[028] Investing in Learning
“How’s the coffee? Good, right?”
“Yeah, it’s amazing.”
Michael Dell, sitting in a small café, seemed to have regained his composure.
“So, shall we continue our earlier conversation? Are you serious about not exercising your voting rights?”
“Absolutely.”
“Indefinitely?”
“Until I decide to sell my shares.”
He reacted sharply to the word “sell.”
“So, you’re not interested in getting involved in management?”
“That’s the basic principle of an investor. You pull out once you’re satisfied with the returns, right?”
I glanced at Oh Se-hyun, signaling him, and he quickly chimed in.
“Exactly. That’s our business.”
Michael took a sip of his coffee, looking between us thoughtfully, then turned back to me.
“Then there must be another proposal you haven’t mentioned yet?”
“Are you referring to the right of first refusal upon sale?”
Oh Se-hyun interjected hastily, likely thinking the conversation was heading into deeper waters that he couldn’t leave to me.
“Yes, James. If you’re aiming for capital gains, you’ll eventually sell everything, but you can’t just flood the market with those shares. It would cause the stock price to plummet.”
I couldn’t let him dictate the terms of a standard deal. I needed to take control of the negotiation.
Sorry, Uncle!
“Mike, I’ll give you the right of first refusal at the exact market price at that time.”
“Do-jun!”
Oh Se-hyun exclaimed in Korean, startled.
“Sorry, Mike. Just a second.”
He nodded slightly to Michael Dell, asking for his understanding.
“Do-jun, this isn’t something you decide lightly. The right of first refusal usually comes at a premium over the market price. From a management defense standpoint, it’s common to sell at a higher price.”
Michael Dell watched Oh Se-hyun’s urgent explanation with an amused smile.
“Hmm, so it’s true, then.”
“Sorry?”
“That kid, I mean… Howard is your boss. I thought it was a joke, but ha ha.”
Michael Dell burst into laughter and set his coffee cup down.
“James, let me have a word with the boss here. Howard seems to be quite a unique character, unlike the me from 12 years ago. Details in an investment contract are bound to change, so there’s no need to worry prematurely, right?”
It was pure curiosity.
“Howard, as James said, this is quite a favorable condition for me. You didn’t propose it without understanding its true meaning, did you?”
“Of course not. Mike, as you just said, it’s a pretty good deal. But you wouldn’t just accept it as is, would you? I think you should throw in a good offer for me too, to balance things out.”
“If the terms you just mentioned are included in the investment contract, Miracle Investment will accept as much investment as possible. How about that?”
“How much are we talking about?”
“It’s hard to say right now. I need to check the exact numbers.”
It’s done. Success.
The captain of the ship heading to Treasure Island has taken my hand and brought me aboard.
Now, all that’s left is a smooth sail to Treasure Island.
With Michael Dell as the captain, there’s no need to worry about rough seas.
All I have to do is enjoy the view of the blue ocean from the deck.
“We should have a beer party for this, but since our major shareholder is too young… coffee okay?”
Michael Dell raised his coffee cup, and I followed suit.
Clink!
A delightful sound resonated.
On the flight back to New York, Oh Se-hyun, who had been silent for a long time, finally spoke up.
“When did you learn English?”
“Three years ago. My grandfather hired an English tutor for me.”
“Must be a good teacher. To make you that fluent in just three years.”
He nodded lightly. Knowing how intense early language education is in wealthy families, he didn’t press further.
But the real question was just beginning.
“But the conversation you had with Michael… I can’t just accept it. I tried to understand, thinking you’re just a smart kid, but my mind rejects it.”
Since it must have been hard for him to bring it up, I decided to be honest.
“Actually, I’m a person from 30 years in the future, reborn. So… I have the knowledge and thoughts of a forty-year-old adult in my head.”
“Don’t joke around. I’m not into sci-fi novels.”
The truth is for the listener to decide. Since he doesn’t believe it, I can only say what he wants to hear.
“Not funny? Hehe.”
I scratched my head with a sly smile.
“Yeah, but that would explain things. If you have the intellectual level of someone in their forties who’s been active in the economy, it makes sense. Haha.”
He chuckled lightly, but it didn’t seem like he was going to let it go.
“I think I mentioned it once. About our family being looked down upon…”
“Yeah, you did mention it.”
“Since then, I haven’t missed a single day of reading three newspapers from cover to cover. At first, I didn’t understand the content, but I looked up words in the dictionary and kept reading. After about a year, I didn’t need the dictionary anymore.”
Not exactly a dictionary, but it’s true I didn’t miss a day.
“All of it?”
“Yes. I didn’t skip the stock prices on the business pages either. I read every advertisement too. I watched almost all the TV news and documentaries, practicing tying everything together… I think that’s why.”
“Every day for three years?”
“Yes.”
He seemed quite surprised.
He knows how hard it is to do something consistently every day. His life experience has taught him that.
“Impressive, but…”
It’s not the answer he was looking for.
“Let’s drop it. Maybe it’s something even you can’t explain. Asking about the source of talent is as foolish as it gets.”
If you ask a handsome person why they’re handsome, they’d say they were born that way. It’s a meaningless question.
Oh Se-hyun smiled at me and asked again.
“So, what do you think when you read the newspapers these days?”
“Construction.”
“Construction?”
“Yes. 90% of the ads are for apartment sales. It means they’re making a lot of money selling apartments.”
He probably expected me to talk about the business articles. But the real face of Korea is in the ads.
