Frank was a very ordinary worker with two jobs. His child was taken care of by his mother, who lived next door to him. He and his wife each had a job.
Two people working together would, of course, earn more than one person working alone, and it was a lot.
If this situation continued for several years, it would be an even bigger number.
Frank worked in a business that sometimes dealt with the rich people in Bupenn, and he knew better than anyone else that getting rich overnight in Bupenn was not a fairy tale. After discussing with his wife, he found a financial management company and opened an account.
It must be said that it was very difficult for ordinary people to operate stock securities. The manual matching process could make anyone miss the most suitable trading opportunity perfectly. If you wanted to match more quickly and steadily, you must have a private trading booth.
The price of a trading booth had almost reached one million, and ordinary people simply did not have the financial resources to buy it. They could only entrust financial brokerage companies to operate their accounts, and were repeatedly charged various fees.
After a period of operation, they made a lot of money.
When the financial trend was positive, even the trashiest stocks could create miracles, not to mention the stocks carefully selected by financial brokerage companies.
Soon the funds in their accounts increased from a few thousand to almost 100,000, which was definitely a huge sum of money for ordinary families.
However, the market had become more and more difficult recently. Except for a few powerful stocks that were still rising strongly, the rising momentum of other stocks had gradually slowed down.
The brokers said that this was a temporary adjustment, and that after the adjustment, those stocks would continue to rise as before.
Many people believed what the stockbrokers said, because on Boston Street, 95% of the people actually knew little or nothing about stocks, and only 5% were real financial professionals.
A large number of laymen contributed to the prosperity of the industry, and these people also received a lot of dividends as a result.
Recently, the brokers had been recommending Frank to buy some bonds. In the words of the brokers, now was the best time to sell, and they could make more than 10% of the profit. There was no more profitable business than this.
And there was no need to worry about the fluctuation of the trading price, because the top price of the bond was its face value, unless there were some incentive clauses in the issuing congress. At that time, the incentive clauses would only make the upper limit of the bond higher, not lower.
In other words, this was a profitable business. If no one else took over in the future, they could also cash in the bonds directly.
Frank and his wife learned a little about bonds and found that this was indeed the case. At least from the books they consulted, they did not find that bonds would depreciate. If they had consulted more professional books at that time, they might not have thought so.
But if they really knew how to consult professional books, they might not have considered these options.
In the end, they decided to invest all their savings, plus the credit they got from the bank, in the first batch of foreign-issued war bonds. Because investing in bonds would not lose money, they did it boldly.
"About 12%, more than 20 thousand yuan!"
This was what Frank said to his family and friends at that time. For this reason, he even opened a bottle of wine for 8.99 yuan to celebrate. In the face of those envious and jealous gazes, he felt that he was stepping on clouds. He felt that he was lucky, and his vision was very good. He could totally consider becoming a full-time financial investor in the future. He even gave himself a learning plan that was actually too late.
All of this yearning for a better future finally stopped on Friday night of the last week of last month.
The last issue of the "Trading Paper" of the month used about a quarter of the board to remind all investors of the huge risk of bond exchange. This time, they did not hide this statement in some more shocking content, but put it out there.
And all of this was caused by the failure of the Federation's diplomatic policy in the international community.
In August and September, the president's cabinet was still fantasizing about solving these and some other problems through diplomatic positions, but it was obvious that they had failed.
Whether it was the victors or the losers of the world war, they did not have any good feelings toward the Bailey Federation. They took it for granted that they would drag it out as long as they could.
The failure of diplomacy immediately caused some things to start to get out of control because the first batch of war bonds was about to arrive. Before that, the major banks had already cleared all the bonds that they could clear. At the same time, they also refused to directly cash these bonds or act as a proxy for the redemption of these bonds.
Because they knew that these bonds were no different from waste paper. They could not bring any value, and they would only drag themselves deeper into the abyss.
Therefore, this time, the "Trading Paper" no longer hid some of the problems and stated it clearly. Once again, it proved that the "Trading Paper" was a newspaper that dared to speak the truth, dared to speak the truth, dared to speak the truth, and had a bottom line and conscience.
