Bond Investment

Wang Xiuyuan's patience was average at best, and it became particularly thin when he had to listen to someone talk nonsense.

Whenever someone reported work to him, Wang Xiuyuan would invariably lose his temper if they didn't get to the point within three sentences.

Even though he knew perfectly well that the high-yield bond Rudolph was recommending was a scam, he still feigned interest and listened to the entire presentation, occasionally asking questions to maintain the facade.

"Mr. Wang, our company's bond product is quite excellent. Are you interested in investing a bit?"

This was Rudolph's first probing attempt to close the deal with Wang Xiuyuan. His goal was to apply a little psychological pressure, a method that usually helped identify a client's resistance points toward a product.

But Wang Xiuyuan was different from ordinary clients; he was a marketing talent himself, and he had long been accustomed to such small tricks.

To avoid wasting his precious time, Wang Xiuyuan refused directly without hesitation.

"No thanks. This bond of yours does look somewhat interesting, but I have absolutely no interest in investing."

"I'm in the finance business myself, and my money-making efficiency is much higher than the bonds in your hand."

"The most important point is that even if I accidentally lose money, at least I lost it with my own hands. I can consider it paying for the experience."

Then, Wang Xiuyuan questioned Renoson and Sanchez: "How much money did your families actually give you?"

"We agreed to go into business together as partners, and each of you was supposed to provide seventy million dollars in cash for investment. After putting up seventy million, do you still have spare cash to invest?"

"I'm telling you the hard truth now: you must provide the corresponding cash at every critical milestone. If your funds aren't in place, I will strictly follow the contract. Don't say I didn't warn you."

Agreed to go into business together? Seventy million dollar cash investment? Follow the contract? The hard truth? Don't say I didn't warn you?

Every word out of Wang Xiuyuan's mouth was a lie. They hadn't made any agreement to partner in a business the night they met, and all four of them knew it.

Renoson and Sanchez might have been a bit lacking in business sense, but coming from wealthy families, their ability to read people and understand subtext was certainly not lacking.

Therefore, there was only one truth: there was a major problem with the high-yield bonds Rudolph was pitching to them.

Since Wang Xiuyuan hadn't exposed the matter to his face, he must have had his reasons.

They were direct descendants of the Rockefeller Family and the Roosevelt Family. Rudolph certainly knew their identities; after all, their surnames couldn't be faked.

Knowing they were from the Rockefeller Family and the Roosevelt Family and still daring to swindle them—how could the situation behind this be simple!

The two shared a tacit understanding, and both of their faces showed expressions of embarrassment.

"I just saw that there's a gap in the investment timeline, right? It's normal to use that idle time to make a little extra money. If you're worried our funds won't be ready on time, we can just transfer the full amount to the company account in advance."

Sanchez of the Roosevelt Family was the better actor. Not only did he look troubled, but he also awkwardly scratched his head, messing up his meticulously styled hair.

"Yeah, who wouldn't want to take a bite when there's a chance to make money? Leaving it in a bank account only yields a tiny bit of interest."

"Since you're worried, we'll just transfer the money to the company account ahead of time. That way there won't be any issues."

Sanchez then looked at Rudolph with a troubled expression: "Mr. Rudolph, we originally wanted to use the idle period of our funds to earn some interest to spend, but it seems there's no chance now."

"Let's stay in touch. There will be opportunities for cooperation in the future."

Rudolph was stunned by this sudden turn of events. He was just about to secure Renoson and Sanchez, so how did it turn into this situation in the blink of an eye?

He really couldn't figure it out, and since he couldn't, he decided not to think about it. These guys in front of him were not easy to deal with.

As long as there was no conflict of interest, it was best to avoid offending these people if possible.

"Alright, it seems the timing just isn't right. Let's stay in touch. You can contact me anytime if you need anything."

Once Rudolph's figure disappeared, the gazes of Renoson, Sanchez, and Mars all focused squarely on Wang Xiuyuan.

Wang Xiuyuan was somewhat speechless: "What are you all looking at?"

"Waiting for your explanation! If you don't explain it to us, how will we know what's going on? Won't we just get scammed later anyway?"

"Does this damn thing even need an explanation? Use your little brains. That's a high yield of around twenty percent annually. If it were investing in futures or currencies, it might be understandable."

"But what kind of product was that Rudolph pitching to you?"

"Those were bonds, which are characterized by high stability and safety but average returns."

"The investment return on bonds is usually only slightly higher than bank fixed-deposit interest. How could a borrower afford to pay such an outrageously high interest rate?"

"If they had that kind of capability, wouldn't it be better to just get a bank loan? Why bother with a complex third-party bond issuance?"

"It's not that a truly reliable company can't issue bonds to borrow money for development, but if the company is reliable, then banks and other investors will definitely scramble to lend them money because they can be sure of their funds' safety."

"Only those companies that could go bankrupt at any time have no one willing to lend to them. So, they can only rely on high interest rates to borrow money to maintain operations. Anyway, once the company goes bust, the debt dies with it."

"If I were the operator of such a company, I would definitely take that gamble."

Wang Xiuyuan's explanation was very clear, and he believed Renoson and Sanchez would surely understand. But understanding was one thing; accepting it was another.

"But the high-yield bonds Rudolph recommended have been issued for over two years, and the early investors have all successfully received their returns. Isn't that quite reliable?"

"Yeah, we've asked friends around us who invested in this product, and they all say it's very reliable."

The two of them were still using friends as examples, but it was precisely this behavior that Wang Xiuyuan found laughable.

In his past life, he had seen many similar cases. Of all those high-return investment projects that ran into major problems, which one wasn't a case of friends introducing friends into the trap?

When nothing had gone wrong, the group of friends would be all smiles, feeling like the world was theirs as they raised their glasses.

Once something happened, the reaction of these people was also very uniform: 'My friend is an idiot!'

'I'm the smart one, I just had bad luck and got screwed over by a big idiot.'

Wang Xiuyuan mocked Renoson and Sanchez with a wide smile: "Then your luck is truly great. The friends you know have IQs as high as yours. You must get along very happily in your daily lives."

After the mockery, Wang Xiuyuan immediately changed the subject.

"Before you prepared to invest in bonds, did you actually make a specialized effort to understand the operational logic of bonds?"

(Brothers, the weather has been very cold lately. Please give a few free bookmarks, follows, and recommendation votes. A small act of kindness can warm a struggling author for the whole winter.)