Original subtitles

- (BELL TOLLING) - (STUDENTS CHATTING QUIETLY)

(STUDENT GIGGLING)

- STUDENT: Oh my God! - (BELL TOLLING)

- School fucking failed her. - CANDACE ALLBRIGHT: Of course.

- I pay all that tuition... - (SIGHS)

...and they don't know what the fuck

- she's up to? - If you tip them enough,

they'll walk her down the aisle for you as well.

Where was their fucking duty of care that night?

Maybe if you'd spent less time with that whore in New York!

Candace, you left me.

(CHUCKLES) Oh! Of course,

that's your cowardly way of figuring it.

You heard that prissy bitch.

One of our kids is fucked in the head.

Why else would they expel her?

This is what happens

when a child is never left wanting.

(SCOFFS) You give her everything except what she needs.

You think your disinterest doesn't affect them?

Even subconsciously?

They need your love and guidance.

They crave it.

Why is it so hard for you to give?

- (OVERLAPPING CHATTER) - ♪ (BROODING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

KENNY KILBANE: (ON SPEAKERPHONE) Guys, I've been pretty pliant,

but risk needs more margin on the Tender position.

My hands are tied.

We stuck to the risk limit that we agreed.

Two hundred and fifty gross leverage.

Yeah, stock is up another seven percent

on Morgan Stanley's turbo bullish preview

of the user uptake data for their new app.

They've heavily beat their projections.

(SPEAKERPHONE BEEPS)

We can't wear this pain. I can't.

You need to post more collateral,

or we'll continue liquidating your other positions.

- (SPEAKERPHONE BEEPS) - What fucking positions?

My positions?

KENNY: European positions this morning.

Your pair trades in the energy and utility names. (SPEAKERPHONE BEEPS)

- (KENNY CONTINUES SPEAKING) - H? Harper.

Those were my positions.

The only ones in our book making any fucking money.

We needed some headroom, okay?

And your longs, hedges, whatever you wanna call them,

are not conviction positions.

And they run counter to the philosophy of this fund.

What's the philosophy? Bet big? Lose the house? (SPEAKERPHONE BEEPS)

- KENNY: ...honestly, only a mother could love them. - Are you fucking margin calling

us or not?

Hey. Spare me the tone, Eric, okay?

I'm nominally a friend, but the margin clerks here,

they make Reinhard Heydrich look laissez-faire, okay?

And you've breached your risk limits.

I bought you a stay of execution.

It's more than I owe you, really.

You're gonna have to post more collateral

in the next 48 hours, 72 at the absolute most,

or I won't be able to stop your man liquidating Tender too.

That, or their share price sees a material sell off,

but the world does not see that company

the way you do, unfortunately.

Gotta bounce, needed back on the desk. Sorry.

- (SPEAKERPHONE BEEPS) - HARPER STERN: Pierre's emailed.

He's asking me to speak at the ALPHA conference.

Some bullshit "Women in Finance" presentation.

More virtue capitalism.

- Seems low priority. - It's not.

Even if he wants you to personally sew a bed net

for every malaria kid in Mali, say yes.

We need all the positive press we can get.

- So, what's the move? - Uh, only one.

Now Dycker's piece has been nixed,

I'm gonna advocate for this until I am blue in the face.

You need to let me go to Accra

and speak to Tender's CFO in Africa.

We keep saying that we have conviction

from fucking where exactly?

- Do you have a plan out there? - A potential itinerary, yes.

All right, I think we owe it

to Sweetpea's work on this for her and I to travel,

and then we can sleep knowing that we did everything we could do.

That is literally all I'm asking...

And high probability the trip's a blank.

Our CIO's on a fool's errand...

- (BUZZING) - ...when the fund is melting down around us.

How do we spin that to Pierre and co?

KWABENA BANNERMAN: Well, Dycker's death is a spooky coincidence.

Like in a straight-to-video kind of way.

- The world is made of them. - ♪ (BROODING MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪

I don't understand how Rishi

happened to be acquainted with the journalist?

Well, he sold drugs to him, apparently.

KWABENA: And he's facing manslaughter charges.

Mm. I'm glad he found his way home.

KWABENA: The fuck does that mean?

JD STERN: (OVER PHONE) I'll call when I know more.

- SWEETPEA GOLIGHTLY: His behavior means he's found... - JD: Speak soon.

...his way to the most rational place for him.

And I speak from trauma and experience, alright?

ERIC TAO: He was a very retrograde human being.

KWABENA: I know someone who isn't me has,

on occasion, frequented the onion router,

and it seems off to me

that coke procured off the dark web

would have fentanyl in it.

ERIC: It just seems sloppy.

SWEETPEA: Well, Rishi was fucking sloppy,

wasn't he? Harper, I'm booking us

on the next BA to Accra.

Um, I... (HESITATES)

Maybe I should stay.

As Eric said, it's, um, responsible for me to stay.

Sure, whatever. Um...

You don't have to follow through,

but my plans are unchanged.

ERIC: You good?

It's just my landlord. It's an, um,

unpaid service charge on my apartment.

- (METAL CLANGING) - (CHAIR SCRAPING)

ERIC: Sweets, you think it's wise for you to go alone?

KWABENA: Eric, it's not Live and Let Die

on the ground there, you know?

Fine. Maybe you should go with her.

Yeah, maybe I should. What fucking use am I here?

