The Art of the Hustle (Complete)

Chapter Thirty-Five

"Do you make any money at it?" 

"I do okay, made thirty thousand last week," he said casually.  

"Wow, good for you." My mind was still trying to comprehend such a large figure. I didn't even make thirty thousand the entire year. 

"Come here, I'll show you what I do. The monitor to your left is where I check all my SEC filings, news, and charts throughout the day. The middle monitor is where I do all my order entries, and the monitor on the far right is set up for my alerts and level IIs." 

I had no idea what he just said, but for the chance to make thirty thousand, I wanted to learn more. I stood behind him and tried my best to make sense of all the flashing lights, graphs, and letters moving rapidly across the screen. I felt like I was in the cockpit of an alien spaceship.  

"If you want to learn more about this stuff, I can show you."  

"Seriously? That would be great, thanks." 

"No problem. You can also help yourself to my book collection. I think you will like everything on the top shelf." 

*** 

We entered the elevator and Steve swiped his key fob against a sensor and pressed PP1. 

"What did you just do?" I asked inquisitively. I lived in the same building, but I did not have to scan my key to use the elevator. 

"Oh, I have a private parking garage. You need to swipe this thing to gain access." 

The elevator took us down one level below the main parking garage. The doors opened and we stepped off the elevator. I was shocked at what I saw. In front of us was an assortment of beautiful exotic cars. 

"Dang," I said under my breath. 

"Nice, right?"  

I was speechless. Who is this guy? For a young guy in university, he sure had a nice car collection. The first vehicle to grab my attention was a polished black H1 Hummer. It was by far the largest vehicle in the fleet, but certainly not the most extravagant. The cherry red Ferrari 599 GTO won that title. He also had a Mercedes E class, a Lexus RX Hybrid, and an equally impressive collection of street bikes.  

Steve extended his hand, pressed a button on his key chain, and the Lexus came to life. 

"Come on, we'll take this one, we can put some small stuff in it. I'll get my uncle to deliver all the larger things." 

On the way to his uncle's furniture store, we talked a lot more about trading stocks. 

"My strategy is simple really, I find 'diamond-in-the-rough' companies and bet large on them." 

"Are you successful most of the time?" 

"Usually. Sometimes I take losses, but my gains far outweigh my losses. I don't want you to get the wrong idea, if you don't know what you're doing you can go broke very quickly. In fact, a buddy of mine lost a half million dollars playing my strategy. I can teach you everything I know, but you must have the right kind of personality for trading. I trade mostly on instincts, and I can't teach you that."  

"I know exactly what you mean," I said, remembering my sales seminar. 

"If you want to invest a little bit of money to get your feet wet, look into XNR." 

"XNR? What does that mean?" 

"Oh, sorry, XNR is the ticker symbol for Xaner Pharmaceuticals." 

"Okay, what do they do?" 

"This company is about to introduce a drug that will revolutionize the way people treat diabetes. It's still undergoing trials, but they are in their phase 3 of testing." 

"Sounds interesting."  

"Yeah, this thing is going to be huge, I have a couple hundred grand invested in it." 

*** 

Thanks to Steve, my apartment was now set up with the essentials. I picked up a cheap couch, bed, and desk. He even gave me an old coffee table he wasn't using. I planned to go into town and pick up some dishes and bed sheets later, but first I wanted to try out my new cell phone. 

"Hello?" 

"Hi baby," I said. 

"Hey! How are you?" Ashley said excitingly.  

"I'm doing well, how are you? 

"I'm good. So is this your new number?" 

"Yeah, I just got it today; I wanted you to be the first person I called." 

"Aww, that's sweet. So how are you finding everything so far? Have you made any friends yet?" 

"It's great so far. I've met a few really nice guys in my building actually. One of them is starting law school as well. And this other friend of mine, Steve, this guy is loaded. He lives in the penthouse of my building, which is huge by the way, and he has over a half a million dollars worth of cars in his own private garage." 

"Wow, sounds like a cool guy." 

"Yeah, he's awesome. He hooked me up with some really cheap furniture from his uncle's store and even got me into trading stocks." 

"Oh baby, be careful, I don't want you to lose all your money." 

"To be honest, I have no idea what I'm doing, I just listen to him and so far he has been right. He told me to put some money into this pharmaceutical company and a week later the stock went up almost four hundred percent!" 

"So how much money did you make?" 

"I just put a couple thousand dollars of my student loan money and I made around eight grand." 

"Wow, that's fantastic!" 

"Yeah, I know. Steve has been teaching me a lot. He has his own personal library and lent me a few books on trading." 

"I'm happy to hear that, hon. I just worry you will lose all your money, or you will be too focused on stocks and not do well in school. Don't forget why you're there. You worked really hard to get there." 

"Yeah I know, but I love making money too." 

"Okay, as long as you know what you're doing, I trust you."