America's Road to Wealth

Swan Wharf, Great Neck, New York.

"Hi, gentlemen. Welcome, I'm Abel Smith, and this is my girlfriend, Keira Wilson."

Abel shook hands with Leo Melamed and Alan Greenspan with a confident smile.

"Thank you both for the invitation, it's a great honor..." Alan Greenspan smiled and shook hands with Abel, and then with the extremely elegant Keira.

Leo Melamed did the same.

Neither had a kiss-to-cheek kiss with Kayla.

For one thing, even in Europe and the United States, when they meet for the first time and they are not so familiar, it is rare for them to make a face-to-face salute.

The second is that someone's taboos in certain aspects have long been known by people in the same circle.

Of course, the two oil men will not commit such a taboo.

There were no reporters at the scene, and it was impossible to have such a private banquet in the top circle.

Those banquets that allow reporters to attend are often for show purposes.

Otherwise, of course, the more private the banquet where so many bigwigs gather, the better. Only this kind of banquet can really talk about interests, and talk about content that is not suitable for the media or the public.

After exchanging polite greetings with each other, a waiter played by a rock security staff behind Abel stepped forward and reached out to lead the two old oil men into the banquet hall.

The second person who came was a silver-haired old man in his fifties and wearing a black suit. He walked slowly towards Abel and Keira with a smile on his face.

Keira said in a slightly unnatural voice: "I'm sorry, my dear, this gentleman, I..."

"Don't worry, I have everything." Abel smiled softly, knowing that Kayla might not recognize someone.

During this period of time, she has been busy preparing for the dinner party, and has to work during the day, so how can she have the time to memorize the score of heroes.

You must know that in the high society in New York, one of the skills that must be mastered is to say the family name of the other party correctly. If you say it wrong, you will definitely offend people and even be laughed at. This is a very serious matter.

In addition, she is still a Californian, and her previous social circle has always been on the West Coast.

It's normal to not be familiar with the same kind here.

In many cases, she may have only heard the name, but never met.

Fortunately, Abel has a super memory, otherwise he would be very troubled by this kind of thing.

"Hello, Mr. Robert Miller, welcome to come, I am Abel Smith, and this is my girlfriend Keira..."

"Thank you. It's a great honor to be invited to tonight's dinner. It's a pleasure to meet you two." With a warm smile on his face, Robert Miller had a good attitude towards Abel and Kayla.

Seeing the back of Robert Miller walking into the banquet hall, Keira asked curiously in a low voice, "Who is this Mr. Miller?"

"He is the director of the FBI who just took office last year, that is, the boss of the FBl. A senior Elephant."

"Wow, I see." Kayla nodded, this is indeed a big shot.

Compared with CIA whose main business is abroad, FBl has a much greater deterrent effect on the United States. Even if it is a consortium, it is often necessary to pay attention to the movements of FBl.

Of course, in many cases, FBl is actually in the hands of the consortiums, and it is a common tool for everyone.

As the leader, the leader of the armed forces like Robert Miller can still be respected by Keira, who was born in a large consortium.

This is mainly because the California consortium she was born in is somewhat marginalized in this regard and has no right to speak.

If you were from a Texas consortium or a New York state consortium, your perception of Robert Miller would be different.

The guests at the back dazzled Kaila one by one.

Delin Schultz, the current leader of the Donkey Party. Richard Gephardt, Donkey Party House Whip. Le Colvin Jones, Senate Whip of the Donkey Party.

The donkey party now has all the big three on the surface.

A couple of back zippers came as well.

The Elephant Party is obviously not weak, and the well-known Elephant Party whip and party leader Tom Drey in both houses also arrived at the scene in person.

This is a Texan, and he's very tough. The best skill is to stand up to unify the internal actions of the elephant party when the number of votes between the donkey and the elephant is evenly matched, and not shy away from threatening political retaliation to force the members of the elephant party to submit, hence the nickname "Iron Hammer".

In the famous American drama "House of Cards" that came out in later generations, the powerful party whip in it was modeled after this one.

In fact, a normal party whip does not have that much power. This position is internal, and its role is to maintain the unity and discipline of the faction when voting.

Because they are elected by members of parliament, they generally have relatively high prestige, but few of them are as prestigious as the party whip in "House of Cards".

Of course, "few" is not all.

One such exception is Tom Dray, a guy with a stellar record on Capitol Hill.

During the two-year period of the 104th U.S. Congress, as the majority whip, he beat members of his faction with a "hammer" style, and succeeded in 303 votes on 303 bills.

Until his retirement, the Elephant Party's voice on Capitol Hill was more unified than ever.

However, in the upper class in the United States, Tom Dray is most famous for successfully organizing a vote in 1998 and passing a resolution to impeach Zipperton, who was deeply involved in the "zipper door" scandal.

It can be said that this whip and leader of the Xiang Party can be regarded as a well-known iron-blooded strongman in the American political arena.

but……

"Good evening, Uncle Tom. This is Keira Wilson, my girlfriend..."