Someone has seen it appropriate

to unilaterally liquidate my book.

Do you know, um, Accra well?

KWABENA: Uh... (SIGHS) I used to go four times a year.

Then once every four years. Now, sort of never.

Big extended family. I'm not sure what use I'd be.

I think you should both leave.

(SIGHS) Um...

If that's what you wanna do.

That's my final decision.

(BREATHES SHAKILY)

♪ (MUSIC FADING) ♪

ERIC: Eat something.

HARPER: I'm not hungry.

The fuck's gotten into you?

You joined this fund to run ops.

That was your experience.

Keeping the music playing is an operational issue.

This fund put one position up in lights,

staked its reputation on it.

That position

was your choice,

and remains so.

It's not worked.

What are our options?

Pull back our gross exposure.

Get back inside our risk limits.

Liquidating the other names in Kwabena's book did that.

It is not going to appease them enough.

How'd you think your head trader took you

expunging his positions without consent?

Those the actions of a good boss?

I'm sorry, you wanna run that sentence back to me,

or shall I point out

every hypocritical fucking syllable?

An equity infusion?

Emergency cash raise?

We scraped the fucking barrel

getting dollars in the first place.

There's no "why now?" for fresh blood.

Okay, what about a Hail Mary? Or a...

a leveraged binary trade?

I'm not letting you play craps, okay?

I've given you enough mileage.

My ten million first loss is already on the pyre.

You think if you leave your girls some money,

they're gonna love you?

Harper.

How's that even an appropriate segue?

Give me a fucking break.

You have become too timid.

♪ (TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

Fuck... (STAMMERS)

Fuck am I even doing here with you anyway?

- Fucking honestly. - I dunno.

Could ask myself the same question

considering your experience has amounted to fucking naught.

You are not useful to me!

Oh, that's what this is, is it?

What else could it be, Eric?

What else do you need from me?

You have no idea how lucky you are

that you have people that expect your love.

No, no.

Demand your love.

And you don't feel worthy of it, so you can't give it.

Nothing between us is gonna fix that for you.

(DOOR OPENS, CLOSES)

♪ (TENSE MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪

(TRAFFIC WHIZZING)

(HORN HONKING)

(PHONE RINGING, BUZZING)

(RINGING STOPS)

DOLLY: Hey, honey, I'm in the bar.

- Are you coming down? - Don't call this number again.

♪ (MELLOW TECHNO MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

Uh, what's the plan for today?

Um, I had a Zoom set up

with Tender's Tony Day last week.

I updated him this morning

and said that we could change to an in-person meeting

as I have other management meetings

bringing me to Accra.

We tell Day that we're trying to get under Tender's bull case

and think stock has further to climb.

I also want to visit Tender's last acquisition

before their biz pivot. SwiftGC.

Hmm. Well, personally, I think you're digging for gold in a sandbox.

(CHUCKLES)

All right, Erin Brockovich. (CHUCKLES)

Look, I'm very happy

to not see you for the duration of this trip.

♪ (MUSIC INTENSIFIES) ♪

(SNIFFS)

- ♪ (MUSIC FADING) ♪ - (CLOTHES THUDDING SOFTLY)

(SIGHS)

You'd think these guys would clean my shirts for free

when I pay a hundred grand a month to live here.

(SNIFFS) And stop Kwabena ordering food to the room.

How many chicken wings can one person eat?

Why are you up so early?

You given yourself the night

to come up with an appropriate fucking apology?

My mom died.

My brother called me from New York yesterday

to say there'd been an accident. (INHALES DEEPLY)

She just went overnight.

Christ.

I'm sorry.

You can talk about it to me.

(SNIFFS)

That's the point. Like, I don't know what to say.

I don't even know how to feel.

(SOFTLY) She was awful to me.

And she tortured my brother so badly,

she fucked him up to the point

where he was incapable of loving me.

And it was his love when I was young...

That's the only love I remember.

Wha... what else do you remember?

- Resentment. - ERIC: Hmm.

Actually... (BREATHES SHAKILY)

- I think it's hate, actually. - ERIC: Hmm.

They can be good motivational principles,

trust me.

Until they're not. (SOBS)

Until they're not.

(SIGHS)

She fell down the stairs running for an Amazon delivery.

(SCOFFS)

- You're joking. - I'm not.

Uh...

I know this...

this kind of pales in comparison,

but my daughter got herself expelled.

Excluded, whatever.

They, uh,

threw her out of a school for little monsters

for being a little monster.

What did she do?

Uh...

She was the ringleader of a group

that catfished a peer.

Pretended to be a boy.

Made this girl travel for a date,

encouraged her to dress provocatively...

took pictures of her when nobody showed.

Meticulous fucking cruelty.

HARPER: That's pretty dark.

So were the pictures. Child dressed like a hooker...

waiting.

My brother and I were very problematic

at her age too.

Imagine swallowing such cut-and-dry evidence

of your failure as a father.

What I feel for my kids should be celestial,

metaphysical, but instead it's...

"What have you done for me today?"

I know when I'm with them,

it's the only place I should be.

♪ (SOFT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

But I... I don't wanna be there. (CHUCKLES)

It's... it's a... a sick thing

to look at an innocent kid and think,

"Yeah, I'm an animal that works on attention,

and no, no, no,

you don't hold mine."

