As I grew older, the whispers around me solidified into a label: genius. Teachers praised me, neighbors told my parents I was destined for greatness, and even classmates, though they didn't always understand me, carried the same impression.
One evening, when I was about nine, my father asked me a simple question over dinner:
"What do you want to be when you grow up?"
The answer came to me instantly. I couldn't say billionaire. I couldn't say reborn. But I could tell the truth hidden in plain sight.
"I want to be an investor," I said.
My father raised an eyebrow, surprised but intrigued. "Investor?"
I nodded. "I admire J.P. Morgan."
It was the perfect name. Warren Buffett, the so-called "stock god," wasn't yet famous in the mid-70s, but Morgan was a legend — a name everyone respected. My father smiled faintly, maybe amused, maybe proud. To him, it was just a child's ambition, a phase. But for me, it was the declaration of a lifetime.
From then on, I maintained that persona. To anyone who asked, I repeated it: "I will be an investor." It wasn't strange anymore — it became part of my identity.
I began asking questions. Nothing advanced, nothing suspicious. Just enough to keep the mask of curiosity.
"What is a stock?"
"Why do some prices go up while others go down?"
"Why do companies sell shares?"
My father, patient and supportive, explained in simple terms. He even brought home newspapers and pointed at the tickers, showing me how to follow the movements. To him, it was teaching a son basic financial literacy. To me, it was laying the foundation of an empire.
By the time I was nearing ten, the plan was already clear in my mind.
The 1970s market was sluggish, like winter — slow, gray, uninspiring. But 1985? That would be spring. The bull run was coming, a tide that would lift countless investors into riches. If timed perfectly, millions could be made.
And beyond that, the real jackpot waited: the dot-com bubble. If played correctly, that was the shortcut of shortcuts. A million into a billion in under a decade. That was the wave I intended to ride.
But there was a problem.
I wasn't an engineer. I couldn't invent an iPod, couldn't code the next Microsoft, couldn't design the next semiconductor. My path was narrower. If I wanted wealth, it had to come through markets. And for that, I needed the one thing I didn't yet have: capital.
Fifty thousand dollars. That was my magic number. With fifty thousand in hand by my mid-teens, the door to everything else would open. But what fifteen-year-old could have fifty thousand dollars? None. Unless his parents helped.
So I would need their support. But support needed proof. Proof that I wasn't just a child talking about dreams.
That's when I looked at the world and saw my first opportunity: the Iran–Iraq war.
Wars drove fear. Fear drove money into safe assets. And nothing was safer than gold. When the fighting began, gold prices would rise sharply. If I mentioned this — in careful words, with the innocence of a child who had been "observant" — people would think me a prodigy. A genius.
Not a freak.
At twelve, if I could casually remark, "Gold prices go up in war, because people treat it like a safe asset," then the disguise would be perfect. My parents would marvel, not suspect. They would see me not as a schemer, but as a natural-born investor.
And from there, step by step, the mask and the reality would merge.
---