Chapter 520: Elon Musk
Founded in 1995, eBay has now become a giant company in the C2C field and an undisputed industry leader.
On eBay's platform, millions of furniture, collectibles, computers, and vehicles are listed, marketed, and sold every day. Even services and virtual items are within the scope of salable items. The scale of transactions is astonishingly large.
It can be said that eBay is standing at the forefront of the times and has successfully overturned the smaller flea markets of the past, bringing buyers and sellers together and creating a market that never rests.
Tens of millions of users sell what they have here and pay for the products they like. This creates huge transaction demand.
However, on a new trading platform like e-commerce, the transfer procedures using existing credit cards or bank cards have become too troublesome, and using cash is even more impossible.
Therefore, the demand for secure online payment services came into being.
Whoever can meet the transaction needs of these users will become the overlord in the field of online payment and achieve unimaginable great success in this new industry.
As the builder of the market platform, as long as the founder of eBay is not stupid, he will definitely not fail to see the benefits of this and will definitely not hand over his lifeline to outsiders.
So whether it is Peter Thiel or Elon Musk, their biggest competitor is not each other, but the dominant giant in the C2C field - eBay.
Even if Lu Yiming had not appeared, the merger of the two companies would have been an inevitable trend. After all, for smart people, there is often only one optimal solution to choose from.
Seeing that Elon Musk seemed to be still hesitant, Lu Yiming said, "It is meaningless to fight alone. Let's join forces. Only in this way can we have hope of defeating the strong enemy. Otherwise, when eBay's own payment system is established, we will all die."
Elon Musk had to admit that Lu Yiming was right, but it was impossible for him to sell X.com to Lu Yiming without hesitation. As a man who would become the world's richest man in the future, he was naturally not someone who could be easily persuaded. He was still hesitating and weighing what to do to best serve his own interests.
Elon Musk asked Lu Yiming: "Would you like some coffee?"
Lu Yiming raised his eyebrows and said with a smile: "Okay, you haven't even poured me a glass of water since you came in for so long. I'm already thirsty."
Elon Musk asked his secretary to come in and make two cups of coffee, and the rich aroma of coffee instantly filled the entire office.
Lu Yiming complained: "This coffee is pretty good. I went to the FBI a few days ago and they didn't even have coffee. They only provided orange juice. This is really too much."
Lu Yiming was drinking coffee and seemed to have forgotten about the acquisition. He asked in a casual tone: "If you make a lot of money, what do you want to do?"
Elon Musk is still worried about the survival of his company. How can he have time to think about the future? He immediately said: "I don't know. I haven't thought about it yet."
Lu Yiming raised his head slightly, as if he was looking at the sky, and said casually: "I have thought that the earth is small, and the journey of mankind should be to the stars and the sea, so if I have the opportunity in the future, I may invest in the aerospace field. I hope that in my lifetime, I can see humans colonize Mars with my own eyes."
Elon Musk is not yet thirty years old, an age full of energy, and his family also has a strong adventurous gene.
For example, his grandfather Joshua Norman Haldeman was a tough guy. When he became rich, he bought an airplane and sold all his houses. In 1952, he flew his plane from Africa all the way north to Norway, a distance of more than 22,000 miles.
That was 1952!
From today's perspective , the airplanes at that time were just kites equipped with engines!
Growing up in such a family, it is easy to imagine how crazy Elon Musk would be.
Now, due to the pressure of life, those wild ideas in his mind have not been released.
However, Lu Yiming's words were like a sharp sword, cutting a gap in his suppressed madness.
A ray of light shone in.
Elon Musk's eyes are shining!
"This idea of yours is really cool!"
Lu Yiming raised the corners of his mouth slightly, and then said calmly : "Before colonizing Mars, we can also do suborbital flights and space travel. Going a step further, we can also develop rocket recovery technology first. After all, current rockets are disposable, which is really a waste. After mastering rocket recovery technology, the cost of space travel will come down. I tell you, this is definitely a good business! And we can cooperate directly with NASA on these things. Konstantin Tsiolkovsky said that the earth is the cradle of mankind, but mankind cannot be bound to the cradle forever."
Since 1992, the United States has become the world's only superpower.
At this time, the United States still had some ideals. They really wanted to become a "beacon of mankind". So we can see that in the thirty years from the 1970s to the 1990s, the United States' technology, music, movies, etc. were full of romantic sentiments, and had a sense of "helping the world when you are successful".
In the field of music, a large number of idealists such as Jackson emerged.
In terms of movies, classics such as "ET the Extra-Terrestrial", "Star Wars", and "2001: A Space Odyssey" all came from this period.
Elon Musk felt his blood boiling at what Lu Yiming said, and he wanted to throw himself into it immediately, just like his grandfather sold all his assets to go sailing.
At this point, he no longer knew what X.com was.
What is mobile payment? Don’t try to trick me, I’m not familiar with it!