It feels like...

a betrayal of something very ancient.

It's surely not lost on you that you picked

a hyper-transactional career

where the transactions aggregate to zero.

They don't make me feel substantial.

They really should.

I'm very fucking annoyed at how empty I feel.

ERIC: Hmm.

That this whole fucked-up situation

with the fund is denying me my grief.

Oh, Harp, you are grieving.

Do you know, I ran through all these... (SNIFFLES)

...scenarios in my head of what it would be like

to see her again.

What'd you imagine?

That she would have no choice but to fall to her knees

and beg for my forgiveness.

Because I had become fucking undeniable.

♪ (MUSIC BUILDING) ♪

You are undeniable.

(SOBS)

♪ (“MOTHER AND CHILD” BY SONNY OKOSUNS PLAYING) ♪

- (TRAFFIC WHIZZING) - ♪ Mother, you are my soul ♪

♪ You are my soul ♪

(INDISTINCT CHATTER) ♪ Mother, teach me how to smile 'Cause I'm still a child ♪

♪ Mama, you are my life... ♪

SWEETPEA: Hi, I'm looking for SwiftGC.

RECEPTIONIST: Over there.

♪ (SONG CONTINUES PLAYING OVER SPEAKER) ♪

I'm looking for the office.

Over there. (SIGHS)

Google doesn't have, uh, a number attached.

Do you have one, by any chance?

I can, um... (CLEARS THROAT)

(ZIPPER WHOOSHING)

(BANK NOTES RUSTILING)

...dash you 20 dollars?

- ♪ You are my angel ♪ - ♪ You are my love ♪

♪ I love you more Than anything ♪

♪ Oh yes, I am a child ♪

♪ Mother and child ♪

♪ Mother and child ♪

♪ Mother and child ♪

♪ (SINGER VOCALIZING) ♪

- (CLEARS THROAT) - ♪ Mother and child ♪

(ANSWERING MACHINE BEEPS)

AUTOMATED VOICE: Hello, you've reached Tender.

Your call is important to us.

- Please continue to hold... - ♪ ("ORINOCO FLOW" BY ENYA PLAYING) ♪

...while we find the next available operator.

♪ (OMINOUS MUSIC OVERLAPPING) ♪

- (INDISTINCT CHATTER) - ♪ (LIVELY AFROBEAT MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

Hi, we have an 11:00 a.m. with Tony Day.

Um, Mostyn Asset Management.

Okay, if you sit, I'll call up

- and let him know you're here. - Thank you.

Is the AC not working?

RECEPTIONIST: No, sorry.

- Um... (CLEARS THROAT) - (KWABENA SIGHS)

I went to SwiftGC and there's no office there.

Their supposed direct line just redirects you

to Tender's Dublin call center.

KWABENA: Is it that strange that you call a company

and their parent company answers?

(SIGHS DEEPLY)

EMPLOYEE: Come, come, come, come and see the price tags.

- (EMPLOYEE SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY) - (TELEPHONE RINGING)

How long has he kept us waiting?

It's closing in on two hours now.

Hi, sorry, is his meeting still overrunning?

RECEPTIONIST: It is, I'm afraid.

May be a power move.

- Um, Mr. Day? - Hello.

SWEETPEA: Hi, Mostyn Asset Management.

Pleasure. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to blow you off.

Yeah, not a problem. Do you have 15 minutes?

TONY DAY: I can give you five.

SWEETPEA: We're just doing a little field work reconnaissance

to help our investment case in Tender,

among with some other equity ideas in the region.

We've been buy and hold for some time.

Yeah, you and everyone else.

Although, uh, being a stock market darling,

thank you, comes with its own challenges.

I mean, I... I guess they must look after you,

expecting you to put roots down so far away from home?

Couldn't they have given the job to a local?

(IN TWI)

(IN ENGLISH) Um, would you mind fleshing out your plan

to migrate users

from the payment processor acquisition suite

to the new app?

Actually, I would just love more granularity

on your local acquisitions,

'cause the, um,

the diversity of them really piqued my interest.

Uh, payment processors, text-to-pay, prepaid cards.

What's the unifying principle there?

♪ (TENSE MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

What other equity opportunities

were you looking at in the region?

You said you had other ideas

that you were circling locally to invest in.

Mm-hmm.

Fan Milk.

Consumer goods.

MTN.

- Wow. That's dull. - KWABENA: Hmm.

- (CHUCKLES) - (SWEETPEA CHUCKLES)

Defensive, transparent revenue streams.

We don't like risk.

Great. Well, um,

if you wanna tour or transport out of the city,

do let me know. There's much to see.

Thank you so much for your time.

Um...

you know, you can just... You can call me

if you like.

If you just... (CHUCKLES) ...feel like talking.

KWABENA: I get the feeling nobody's asked him many questions.

SWEETPEA: I reverse-image searched that novelty check pic

and it links to an article about SwiftGC's acquisition.

It's a curious detail about who did it.

KWABENA: A local boutique investment bank?

No, SwiftGC instructed a lawyer.

Is that that curious? I assume that happens a lot here.

Well, how curious it is

depends on the size of the deal in question

and the size of the legal operation,

does it not?

I've booked an appointment with the lawyer

and told him that we work for MergerMarket

and we're meeting anyone involved

in M&A deals in the territory.

Sorry, uh,

- Mr. Samuels, is it? - Oh, call me Lawyer.

