just said you were poor…”