Elon Musk said to Lu Yiming excitedly: "The newspapers say you are a cold-blooded butcher and a money-making machine without emotions. I think they are all wrong. You are an idealist who cares about all mankind!"
Lu Yiming had a righteous expression on his face, and his whole body seemed to be emitting a holy light: "Other people's misunderstandings cannot hurt me in the slightest. I know what I am doing. Great ideals often require huge amounts of money, so I will never be soft-handed when it comes to making money."
Elon Musk agrees with this and said: "Indeed, the world is material, and any ideal must be built on enough money."
The two then talked for a while. Lu Yiming talked to Elon Musk about autonomous driving and wireless communication between the earth and the sky, which made Elon Musk fascinated. He wanted to dissolve X.com on the spot and follow Lu Yiming to realize his great ideal. As for the merger of X.com and PayPal, Elon Musk agreed without hesitation and said that he would take people to PayPal the next day.
Seeing that it was getting late, Elon Musk still felt that he had not yet finished his visit, and reluctantly sent Lu Yiming to the bottom of the office building himself.
The two said goodbye, and Lu Yiming was about to walk towards the car parked nearby when he suddenly heard someone shout in surprise: "Mr. Lu!"
Lu Yiming was startled and took two steps back involuntarily. He looked closely and found that it was a reporter running towards him with a photographer.
"Fuck, why is there someone waiting for me here..."
Lu Yiming was speechless.
The person who appeared before him was a reporter from the San Jose Mercury News named Catherine.
She came here originally to interview another young entrepreneur, but unexpectedly she happened to meet Lu Yiming. Naturally, the reporter had an idea and ran over to interview Lu Yiming.
Recently, Lu Yiming has been living in seclusion and rarely shows up, but the legend about him has been circulating in the world. After all, this is a man who broke the defense of the US stock market. Many people are saying that he has been detained by the FBI, and some even say that he has been secretly executed.
Various rumors spread like wildfire, arousing people's curiosity.
If we could interview him now, wouldn't the sales of this issue of The Mercury explode?
Catherine came to Lu Yiming, held out the microphone, and said, "Mr. Lu, I'm Catherine, a reporter from the Mercury News! You suddenly showed up in San Jose, are you planning to do something big?"
In the past, Lu Yiming would definitely not accept this kind of interview.
However, at this critical moment, Lu Yiming suddenly thought about it and said calmly into the microphone: "I came to San Jose City because I want to invest here. After all, I am an investor."
When Catherine heard this, she was even more delighted. Not only did she snoop on Lu Yiming today, but she also dug out Lu Yiming's investment plan. Wouldn't her bonus this month be tripled?
"Which company does Mr. Lu plan to invest in?"
Lu Yiming, who had already made up his mind, was not afraid of the stage at this moment. He spoke in front of the reporters: "I have bought 20% of Confinity's shares. Confinity will also change its name to PayPal according to my suggestion."
Then Lu Yiming also mentioned Elon Musk: "In addition, I just talked with Elon Musk of X.com for a few hours. He is a very thoughtful young man with a bright future. I even think he can become the richest man in the United States and a very important figure in the world."
Elon Musk, who had not yet walked far, did not expect that Lu Yiming's interview would also involve him. Lu Yiming knew it very well and even said that he would become the richest man in the United States, which immediately made him speechless.
Now, he is still worried about X.com's expenses for next month. Not to mention becoming the richest man in the United States, it would be difficult for him to even become the richest man in this office building.
Not only Elon Musk thought so, even Catherine, the female reporter from the Mercury News standing in front of Lu Yiming, felt that what had just been said was outrageous.
But she was a journalist, and the more outrageous the topic, the better she liked it.
After all, how can a topic be popular if it is not outrageous?
Now, she doesn't have to worry about how to hype it up. She can just write down Lu Yiming's original words, which will probably cause a sensation.
Catherine immediately asked with a flushed face: "Since Mr. Lu admires Musk so much, has some kind of deal been reached?"
Lu Yiming said with regret: "I wanted to buy it, but Musk refused to sell it. He has great business ambitions, so I could only persuade him to join PayPal. PayPal is a great product. If banks don't change, we will change them. The Internet is developing too fast now. Popular shopping and entertainment have all moved to the Internet, such as eBay. But in the payment process, our bankers reacted too slowly. They were arrogant and stupid. So, what we are doing is to break their monopoly and provide the most convenient online payment service for everyone."
Catherine herself often goes to Silicon Valley to interview Internet-related entrepreneurs, so she is no stranger to this industry. She immediately asked, "I heard rumors that eBay is also working on its own payment system, which will inevitably conflict with PayPal. Aren't you afraid that your investment will go down the drain?"
Lu Yiming said calmly: "I believe PayPal will succeed because it is a group of energetic young people with unparalleled wisdom and talent. It is hard for me to imagine that they will fail."