Keira was a little surprised to see Abel take two steps forward, and his attitude was much better than that of the previous group of people. It even seemed that when he faced Tom Drey, he looked like a junior facing an elder.

Then Tom Drey looked at Abel expressionlessly, smiled at Keira in a friendly manner, and said hello softly: "Hello, Miss Wilson. This is a bastard, and it is really difficult for you."

Keira was very surprised. Now there are still people who dare to judge Abel as a jerk. Is this guy really so fierce and fierce?

She didn't know how to respond.

Although she also felt in her heart that Abel was really a jerk in many ways.

But on this occasion, it can't be like this, right?

She immediately looked at Abel, worried that Abel would fly into a rage.

But at this time, she heard Abel say softly: "Uncle Tom is my grandfather's godson, and he used to play with me when I was young. I used to like to draw, that's what he said about me."

"Oh, oh, oh!" Kaila suddenly realized, thinking that it's no wonder that Abel even has a different name.

No wonder Tom Dray dared to call Abel that, and Abel wasn’t angry yet.

It turned out to be a family friend.

"Hmph—quit the Elephant Party, you have disappointed many people. Abel." Tom Drey looked at Abel expressionlessly.

Abel shrugged, waved his hands lightly and said, "Uncle Tom, from my standpoint, I don't think I did anything wrong."

Keira could see that the atmosphere between the two was a little tense, she choked on the words she had planned, and looked at the two quietly holding her breath.

But the imaginary quarrel did not appear, Tom Drey just snorted again, nodded to Keira, then ignored Abel, and walked inside.

When Tom Dray was far away, Abel looked at the curious expression on Princess California's face, and he could only explain a few words.

"Tom Dray's family is also a farmer, and he is from Tarrant County like me. His father and my grandfather have a good relationship. His father is also my father's godfather. But then my father's godfather passed away early, Tom. Dre took a completely different path from my father and grandfather. He himself didn't like my father's way of being a farmer in his early years. He thought my father had no ambitions, and the two were at odds and quarreled many times. It's getting stiffer."

"Oh, when I was young, I really liked drawing and wanted to be a painter. He didn't like this kind of thing either. He wanted to train me to be a gentleman since I was a child. He once wanted to be my godfather. But my father refused. No, because they have a bad relationship."

Abel shrugged, "But he respects my grandfather. Because that's his godfather, and he was also his biggest supporter when he started out in Tarrant and Texas."

There is another aspect that Abel didn't say, that is, when he first came to New York, many people wanted to mess with him but didn't do it, and there were many reasons for their scruples.

One aspect of it is probably related to Tom Dray.

That's why a surreal person like Herbert has always maintained a good relationship with Alex before Abel's full fortune.

Although, Alex Smith is not rich enough, nor is he famous. But Smith really saved a lot of people and contacts in the central area of ​​Texas.

It is not important to say that this kind of thing is important, and sometimes it is quite useful to say that it is not important.

When there is no real conflict of interest, these things are clearly in a state of being quite useful.

This is why Alexander was able to run the Texas Rangers with George later.

Alex has a lot of connections like Tom Drey.

But... For Alex now, the most important contact is actually only one.

That is his grandson - Abel Smith!

Otherwise, if Abel has no skills, he will quit the Elephant Party. If someone like Tom Drey knows about this kind of thing.

This fiery capitol hammer will definitely not give Alex any face, and will definitely make something troublesome for Abel.

Networks are sometimes important, but in this place in the United States, the most important thing is to have strength!

It is only useful if you have strong contacts.

Without strength, even if you are a relative of Rockefeller, you are useless at critical moments.

After that, the guests came one after another.

For example, Deputy Commander Cheney brought his daughter Liz, as well as CLA Director Tenet and other Washington bosses.

In addition to these bigwigs from Washington, the invited Wall Street giants will certainly not be absent.

David Komansky, chairman of the board of directors of Merrill Lynch, was the first Wall Street giant to come.

This can be said to be the Wall Street executive most affected by the Abel Butterfly Effect.

If Abel hadn't appeared, he would have been taken over by Stanley O'Neill, the first black executive on Wall Street, in the parallel time and space.

Unlike now, he not only kept the CEO position. Also because of the downfall of O'Neill, he won the trust of the Merrill Lynch shareholders' meeting and became the chairman.

After that, many of them are Abel's acquaintances.

Like what Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis...

Paulson, chairman of Goldman Sachs...

Lehman Brothers CEO Richard Fuld...

The two CEOs of Morgan Stanley and Jr....

First Citibank...

In addition to these Wall Street giants, there are also some foreign friends like the Mitsui father and daughter.

For example, Mukesh Ambani, the current richest man in the third brother, and his brother Anil Ambani, who has a very tense relationship with him, and so on.

As for Buffett, Bloomberg and the others, they arrived early, and they have already helped to greet the guests and make contact in the venue.