(LAUGHS)

- My name is Lawyer. - Oh. (LAUGHS)

LAWYER SAMUELS: It's not uncommon here.

Although I'm not sure how often that kind

of nominative determinism works out. (LAUGHS)

By example, I was christened "Dog-Fucker" Bannerman. (LAUGHS)

SWEETPEA: Ooh.

Um, may I ask how you divined SwiftGC's valuation?

LAWYER: SwiftGC is a high-growth company.

It's not uncommon for comparables

to be valued at ten, even 20 times revenue.

The mobile pay sector has boomed

since the Bank of Ghana relaxed the regulatory environment.

Do you have much other experience

- in 50-million-dollar M&A deals? - I have an accountant.

And, as I said,

an expert valuation advisor I've worked with for 30 years.

A regulatory advisor. A tax guy.

I could go on.

And how did the fee structure work?

- Excuse me? - SWEETPEA: How were you paid?

♪ (LIVELY AFROBEAT MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

I have been nothing but polite. That is not a polite question.

And how is it relevant to your database?

KWABENA: You know, you didn't need to be rude to him

just 'cause he straight-batted all your questions.

Nothing about that guy and his operation

was commensurate with the size of the deal

that Tender did with SwiftGC.

You're telling yourself that to bend the facts

to what you want to be true, all right?

I mean, he said it himself. It's Africa.

Just 'cause it's different doesn't make it wrong.

Let me put this as delicately as I fucking can.

How much do you actually know about Africa?

You can stop with this, like, prodigal son gimmick.

The answer's probably alcohol.

STREET HAWKER: Original iPhone with iPhone charger.

KWABENA: What, materially, changes in the world if at the bottom of the barrel,

these guys are bent and we prove it?

- I mean, does the world improve? - ♪ (LIVELY MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪

You know, being as glib as you are

is actually charmless.

You think it is charming, but it is charmless.

I have given this my full fucking attention,

and that is a finite resource. That is why the outcome matters.

BAR PATRON: Who keeps drinking my drink?

This is Guinness, not the blood of Jesus.

- Lord have mercy. - I mean, yeah, yeah. I guess you're probably right.

This is probably just like a big 'ole fucking distraction

and like a fucking waste of my time.

KWABENA: Oh, come on. Don't say that.

Look, I'm just saying we should probably tell someone

if we're on the verge of eliminating

all financial fraud in perpetuity

and delivering equitable economic outcomes for all.

BACKPACKER: Your turn!

SWEETPEA: Well, between us, I need this short to work.

Before I took Harper's offer,

I interviewed at multiple places.

I couldn't get a job.

You can imagine why.

Yeah, that was a tough thing to happen.

Keep moving forward.

Let the distance grow between me and the event,

and just let time do the work.

When I think of those

pink-faced, fat-neck losers laughing at me...

(LAUGHS) God,

so much disrespect for your audience.

You should run a movie studio.

Well, the guy who outed me,

he got his in a sort of roundabout way.

"In a roundabout way"?

Rishi? You know it was him?

I think certain things in life make sense.

And your stomach is probably right,

separating theory and fact.

♪ ("TRUE" BY SPANDAU BALLET PLAYING IN BACKGROUND) ♪

Do your family know?

What did they make of it?

♪ (BACKPACKERS SINGING IN BACKGROUND) ♪

Well, I thought I was close to my mum.

Um... I was. I mean, I am. I am.

Like, she's my confidante, you know?

And then this happened, and she knows about it,

and she just pretends like it didn't.

And, like, I'm waiting and waiting

for her to say something about it, and she just doesn't.

And, like, yeah, that just, like, broke my heart.

♪ (KARAOKE VERSION OF "STEAL AWAY" BY ROBBIE DUPREE PLAYING) ♪

- BACKPACKER 1: Hey! - Come on!

You said you'd come! Come pick the next song.

All right, I'm gonna lay this shit on thick, okay?

Make me a market on how many of these punters fuck off

- when I start singing. - (LAUGHS)

BACKPACKER 1: Come and sing with us!

BACKPACKER 2: Come on! Hurry up!

KWABENA: (IN GHANIAN ACCENT) One second, one second, I'm coming.

♪ Come on and hold me ♪

- ♪ Just like you told me... ♪ - ♪ (BACKPACKERS SINGING ALONG) ♪

- (PHONE VIBRATING) - ♪ (SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

TONY: Hello, Miss Golightly.

Hi.

TONY: You're almost as memorable as your name.

Tell me, are you a compulsive liar,

or was this a one-off?

- ♪ Into the night ♪ - ♪ Into the night ♪

ALL: ♪ I know it ain't right ♪

TONY: Why did you lie?

I looked you up on the FCA register

and then I called your former employer.

A man in your position must know that there is a vocal minority

who believe Tender's share price to be an illusion.

I don't know if you're aware

of the growing speculation in the press.

You mean Jim Dycker at FinDigest?

He telegrammed me. Yeah, he was, uh...

Yeah, he was supposed to visit us.

T...

to get you on the record?

TONY: Well, how should I know his intention

if he never followed through?

Were you in contact with his editor Mr. Burgess?

Dycker mentioned that he could sketch out,

uh, a couple of...

pathways...

for me.

- Would you know about those? - Pathways for what?

Well, how should I know, Miss Golightly?

