Pay My ¥1M Debt and I’ll Marry You! Chinese Gold Diggers Try Blind Dates After Stock & Gold Losses

I'm down 100,000 yuan. I started with 500,000 yuan and now I have 400,000 yuan left. I just keep losing. I've never made any money. It's enough to make me cry. The more I think about it, the angrier I get. The more I think about it, the angrier I get. I'm on a trip and I won't even splurge on food, drinks or a nice hotel. Then I lose over 100,000 yuan in a single day. I'm so mad. My stomach hurts. My God, ha. I lost the price of a car in a single day. China's stock market has plunged and people are venting on social media. Many female stock influencers are posting about their losses to draw sympathy. I've lost so much money this month that I'm not even in the mood to update. I have no interest in anything I do every day now. I've lost so much this month that I don't even feel like posting anymore. I don't feel like doing anything these days. I lost another 1 million yuan. About 140,000 US dollars this month. I don't know what to do. I'm running out of money. Peh, peh, peh! Damn, what a jinx. I jinxed myself. A generous guy showed up on my live stream yesterday and I made 3,000 yuan. Then I checked at the opening bell this morning and saw I'd lost 30,000 yuan. I worked for hours to make that money and in a second, I gave the market 10 times as much back. A new group of female stock influencers has emerged in recent years. They draw views by playing up their looks and presenting themselves as stock traders. People online jokingly call them stock divas. The nickname follows a string of similar labels for women who make content about Buddhism, illness, vegetables, cycling, or food delivery. These influencers skip earnings reports and market cycles. They switch between playing a stock market genius who flaunts her wealth and returns to a hapless trader who cries over big losses. The goal is to get tips from wealthy male followers, earn platform payouts, draw people into sell courses, or even lure them into investment scams. It's normal to like me! Of course people like me. I'm pretty and I can trade stocks. I'm interesting and I can trade stocks. I'm funny and I can trade stocks. People in the comments weren't buying it. One wondered how she could call herself a good trader after 10 years of losses. Another said she had everything going for her except her stock trading. As stocks plunged, the carefully crafted image these influencers had built online fell apart. China's A-share market fell across the board again on November 3rd. All three major indexes opened lower. Trading was choppy in the afternoon and losses spread across the market. The Shanghai Composite closed down 0.8% at 3,608.1. The Shenzhen Component Index fell 1.2% to 10,877. The ChiNext Index dropped 2.7% to 2,391.7, slipping below 2,400. The tech. STAR 50 Index slid 3.8% and the Beijing Stock Exchange 50 Index fell 4%. More than 3,300 stocks lost ground. Trading in Shanghai and Shenzhen shrink to 1.7 trillion yuan, about 238 billion US dollars, down about 80.3 billion yuan, which is about 11.2 billion US dollars from the the previous session. As investors stayed on the sidelines. The weakness was already clear in October 2024. The Shanghai Composite fell 6.3% that month and the Shenzhen Component Index dropped 15.9%. Both the ChiNext Index and the STAR 50 Index lost more than 23%. Bloomberg data shows China's stock market lost about 3.5 trillion US dollars or 25 trillion yuan from its May peak through the end of October. The CSI 300 index fell more than 20% from its recent high, putting it in bear market territory. The Star 50 index, which focuses on chip makers and AI companies, fell about 40% in less than four months, wiping out nearly $480 billion in market value. Wow. Wow, there's news of liquidations everywhere. Wow! There are stories everywhere about traders getting wiped out, tech stocks kept plunging today, and Eoptolink, Zhongji Innolight, and TFC Optical Communication all collapsed. Trading groups have been sharing stories about forced liquidations for days. It's awful. Some people lost 70% of the several million yuan they started with. Some accounts worth 10 million yuan or more were forced to sell. There's even talk of a trader in Taizhou who bet on AI computing stocks and went from 30 million yuan, about 4.2 million US dollars, to 300,000 yuan, about 42,000 US dollars. Accounts worth anywhere from a few million to more than 10 million yuan are getting wiped out one after another. Trading with borrowed money can ruin you. As traders who borrow money are forced out, hundreds of millions of everyday investors are under extraordinary stress. The latest figures from regulators put the numbers of individual A-share investors at more than 250 million. That's about one in six people in China. More than 90% of those investors are taking meaningful losses. It's over, the A-share market has crashed. It's over. It's over. A-shares are crashing. What is going on? I just announced yesterday that I was getting into the market. Today, I'm already down 7% to 8%. Something like 100 stocks hit