Its position and attitude were like the Federation's at this time, absolutely neutral, and did not side with anyone.
After reading the report, Frank was so shocked that he broke out in a cold sweat. He immediately asked his agent about the redemption of the bonds and then went to the bank.
The bank directly rejected his request and told him that he could take a boat directly to the bank of the country where the bonds were issued and ask for the redemption. However, it was not easy to do it in the country. No, it was impossible.
Frank, who did not give up, was smarter than others. He called the issuing bank of the country where the bonds were issued. At first, the other party said that they could provide the redemption service at any time. Frank was relieved.
However, when he reported his bond number, the other party directly told him that there were some risks involved in the bonds and temporarily stopped the redemption. This instantly killed Frank. He was in despair.
A total of more than a hundred thousand yuan, ten years of hard work, all turned into waste paper. This was not the scariest thing. The scariest thing was that he still had to pay all the necessary expenses for his life every month, and there was also the interest of his personal credit loan. Otherwise, the bank would take away his and his parents' house, his car, and he would have to move to a worse neighborhood or even live on the streets with his family.
In desperation, he called his agent.
"You already knew, didn't you?!"
Frank's voice on the phone was low and full of anger, like a volcano that was about to erupt.
The agent on the other end of the phone was silent for a while before he said dryly, "If I said that I didn't know, would you believe me?"
In fact, from the few seconds when his agent was silent, Frank knew that his agent knew some inside information. This made him even angrier. "We've known each other for so many years, and we've always worked well together. Why did you do this to me? I thought we were friends."
The agent chuckled a few times. "Frank, I have a few contacts in my pocket for friends like you."
"You have made a lot of money by relying on me these past few years. This is just an accident. You have to understand that I am innocent."
"The higher-ups asked us to recommend these bonds. All we can do is call you and tell you the benefits and risks. The final decision is in your hands, not mine."
The agent's phone communication had a very standard process. They would not hide anything related to the risks, but they would use some clever words to mislead people about the risks.
When the agent recommended these bonds to Frank, he also reminded Frank of the risks. However, he also successfully made Frank think that the risks mentioned by the agent might be that no one would be his next customer and take over these bonds.
However, when the agent told him that he could cash in according to the face value, these risks in his eyes were no longer risks.
Frank's voice became even more irritable. "You lied to me, but you can't change this fact. You lied to me, so you have to give me back my money!"
The agent's voice also became a little impatient. "First of all, I didn't lie to you. I said that it was your own decision."
"Second, in the entrustment agreement we signed, it said that the risks are borne by oneself. Now that you have losses, you want me to compensate you. Then why didn't you call me when you made tens of thousands of yuan over the past few years and asked me to split it half with you?"
"Wake up, you're not a child anymore. If you don't have candy, you'll cry. If there's nothing else, I'm hanging up. I don't have time to waste with you!"
"If you have time, why don't you think about your life from now on?"
With a bang, the phone was slammed on the pedestal. At the same time, there was a busy tone. Frank was furious. He had been forced to the edge of a cliff.
If they had only lost their own savings, it would have been fine. However, there was also the credit they got from the bank, a part of Frank's parents' savings, and their own credit.
After the credit was released, almost all of the selected people applied for it. In these difficult times, there was nothing more reassuring than having a sum of money in hand.
However, this also made some problems that originally didn't exist become terrifying.
His whole family might have to wander!
After locking himself in his room for two days, Frank finally decided to make a big deal out of it. This wasn't an impulsive decision. It was a decision he made after careful consideration.
As the first person to make a scene, if the Federation government could help them solve these problems, then as an iconic figure who represented the cause of this incident, his problem would naturally be solved first.
As for whether he would go to jail for this, he didn't care. He knew very well that ten years of hard work wouldn't be enough to get back the money he had lost. However, if ten years in jail could make up for the loss, he felt that at least he wouldn't lose out!
Therefore, on Sunday night, he brought a dagger and a few ropes and visited his agent.
This was the reason why the agent appeared at the exchange today with an ugly expression.