I never met him.

(WAVES CRASHING)

You know that he passed away?

- ♪ (MUSIC BUILDING) ♪ - Wasn't aware.

Where are you now?

SWEETPEA: Auntie Freda's in Osu.

If you don't want to talk on the phone.

TONY: It's not a violent city,

but the beach can get quite dangerous at night.

♪ (MUSIC SWELLING) ♪

- ♪ (“EYES WITHOUT A FACE” BY BILLY IDOL PLAYING) ♪ - ♪ Now I close my eyes ♪

♪ And I wonder why I don't despise ♪

♪ Eyes without a face Got no human grace ♪

♪ Your eyes without a face ♪

- (LAUGHS) - (CROWD CHEERING)

♪ (KWABENA CONTINUES SINGING IN DISTANCE) ♪

- (FAUCET STOPS RUNNING) - ♪ (OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

KAWABEN: (MUFFLED) Whoo!

Sorry, this is the ladies.

Did you not hear me? This is the fucking ladies!

- (GASPS) - (GRUNTS)

♪ (MUSIC INTENSIFIES) ♪

(WHIMPERS)

(GROANS, YELLS)

- (GROANS) - (LOUD THUD)

(SWEETPEA SNIFFLES)

(GRUNTS SOFTLY)

♪ (OMINOUS MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪

(BREATHES SHAKILY)

(GROANS)

KWABENA: ♪ Got no human grace Your eyes without a face ♪

♪ Face, face, face... ♪

- Oh, shit! - (MICROPHONE THUDS, SCREECHES)

Do you think you were, like, targeted?

SWEETPEA: Tony Day called me before it,

so you fucking tell me!

- Slow down. - (SOFTLY) Fuck!

I'm so fucking jacked up right now.

I'm... I'm gonna... I will go to fucking war.

I will run a fucking train on them.

Are you sure it's not broken?

(SIGHS)

- I love my nose. - No, no, I know. I know.

I know. It's a good nose. It's a really good nose.

BAR PATRON: Let's drink beer and make some bad choices.

KWABENA: Thank you.

♪ (MELLOW MUSIC PLAYING OVER SPEAKERS) ♪

Can you stop fucking around

and just admit that you've seen my tits?

Okay, cool. Fine. Yes. Fuck it. Yes, I saw it.

- Did you like it? - Oh, my...

Sweetpea, what are we doing?

Well, did you like it?

(LAUGHS) I don't... I don't know what the right answer is.

Honesty. Honesty.

Okay, well, I mean, I didn't not like it.

(BAR PATRON SPEAKING INDISTINCTLY)

Is Harper a good fuck?

Oh, why? 'Cause crazy girls are good in bed?

I think that that is reductive, and misogynistic,

- and often true. - Yeah. Oh, no, I agree.

I was just, like, projecting what you think.

Did you wank to my Siren videos?

Oh, fucking hell, man. What?

Did you jerk off to it? Are you a porn addict?

A porn add... I mean... (SIGHS) I guess?

Like most men who grew up with the internet.

Like, I can see whoever,

do whatever to whoever, whenever.

I want to build a picture of the men who've seen me.

Sweetpea, you chose to put it online.

I was fucking 19. It's money.

Do you watch porn?

Like a lot of women who grew up on the internet, yeah.

What'd you make of that bird who got tag-teamed

by a thousand yoots in shiesties?

Yeah. More power to her.

Oh, come on, you don't believe that shit.

Oh, fuck pathologizing it, you know? Fuck Freud.

There doesn't always have to be a why.

Yeah, that shit's bad for the soul.

And good for the body. What do you like?

(LAUGHS) Now, that is a question nobody gets an honest answer to.

- I said what do you like? - (LAUGHS)

Okay. You made me say this.

Oh, fuck it, I feel like such a traitor.

(CLEARS THROAT) Uh, forgive me, Dr. Umar.

I like...

premium calcium.

Small, blonde, White women.

Yeah, I know. I know, I'm a cliché.

- Look, sue me. - (CLEARS THROAT)

Okay, but... But... I also like to be held.

You're a fucking corny cunt. Do you know that?

(KWABENA LAUGHS)

But yeah, I guess, uh...

some things are only attractive because you can't have them.

(LOCK BEEPS)

Do you wanna put the key in the...

light?

Actually...

don't.

Can you stay for a bit?

I'll be... I'll be just next door.

Just shut the fucking door.

- (GRUNTS) - (MOANS) Pull my fucking hair.

(MOANING) Oh, fuck. Harder.

- KWABENA: Fuck! - (MOANS)

(BOTH MOANING)

(BOTH PANTING)

(SOFTLY) Oh my God.

(BOTH CHUCKLING)

(DOOR OPENING)

- (DOOR CLOSING) - (FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING)

ERIC: Oh, shit. I... I...

I didn't realize you were here already.

Any update from Accra?

HARPER: Kwabena didn't sound optimistic. (SIGHS)

Then they both went dark.

I feel like we're running out of time.

I have an idea.

Source more margin from another prime broker.

Can't do that in our precarious state.

Okay, but what if we don't tell them

about our state?

- Our financials. Our exposure. - ♪ (SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

We'll just tell them that we fell out

with our prime broker,

that they missed out on a buzzy fund.

Whatever it takes to...

get some fast cash.

They'll ask for documents.