their daily limit on losses, and I only bought my stocks yesterday. How are they down this much already? More than 5,000 stocks fell today. Investors were hit hard in A shares. Gold, the assets many had counted on as a safe haven, also plunged from its highs. I hadn't been feeling well so I hadn't checked gold in two months. I opened the app today and saw it was down to about 26,620 yuan a troy ounce. When was the last time gold was that cheap? I got in during the first half of the year. I was buying at about 37,320, 34,210 and 31,110 yuan a troy So as At 26,620 yuan, I bought more than 16 troy ounces on the spot. you can Then I checked my phone again and it was down to 26,160 yuan, see, I'm about 470 yuan a troy ounce starting below what I had just paid. I got carried away and bought more than 9.6 troy ounces. Then it hit about 25,910 yuan. to speak Even after all that, my average is still above 34,210 yuan a troy ounce. now. Anybody here from the future, anybody living this life over again, just tell me when I'll break even. Is there any hope or am I already sunk? Just give it to me straight. Plenty of other investors bought gold near 37,320 yuan a troy ounce and kept buying on the way down only to sink deeper into losses. Many thought gold would always be a safe haven. But when big investors take advantage of small traders, precious metals can leave them just as exposed as digital assets. I bought gold at 1,200, and now it's 800. That gold you bought at about 37,320 yuan a troy ounce is down to 24,880. The silver you bought at about 995 yuan a troy ounce is down to 435. The apartment you paid more than 2 million yuan, about 280,000 US dollars is worth less than 1 million yuan, about 140,000 US dollars. The car you paid more than 200,000 yuan, which is about 28,000 US dollars for is worth 20,000 yuan, about 2,800 US dollars. The only number that's gone up is your wife's age. She was in her 20s when he married her and now she's in That sums up what's happening to many household finances in China. Homes and cars are losing value. Precious metals are down by about half from their highs. And the cash families count on has all but disappeared in the continuing air share slump. For more than half a year, investors looking for a safety drove gold to records high. People rushed to buy bars and and small gold beads. As prices kept falling, retail buyers who had jumped in near the top found themselves stuck with losses of about half their investment. As those hopes of quick wealth faded, credit card and loan bills piled up, even the once generous men who send money online had little left to give. Some of the stock influencers turned to the dating market. That helped popularize a new phrase, marrying away your debt. Local governments use special purpose bonds to deal with hidden debt. For some heavily indebted traders, marriage looks like a last chance to restructure their finances and pass the debt on to someone else. This year's stock has lost more than $1,000,000. I just want to take a break and reset myself. I lost more than 1 million yuan, about US$140,000 on stocks this year. I thought I'd go into a blind date, get married and do little financial restructuring. It was going pretty well until he heard I traded stocks. He hurried through his meal, paid and left. People online responded with jokes. He understands finance. You're trying to dump your debt on him. He knew you were there to clean him out. Maybe he's looking for someone to pay off his debts too. You're both looking for somebody else. He went in hoping for a backdoor listing, a family, and a way to make money with someone else's resources. Then he did his due diligence and found a bad asset that needed a full write-down. The deal died on the spot and the stock opened at its daily loss limit and stayed there. I've already made up my mind. I'm going to marry someone with my stocks. I've made up my mind. I'm taking my stocks with me into marriage. If I wait until I break even, I'll probably never get married. Many people who gambled away their savings on stocks are looking for a spouse to take on the losses. They see marriage as a way to resolve a financial crisis in one stroke. Some even tell prospective husbands up front that they'll have to pay off the debts from their failed investments. Take a look at the values of contemporary women. Here's what one woman posted about marriage. I owe 120,000 yuan. If someone pays it off, I'll marry him right away. One guy in the comments said, That 120,000 yuan could buy him a different massage every day for a long time. So why marry her? She asked whether a massage therapist was going to build a life with him. Another person said she was looking to take care of herself. Then she said people with millions of yuan in debt still get married. She wanted to know why she couldn't find someone to build a life with when she owed only a little over 100,000 yuan. Another trend online involves getting money from older men. It means dating several well-off people at once under the pretense of romance with the goal of getting money or gifts to cover your own financial