...

As time went on, more and more guests came, and several people walked back and forth on the red carpet. Abel and Keira still welcomed them with elegant and calm smiles, until Rockefeller and Morgan Finally came hand in hand.

The two old men and the little old man have always given Abel a feeling of being inseparable from Mengmeng.

If it weren't for the big age gap between the two, and they are both very traditional WASP old white men.

Abel wondered if these two guys had that tendency.

In fact, Abel misunderstood this aspect.

Rockefeller and Morgan hadn't been together as often as he'd seen.

Eighty percent of the occasions they often appear together are because of Abel's presence.

In other words, it was Abel who was too important for these two people to attach great importance to. So when they appeared in front of Abel, the two of them often appeared together.

"Abel, you are such a shrewd kid. I have to admire you. No wonder you can accumulate so much wealth in such a short period of time. Your timing control is simply a genius."

As soon as he came up, John Chris Morgan praised Abel without hesitation.

To be honest, although tonight's dinner is definitely a feast for many people, after all, it is not an easy task to gather so many big names together.

But John Cleese is obviously not boasting about this.

For a banquet of this level tonight, Morgan can afford it too.

It is another recent thing to let John Chris praise him as soon as he comes up.

Just when Keira was a little surprised in her heart, why John Chris praised Abel so much when he first came up.

Knowing the reason why the little old man said this, Abel smiled and said:

"As a latecomer to Wall Street, I'm very honored to be praised by you, John. But at the beginning, I really just wanted to earn some Canadian dollars. It's just that I didn't expect Ottawa to be so generous, so I have no choice but to be disrespectful."

Abel said with a calm smile, not paying any attention to the deliberate teasing of the little old man John Chris, and the helpless eyes of David Rockefeller, who was next to him with a somewhat stern face.

Thick-skinned, Abel didn't think he would lose to others.

Kayla, who was watching the conversation of the Big Three, didn't know that the reason why John Chris said that when he came up was actually to tease Abel and stimulate David next to him.

What they were talking about was actually a piece of news announced by Canada a few days ago.

In that news, Ottawa's business department announced that it would sell the remaining 20% ​​of Petro-Canada's shares to Pacific Energy at a price 20% lower than the market price.

The reason why Canadians are forced to do this is that as early as a few months ago, Abel began to short the Canadian dollar to attack Canadians.

In order not to cause the Canadian dollar exchange rate to collapse, it will affect Canada's exports and even people's livelihood.

The Canadians made the same choice as the Norwegians when there was nothing they could do about it.

They "recruited" Abel Smith, the largest short seller, and used the shares of Petro-Canada they intended to sell to make Abel withdraw from this attack.

This is what John Chris joked about, because Rockefeller has always wanted the 20% stake in Petro-Canada.

David has been planning for a long time, and the parallel time and space was also in 2004, and these shares were taken by Rockefeller.

Now being intercepted by Abel, David Rockefeller is of course a little unhappy.

Even though he has actually used various methods to hold a very large amount of the other 80% of Petro-Canada's shares.

But seeing the flesh that is about to reach the mouth is cut off, no one will feel comfortable.

All John Cleese wanted was Rockefeller's unhappiness, and Abel's uneasiness.

I just didn't expect Rockefeller to look very unhappy.

Abel didn't look uncomfortable at all.

Although everyone has shaken hands and made peace now, they are even allies.

But whether it's Morgan and Rockefeller, or they and Abel. Everyone used to be rivals, enemies.

In terms of general direction, although everyone is no longer engaged in confrontation and hostility, on the contrary, they will often unite together.

But this kind of daily ridicule, if you can catch it, of course you won't let it go.

Seeing Abel's answer as it should be, John Chris laughed, thinking that you are really thick-skinned.

But the old guy is probably not so happy.

Morgan immediately looked at David beside him.

Sure enough, Rockefeller almost vomited old blood when he heard Abel's words of being cheap and good-looking.

It's hard and I'm in a bad mood. It happened that this was sent out by Ottawa on its own initiative, and Abel didn't even call the name.

Moreover, David's action that has been laid out for so long has not yet started, and from this perspective, it cannot be regarded as Abel grabbing food.

It cannot be regarded as a confrontation, and it did not violate the agreement at that time.

David was so miserable that he had nothing to say.

"Hehe... okay, you're really good... let's go, let's go in together, don't you really want to keep welcoming him?" The old guy finally had no choice but to say angrily.

"You came too slowly, making my feet sore. Let's go, let's go in together."

Abel held Keira, who was smiling next to him, and said softly with a smile.

Even Rockefeller and Morgan had already arrived, and there were no more important guests behind.

Even if there is, he and Keira have been standing here for so long, and they are already tired of standing.

For those who come later, just let the two Davids go to greet them.

It's a bit of a text, the more difficult it is to write later, sorry, there is only one chapter today. Tomorrow three more make up