And we'll give them documents

that read the way they wish them to.

Bogus financials?

What happens if Tender continues to defy gravity?

We're double leveraged. What, we get two margin calls?

And open another ersatz fucking line?

Throw a third in for shits and giggles.

That's not us losing the house, you know.

It's fraud, conspiracy, racketeering.

Why are we holding ourselves

to any ethical standard when they have none?

Why would we invite potential prosecution

when nothing has materially changed

on what we can prove on Tender? It's brainless.

We're going to lose the war

because they are willing to fight dirty and we're not.

ERIC: Harper.

The thing's lost.

As your co-partner,

my position is we liquidate our Tender position

and find the least painful way

of boarding this whole thing up.

♪ (BROODING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

(LIVELY CHATTER)

(PILLS RATTLE)

They're for your face.

Let's just forget that this happened, okay?

What happened?

I was fucked up.

So, you do always need a why.

(CHUCKLES SOFTLY)

KWABENA: Okay, so look, I'll be the first to admit,

I didn't really come here with a whole lot of belief

in it solving the trade's problem,

but while you were sleeping, I did a bit more digging. Okay?

Apparently, Tender acquired SwiftGC from GoldSalt Media.

It was a tiny subsidiary in a suite of companies

- owned by a media conglomerate. - I knew that.

(HESITATES) Okay, well,

GoldSalt Media's chairman died recently,

and his scions are jockeying to cut up his financial corpse.

- Um, Murdochs in Kente. - ♪ (DYNAMIC TECHNO MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

God, how long have you been up? (CHUCKLES SOFTLY)

- Um, so what's the point? - KWABENA: Well, the British

sought to civilize the Gold Coast.

They didn't think enslavement was enough

to bring us closer to God.

They also saw fit to import buggery

and emotional retardation.

- Sorry, what? - Boarding schools.

- Oh. - Okay, so my auntie,

who's not really my auntie but, you know,

she went to Achimota with a certain Mrs. Mensah.

Now, Mrs. Mensah is mourning her father's death.

And her father just so happens to be the erstwhile chairman

of GoldSalt Media.

Yeah. Ghana's very small at the top.

Can you flesh out

your connection to SwiftGC for me?

Eight of us squabbling over his legacy.

I say it's not big enough to warrant a dispute.

SwiftGC was a chunky deal, right? (CHUCKLES SOFTLY)

Yes. But it's more of a real estate dispute.

The land the office is on.

But Tender paid 50 million dollars

for SwiftGC, right?

What?

(LAUGHING)

If we had 50 million dollars, it would be a total bloodbath.

But the check says 50 million dollars, does it not?

You can write whatever nonsense you want on them.

Doesn't mean it's true.

Fifty?

For a tiny company? Lord have mercy.

Thank you so much for the tea. Can we see the business?

It's only listed as a PO box online.

♪ (DRAMATIC TECHNO MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

(METAL GATE RATTLING)

♪ (MUSIC RECEDING) ♪

- (WHISPERS) Look. - (WHISPERS) Fifth floor.

Why are we whispering?

♪ (SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

♪ (MUSIC CONCLUDES) ♪

Who are you?

Sorry, we're just looking. Do you know of Tender?

Huh? Tender?

- Do you know Tender? - (TOILET FLUSHING)

(SECURITY GUARD 1 GRUNTS)

- Ah, Tender? - SECUIRTY GUARD 2: Mm-hmm.

Who hired you, SwiftGC? Tender? Why are you here?

- Uh, squatters. - Uh, squatters.

(SCOFFS)

- (PHONE LINE RINGING) - ♪ (OMINOUS MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

(TELEPHONE RINGING)

- ♪ ("ORINOCCO FLOW" PLAYS) ♪ - AUTOMATED VOICE: Hello, you’ve reached Tender.

- Your call is important to us... - What are we looking at?

A facade.

Say we prove Tender isn't what it says it is.

We get the surrogate joy of saying,

"Your identity is bullshit, you're a fake."

And what?

We temporarily get to live in the illusion

that we ourselves are built on firmer ground?

Well, crucially, we're not lying to the world

to profit off it.

That feels much closer to the truth of my life

than anything else I've said to myself.

(SPEAKERPHONE RINGING)

(SIGHS)

- (RINGING CONTINUES) - ♪ (SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

- (SPEAKERPHONE BEEPS) - Sweetpea?

- SWEETPEA: The thing is nothing! - What?

- SWEETPEA: Put me on speaker. - You... You are. Go.

SWEETPEA: The thing is nothing.

Okay. All right. Can you explain?

Dycker's payment laundry thesis suggested

that Tender's high frequency of acquisitions

was to circumvent local decency and gambling laws, right?

But what if something else

was motivating their indiscriminate spending?

Let's say you claim to be a fast-growing,

highly revenue-generative company, but it is only a claim.

Fake profits leads to fake cash, so what do you have to do?

You have to deploy said fake cash.

Why? Because the cash reserves are the first thing

that an auditor looks at. But how do you account

for the cash balance not being there?

You say, "Oh, I've already spent it."

But Tender are lying about the value

of what they're buying out here because juicing it up

fuels the facade of aggressive growth

and then deploys said fake cash.

It’s a Potemkin village...

They paid 50 million dollars for an empty room.

Why? Because they didn't. (CHUCKLES)

SwiftGC has no users, there is no revenue,

and there is no 50 million dollars.