After the interview, Catherine couldn't even wait for her scheduled interview. She called to cancel the appointment and rushed back to the company to write the article.
The next day, the news was published in the newspaper. eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and female president Meg Whitman both looked very unhappy when they read the newspaper.
Lu Yiming's actions obviously disrupted their pace of action.
Pierre Omidyar was particularly upset. After all, eBay was the company he founded. Now that he had finally achieved success, how could he just sit and watch someone run wild on his turf?
The existence of PayPal is like a thorn in his side.
Meg Whitman, known as the "Queen of Online Flea Markets", did not dare to ignore Lu Yiming's presence and said with a serious expression: "We are in trouble."
PayPal was already a difficult problem to begin with, and now that Lu Yiming has stepped forward, the two are under tremendous pressure, but they are helpless.
Also helpless is Dominic Burton who is far away in New York. He has been having a very bad time recently.
On this day, Dominic Burton got up early in the morning and prepared to go to work. His wife Cassie McMillan said worriedly, "Honey, why did you go to the police station so early? Recently, you have been going out early and coming back late, and you sleep less than six hours a day. What case is worth investigating like this?"
The son who was eating oatmeal ran over and hugged Dominic Burton's thighs, saying in a baby voice: "Dad, catch the bad guys."
Dominic Burton picked up his five-year-old son and said, "Yes, Dad is catching the bad guys."
"When I grow up, I want to catch bad guys with my dad."
After saying goodbye to his wife and son, Dominic Burton drove to the police station with a gloomy face.
As soon as he entered the police station, Lancelot Harrison called him into the office and said, "We have been investigating for a whole month, and now we have to stop here."
The Investigation Bureau was ordered to search everywhere for evidence of Lu Yiming's crime, but naturally they found nothing.
Lu Yiming's source of funds is extremely clean, after all, it was provided by Epstein.
Moreover, the investment was indeed made in the Saltwater Fund, and everything was within the framework permitted by law. Even the short-selling method itself was "cleaner" than many Wall Street fund companies.
Lancelot Harrison sighed and said, "The bureau is under a lot of pressure right now. Let's end this matter here. We need to prepare to close the case, otherwise we won't be able to explain ourselves."
Although there are people behind the Investigation Bureau who support them in continuing their investigation.
But the problem is, you have to find evidence, otherwise you can't do anything.
If you dare to do anything wrong, the protectors behind Lu Yiming will definitely not be pushovers.
Dominic Burton was filled with righteous indignation. He knew clearly that Lu Yiming was the culprit of all the troubles, but he could not bring him to justice. He could not accept such an outcome.
"I see."
After leaving Lancelot Harrison's office, Dominic Burton felt more and more upset the more he thought about it, so he drove directly to Lu Yiming's residence.
Although Lu Yiming's whereabouts seem to be kept secret, Dominic Burton works for the FBI!
Not long after, Dominic Burton arrived at the door of the villa where Lu Yiming lived.
Inside the house, Lu Yiming, who had received the news, walked out of the house with a smile, and personally opened the door of the villa for Dominic Burton, greeting him warmly as if he had met a long-lost friend: "Good morning, Mr. Burton. Come, don't stand at the door. It's windy outside. Come in to warm up."
In the villa, the fireplace was burning hot , and it was very comfortable. Lu Yiming asked enthusiastically: "You are a rare guest, what would you like to drink? Coffee or Coke or orange juice? Or beer? Or maybe brandy?"
Dominic Burton said with a gloomy face: "The investigation is over, but I will never give up. I will keep watching you until you reveal your flaws."
Although they were hostile, Lu Yiming still admired Dominic Burton. He poured him a cup of black tea, sat in front of him, and said calmly, "I'm going back to my country soon, so everything in the United States will have nothing to do with me soon. Besides, even if you keep an eye on me, you can't change anything."
Dominic Burton was unconvinced and was about to refute something, but Lu Yiming shook his head and continued, "The problem is not me, but the rules of the game in the US stock market. So no matter what I do or not, the tragedy will still happen. Since someone has to make this money, why can't I be the one making the money?"
These words gave Dominic Burton a bad feeling, as if this stock market crash would happen again in the future.
Lu Yiming held up the teacup, smiled calmly, and said, "You will understand in the future. Let's wait and see who will be the one who really caused the big trouble."
Lu Yiming was very much looking forward to the subprime mortgage crisis in 2008, as it would be an unprecedented short-selling feast.
After drinking tea, Dominic Burton left. He felt that he was indeed not thoughtful enough, so he ran over to tell Lu Yiming about it.
He couldn't fight with Lu Yiming, and it was even more impossible for him to pull out a gun and kill Lu Yiming.
Now even the action of continuing the investigation of Lu Yiming has been terminated.
Dominic Burton was indignant, but helpless.
This world is so magical.
