Hand to mouth?_其他_趣味英语-查字典英语网

Hand to mouth?

- The Press: Tearing down to build up, Time Magazine, May 4, 1959.

2. From the younger generation of super-rich, Liu Yiqian is China’s biggest art collector.

Chinese media have dubbed him “the eccentric Mr Liu” because he wears T-shirts to work and shaves only occasionally, but his investment style suggests he is highly savvy.

As my crew fussed around his office preparing for the interview, Liu appeared unfazed, intently studying a huge screen of stock prices, a cigarette in one hand, and a mug of tea by his side.

Born in 1963 into an ordinary working class family in Shanghai, Liu left school at 14 to help his mother with her handbag business.

Initially, he made the bags which she sold from a stand on the street. But Liu worked out a way of making the bags cheaper than the other street vendors. By undercutting them he outsold them.

It was the beginning of the 1980s, and the earliest roots of China’s move to capitalism were being put in place. Small but significant fortunes were being made.

At the time there was a phrase in Shanghai: “becoming a 10,000 yuan person.” The average wage was 300 yuan per year at that time and the people earning 10,000 in Shanghai were all street traders like Liu.

He became a 10,000 yuan person aged 17. But although his fortune was on the rise, he and his family were still living hand to mouth.

Liu’s big break came when he was 27, and his on-the-job schooling finally proved useful. He was visiting the Shenzhen economic zone to buy materials for bags when he met a former classmate, who told him about a new thing called stock trading.