shortfall. A lawyer recently took a call that illustrates how this can play out. She dated a few boyfriends and then took 780,000 yuan from them. I was dating three guys at the same time. Over a year, they sent me... 780,000 yuan, about 109,000 US dollars all together. Now they've found out and are accusing me of fraud together. I wasn't trying to scam anyone. I was dating, keeping my options open and looking for someone to marry. You were dating three men at once? Did you legally marry any of them? No, I'm 26 and I don't want to waste time. I want to find a good, dependable guy and get married soon. Dating them at the same time just saved time. So do you see Zhang Shan in the morning, spend the afternoon with Li Shi, and go out with Wang Wu at night? When you were with Zhang Shan, did you ever tell him about the other two? Of course I couldn't tell them, and they never asked. That 780,000 yuan was all gifts they chose to give me while we were dating. I was sweet and considerate, and I made time for them. They wanted to help me with my expenses. I never asked them for money. You never asked? Did you ever mention that you liked a handbag or wanted a new phone when you were chatting? Well, sometimes I wanted something, but I never came out and asked them for it. If I wanted a bag, I might post that it was pretty and that I'd be so happy if someone gave it to me, or I'd say my best friend's boyfriend got her something and she was so lucky. I think couples talk that way. Friends do too, right? They saw what I said and bought the stuff themselves. It worked almost every time. You are dropping hints to get them to give you things. Dating several people at once can be a matter of personal ethics. But if you hide those relationships and use romance to talk people into sending large amounts of money or buying expensive gifts, prosecutors can treat it as romance fraud. Once the amount reaches several hundred thousand yuan, you could be facing criminal penalties. Some people demand that a date pay off their debts. Others take it for granted that older men will give them money. A distorted dating market and a flood of misleading advice online have led many women to see relationships as a shortcut to wealth. A relationship counselor put it this way. The vast majority of ordinary girls indeed use marriage as the first way to live a better life. For most ordinary women, marriage really is the first time they get to live a better life. Everyone's talking. Talking this year about sorting out what's real. So here's what I think. Most of the problems between men and women today come from unrealistic expectations. There's this idea online that any woman deserves a wealthy, generous, understanding man, whatever her judgment or ability to look after herself. It sells a consumer view of marriage under the banner of Feminism. It turns wants into rights and treats whatever the other person gives as something they owe. Marriage is usually two people pooling income, time, and family resources to build a more stable home. A man may be willing to take on more and he still gets to choose carefully who he shares his life with. Few people who expect a big payout for little effort end up doing well. Don't treat a partner as your escape from real life. If what you gain outpaces your ability to handle it, it can undo you. In some private lending and matchmaking circles, marrying away debt has become a calculated financial scheme. Some women look for men to cover their debts and some men who know the loopholes target financially secure women. Stock influencers who have lost their savings and hope marriage will clear their debts can end up walking into a more sophisticated financial trap. Friends in Nanchang, can you believe this? People in Nanchang, listen to this. Men who can't get by are thinking about getting married and women in the same spot are doing it too. I met a client who earns only 4,500 yen and is deep in debt. I asked him how he planned to pay it off. He said he was getting married soon and could pay it all off early once he collected the wedding cash gifts and marriage payments. And the women being targeted have... Excellent jobs at state-owned companies and public institutions. You really have to check someone's background before you marry them. The largest asset merger and acquisition in one's life is marriage. Marriage is the biggest merger of your life and most people go into it with no experience. Plenty of people present themselves as wealthy and promise a lavish wedding. They might even offer to cover the home and all the renovations. What you may never see is a dedicated bank card. They used to take out unsecured loans from several hundred thousand yuan to two million or three million yuan, about 280,000 to 420,000 US dollars. They've made sure the receipts and loan agreements clearly say the money went towards the wedding, the home or household expenses. Under the civil code, even if the loan was taken out before the marriage, strong evidence that it paid for your life together or major family expenses could make it a shared debt. By the time you realize you've