Thirty years later, when economic polarization was a hot topic, loan and insurance ads dominated newspapers and broadcasts.
With no money, loan ads were rampant, and with insecure retirements, insurance ads were everywhere.
Now, apartments have swallowed everything in Korea.
“But, Uncle, do you know what’s interesting?”
“What is it?”
Oh Se-hyun’s face, now devoid of a smile, was full of anticipation.
“The stock prices of construction companies don’t keep up with the volume of ads.”
“Do you know what that means?”
“I think… they’re siphoning off funds as slush money.”
“What? Slush funds? Do you even know what that means?”
“Uncle! Do you think I wouldn’t know that? It was the most mentioned word during last year’s hearings. You’re underestimating me.”
Reaching a conclusion based on scattered elements is insight.
Insight is solidified through the acquisition of knowledge and the accumulation of wisdom. In a way, it requires physical time, but skipping that is something you’re born with.
Oh Se-hyun looked at me as if I were a fascinating creature, and I met his gaze.
“Grandfather meets with the president of Sunyang Construction quite often. I’ve overheard their conversations, and it’s mostly about money. They often mention foreign banks. That’s when I realized that construction companies are hoarding money as slush funds.”
A child who has seen and heard the reality of slush funds.
Oh Se-hyun’s skeptical look didn’t disappear, but he didn’t say more.
However, it seems he won’t stop scrutinizing me to understand my true nature.
As soon as we arrived in New York, Oh Se-hyun unpacked at the hotel and rushed back to the office.
“I’ll be busy with the investment agreement from now on. We’ll stick to the terms we discussed and try to maximize the investment amount. But they might reject the full $15 million, so what should we do with the remaining funds?”
“Why don’t you discuss it with your staff and suggest a good investment opportunity? I’ll decide based on that.”
“Let’s do that.”
Reporting and deciding. It’s become the norm now.
Oh Se-hyun sought my mother’s understanding.
“Sister-in-law, I have some work to do, so I won’t be able to accompany you. Is that okay?”
“Oh, yes. The guide has been very attentive, so it’s no problem. Go ahead with your work.”
With just our family left, my mother seemed eager to suppress her curiosity. She only asked in passing.
“How was Texas? Is the weather nice?”
“The weather’s unpredictable, but it was nice the past couple of days. They said we were lucky.”
“And the investment stuff?”
“Oh, I just watched Uncle work, and it got a bit boring.”
“Alright. Then let’s enjoy some sightseeing and good food together. Sound good?”
“Yes. But what about my brother?”
“Go check on him. It’s quite a sight.”
In the suite with a living room and three rooms, I knocked on the door to my brother Sang-jun’s room and entered to find quite a scene.
The bed was piled with dozens of CDs and LP records, and a CD player sat on the nightstand.
In 1986, SKC (Sunkyong Chemical Co., Ltd.) released the first domestic compact discs in partnership with Philips, and the first CD album composed of songs was released in November of that year, but they weren’t yet common.
It seemed Sang-jun’s goal for this trip was to sweep up all the unreleased albums.
Despite being from a wealthy family, his spending was astonishing. He casually bought a CD player that cost more than a few months’ salary for a working adult.
In a family overflowing with wealth, it’s easy to forget the value of money. If you don’t understand its worth, you’re bound to become the kind of spoiled heir that society loves to criticize.
If this kid ends up being the target of such criticism, it could reflect poorly on me too. I need to work on reshaping his mindset.
Sang-jun was so absorbed in his music, headphones on, that he didn’t even notice me coming in or leaving.
For the next three days, I wandered around New York with my mother.
5th Avenue, cutting through the heart of New York, is renowned as one of the world’s premier shopping destinations, alongside London’s Oxford Street, Paris’s Champs-Élysées, and Milan’s Via Monte Napoleone.
My mother indulged in quite a bit of shopping here, showing no hesitation in spending large sums of money.
Even though we receive a generous allowance, it’s not enough to buy luxury goods without a second thought.
She must have sold the land in Ilsan. I wonder how much she made from it.
“So, you returned today?”
“Yes.”
“Did you look into what they did in the States?”
“According to the New York branch, it was all sightseeing and shopping. We couldn’t account for one day when Oh Se-hyun and Do-jun were absent.”
“Both of them took a day off?”
Chairman Jin’s eyebrows twitched at Director Lee Hak-jae’s report.
“If it were just Do-jun’s family, I’d think it was a vacation. But with Oh Se-hyun tagging along, it’s not just tourism. It’s a business trip.”
They’re definitely scouting investment opportunities in the U.S. through PowerShares, the asset management firm.
Lee Hak-jae had a hunch why Chairman Jin was frowning.
If money starts circulating in the U.S., it slips out of his control. And Chairman Jin never tolerates anything he can’t control.
“I’ll dig deeper.”
“Precisely. And quickly.”
“Yes, sir.”
Lee Hak-jae began to gauge Chairman Jin’s mood again, knowing he had more troubling news to deliver.
“Uh, Chairman?”
“What is it? Why so cautious?”
Sensing something serious from Lee Hak-jae’s expression, Chairman Jin put down the report he was holding.
“It’s about Yoon-gi.”
“What about Yoon-gi?”
“He’s in the process of setting up a film production company.”
“What? A film company?”
“Yes. It’s almost finalized. They plan to start production next year, with two films at once…”
“Don’t tell me… Is it Do-jun’s money?”
Chairman Jin’s voice grew increasingly agitated.