That's what their book says, but it's cosmetic.

They probably paid three cents on the dollar, if that,

and then knocked it back with bribes at local level

to make it look like many multiples more.

Photo ops, novelty checks, it's all surface.

The cash can never sit still.

It doesn't even need to be real

if it's hotfooting from one acquisition to another.

Always too short a stay to be seen.

They can always point to its next destination.

Correct. The opaque structures,

the complex web of subsidiaries, the Africa of it.

They're probably so brazen,

they think people are too lazy to do the footwork

- to actually knock on the door. - Well, guess what?

Uh, I knocked on the fucking door, bitch.

Each stage of Tender's pre-pivot is all overinflated.

I... Each lie relies on the next.

Fake users drives fake revenue, which drives fake cash,

which then must be deployed on acquisitions,

which accounts for more fake users

- and more fake revenue. - It's an Ouroboros.

Sure, whatever the fuck that is. (CHUCKLES)

It is a feedback loop of fakery.

That is why their profits never suffered

after the U.S. gambling legislation came in,

and why Whitney could cull Siren

without a second thought about the bottom line.

Tender started as a payment processor.

Yeah, and it became a bank to hide the fact

that it was never a successful payment processor.

It was a phantom.

(SOFTLY) The thing was nothing.

- So, we can corroborate this? - Did you get photos of SwiftGC?

KWABENA: Yes. Yes, we did.

And Dycker's source is here and I think

that we can make him the motherlode.

He wants to whistleblow?

SWEETPEA: He wants some pathways

to understanding what that might look like.

Un-fucking-believable work, Sweetpea.

Yeah, I quite agree.

Keep us bang up to date.

- (LAUGHS) - ♪ (JUBILANT TECHNO MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

(BOTH SCREAMING, LAUGHING)

- Whoo! - (LAUGHS)

Okay. How do we present this?

And how fast and wide can we disseminate it?

We don't have irrefutable evidence.

We need the informer.

We don't need the world to believe us,

just enough investors with enough capital.

♪ (SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

What if I go to Pierre's conference

and instead of talking about women in finance,

I talk about something else entirely? We don't need proof.

Why?

Because we finally have a compelling story to tell.

(PHONE LINE RINGING)

EDWARD BURGESS: Burgess.

Mr. Burgess. Hi. I’m Sweetpea Golightly.

You're what?

SWEETPEA: I'm very sorry for the loss of your colleague.

I work for an investigative hedge fund. SternTao.

Yeah, I've heard of you, unfortunately.

SWEETPEA: I've opened a potential line

of communication with Jim Dycker’s source

here in Accra who he’d planned to meet.

BURGESS: Yeah, before Tender muzzled us.

Are there any protections that you can offer him

as a public body?

I mean, there was a whistleblower directive,

but we're not covered by that anymore

because doombrain mugs falsely incentivized

other doombrain mugs to vote us out of Europe.

SWEETPEA: What else can incentivize him?

Well, I mean, what vectors can you hit him on?

"Doing the right thing"?

I mean, that's largely bullshit to human ears.

Relief from the burden of the lie, relief from threat

from other perpetrators of the lie.

Relief from prosecution?

I... I say this with respect,

but these sources tend to be incredibly sensitive

given what's on the line, yeah?

They require a special bond, trust established through time.

It's a gentle, protracted process.

It's not best led by a person

who stands to be financially compensated

if the source decides to talk.

- Ms. Golightly? - I'm here.

You think Jim was right about these guys?

He was more right than he knew. Speak soon.

- (CLEARS THROAT) - So?

How do we play it?

We snooker him.

♪ (MUSIC FADING) ♪

- TONY: Um, I’ll call you back. - (TELEPHONE RINGING IN DISTANCE)

So under-qualified and so overpaid.

- And that was the lure, right? - (CHAIR CLANGS)

It was too good to be true

because actually it wasn't fucking true.

(TV VOLUME INCREASING)

(QUIETLY) Shut the fuck up.

SWEETPEA: And now the hook is in your gut

and you have two outsiders walking into your office

saying... (WHISPERS) ...we know.

Well, I'm not on the hook for anything.

Because at close yesterday my Tender equity

- was worth 80 million dollars. - At what point did this start?

Did this start with juicing the user numbers

for the funding round, or was it the IPO?

You know, how many people are complicit in this?

God, it must have been exhausting to live

with that compounding growth.

Each fat lie relying on the next.

I mean, I don't think there's a more tired man on Earth right now.

Yeah, and you’re the second most tired man at Tender.

Has Halberstram ever threatened you?

No, hmm.

Pay enough people to follow top-down orders

and then pay them some more to look the other way.

I bet these people here

don't even think of themselves as accessories.

In the room, the Africans exchange the bribes

while the White men talk.

Was every acquisition as empty as SwiftGC?

Tony, you assume that someone is listening to you,

and watching you. If it’s not Halberstram, who?

- (ANCHOR SPEAKING ON TV) - Assume?

You know?

(WHISPERS) I want to know

exactly how I am able to minimize my liability

before I make any kind of disclosure.

And I want counsel before any of that.

Okay, we'll fly you to London, buy you a ticket,

no trail to you.

Introduce you to Edward Burgess,

formalize a path of protection through FinDigest.

Yeah, but what have you got without me?