been deceived and want a divorce, they may have legally used up your assets. You could lose years of your life and still be stuck with half the debt. Back in China's A-share market, much of the damage traces back to the rush to get everyone trading stocks. The dream of getting rich through real estate had collapsed. Businesses outside finance were making thin profits and households had huge savings with few places to put them. Government messaging and social media personalities touting quick stock market riches helped fuel an all-in rush. Middle-aged actors who had worked for 20 years delivering writers working From dawn to night, small shop owners and young office workers with no financial experience drained savings across their families, maxed out credit cards and borrowed heavily to buy stocks. People thought this was their big chance to rebuild their wealth. They overlooked how the A-share market had operated for more than 30 years. It offered little focus on shareholder returns and one trader's gain often came at another expense. Investors could lose money collectively. More than 200 million ordinary people rushed in, often with enthusiasm and little understanding of the risk. Their life savings gave institutions, certain major shareholders and state-backed funds a chance to sell into the rally and cash out. The rush failed to produce a sustained bull market. More than 30 years after the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges were founded in 1990, the benchmark still hovered between 3,600 and 3,700 points. The rush into stocks left many households with badly damaged finances and the prospect of slipping back into poverty in middle age. One reason A shares have failed to build broad wealth is that profits are so concentrated. Of the 5.4 trillion yuan, about... $756 billion in total market profits. Banks, insurers, and brokerages took in 2.85 trillion yuan, about $399 billion, or more than 52%. Add state-owned energy monopolies in oil, coal, and power And those two groups account for more than 65%. Advanced manufacturers, consumer businesses, and high-tech companies which are expected to drive the transition are left to compete for the smaller share. Most dividends come from state-owned banks and energy giants, where government entities hold 70% to 80% of the shares or more. Most of the payouts go straight into government accounts to plug local budget gaps and pay interest on hidden debt. That money rarely flows back into the stock market as buying demand. A-shares have effectively become a source of cash for local governments trying to manage their debt. Small investors absorb the drop in the share prices after the dividend adjustment and see little benefit from the money flowing through the system. The more than 2,000 companies on the STAR market and ChiNext earned a combined annual profit of just over 300 billion yuan. About 42 billion US dollars. That was less than Industrial and Commercial Bank of China earned on its own and less than one-third of Samsung Electronics' profit. Meanwhile, the earlier AI boom turned into a rush to sell as buyers dried up. There's still no bottom in sight. The whole case for AI stocks has changed. First, it was a shortage of chips. Now it's a shortage of cash. The money to buy computing power has dried up. Big cloud companies in North America are running low on cash. The Federal Reserve is keeping rates high and the dollar cycle is driving everything. Second, orders are growing more slowly. The earnings just don't justify the high valuations. The median valuation for Chinese AI stocks on the STAR market is 50% to 60% above comparable US stocks. The biggest problem now is that liquidity is shrinking while tech stocks are still too expensive. Expectations had soared ahead of proven commercial results. When weak third quarter earnings punctured their optimism. Investors who had piled in with borrowed money were forced to sell, deepening the market's losses. With 3.5 trillion US dollars in market value gone in a matter of months, Chinese regulators rolled out several emergency measures on November 2nd. They made the re-lending program for stock buybacks and larger shareholding permanent and cut its rate to 1%. They also made overnight reverse repos, a regular operation and launched more than 100 billion yuan, about 14 billion US dollars in operations under the securities, funds and insurance companies swap facility or SFISF. But the weighted average overnight interbank rate was only 1.3% in October, so funding was already relatively easy to get. Even so, both the STAR 50 index and the ChiNext index fell more than 23% that month. That points to a deeper problem. Businesses were short on orders and confidence, even though banks had cash available. The low-cost rescue money comes with strict risk controls and political performance requirements. Most of it goes into a handful of their As the dream of quick stock market riches fade, so does the idea that marriage can ease debt. In markets and in everyday life, trying to take shortcuts and pass a risk to someone else can leave people deeper in trouble.