The board, the government, the auditors, the investors,

the research analysts,

they’ve got no incentive to believe you,

so they won’t. They'll all say more conjecture that you guys,

- you're paid to believe is fact. - Do you wanna answer to us,

or do you wanna answer to law enforcement?

Do you ever get the feeling

you’re a little bit above your fucking station here?

Never in my fucking life, sir.

- You fancy paying for my nose job too? - (CHUCKLES)

‘Cause we can add actual bodily harm

to your list of charges.

It's not something that happens overnight.

No, this is your window to potentially being exculpated.

You're salivating over the speed of it all, aren't you?

Who actually...? Genuinely, who fucking cares

what incentivizes the truth?

You can be a victim in this, not a perpetrator.

If you wanna be punished like a perpetrator,

that is fine with me.

Or, we can engineer your flight

and start telling the story of your victimization.

This is your choice.

♪ (BROODING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

(TV CUTS OFF)

I'll consider.

Thanks for coming in.

♪ (MUSIC FADES) ♪

She's... She’s hollowed out.

I'm not sure what lesson we can teach her

she hasn't learned from it already.

Mind if she stays over?

- She's exhausted. - Mmm.

Why don’t you stay too? You must be beat.

Stay.

- You sure? - ERIC: Of course.

Take the... Take the bed with her.

Okay.

♪ (SOFT INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

I just wanted to say

don’t mistake regret for love.

The girls won’t.

(SNIFFS, GRUNTS)

(BREATHES DEEPLY)

♪ (MUSIC CONTINUES) ♪

(PHONE LINE RINGING)

Hey, it's me.

♪ (BROODING MUSIC PLAYING) ♪

(SCOFFS)

You always have a room here?

DOLLY: On standby.

ERIC: Hey.

Make me feel big.

Yes, Daddy.

♪ (MUSIC CONCLUDES) ♪

(GASPS) Oh my God.

- Sorry. - (SWEETPEA SIGHS)

Oh, God, it's much worse than he said it is.

Sorry, I know you said you didn’t wanna see anyone,

but I just had to check in.

Sorry.

SWEETPEA: I haven't heard from Tony Day yet.

I’m just amped up, you know? Like I can’t...

take myself off the ceiling.

Didn’t sleep for the whole plane journey.

HARPER: Don’t worry, I’m gonna present

our findings at Pierre’s conference.

SWEETPEA: Hmm.

Even if we had the actual smoking gun

they would say that we manufactured the gun

and conjured the fucking smoke.

Yeah, they'll just call bullshit again.

Let them.

I'm gonna lay it out brick by brick.

It will be undeniable.

Mm.

I'm so, so sorry that I let this happen to you.

- It is my responsibility. - No, you didn't.

Don't take this away from me.

Look, I work for you, you know, you don’t have to act out this

like pastoral compassion.

And I wanna be paid. Do we understand each other?

Y... (SNICKERS) Y... Yeah.

And look, I'll tell you this now in case he tells you it himself

but, um...

Kwabena and I, we hooked up. And I don’t know,

I mean I assumed it was casual between you both.

I don’t know. Um...

I just feel like transgressions are best dealt with head-on,

you know, so they don’t fester.

No, no. It... Um...

(CLEARS THROAT)

It was casual. (CHUCKLES)

Good.

I really appreciate your honesty.

Okay, well, can I...

can I come inside, just keep you company?

I'm really fucking tired.

(SUITCASE RATTLES)

(DOOR UNLOCKING, OPENING)

(DOOR CLOSING)

(DOOR CLOSING)

- Good flight? - (SHUSHES)

I just checked in Eric's room.

His wife and kid are asleep in there.

This whole setup needs a rethink.

- Where is Eric? - Who knows?

How was Sweetpea?

(INHALES DEEPLY) She was a dog with a bone.

- Really? - KWABENA: Hmm. Tenacious.

You know, it’s really admirable how she’s recovered

from all that shit she went through.

You okay?

HARPER: Fine.

More than fine. We are...

very close.

KWABENA: Close?

Us?

To floodlighting the whole fucking underside.

Huh.

Well, I spend so much time listening to my higher brain

and its love of complexity and...

all along your gut’s telling you what’s truly right.

Yeah.

Trust your gut, I guess.

Don't ever fucking liquidate my positions again.

Okay? I'm not some boy.

Okay, we fuck each other, but not like that.

Is that clear?

Crystal.

I need to get together these materials for this talk.

- Kwabena? - Yeah?

If anybody calls for me, tell them I'm busy.

I'm working.

♪ (“EYES WITHOUT A FACE” BY BILLY IDOL PLAYING) ♪

♪ I'm all out of hope ♪

♪ One more bad dream Could bring a fall ♪

♪ When I'm far from home ♪

♪ Don't call me on the phone To tell me you're alone ♪

♪ It's easy to deceive ♪

- ♪ It's easy to tease ♪ - (SOBS)

♪ But hard to get release ♪

- ♪ (SINGING IN FRENCH) ♪ - ♪ Eyes without a face ♪

- ♪ (SINGING IN FRENCH) ♪ - (SOBS)

- ♪ Eyes without a face ♪ - ♪ (SINGING IN FRENCH) ♪

♪ Eyes without a face ♪

♪ Got no human grace Your eyes without a face ♪

♪ And now it's getting worse ♪

♪ (SONG CONCLUDES) ♪