Father did not follow the company when it moved. Instead, at the age of nineteen, he started his own business, Joseph Yen& Company, in the French part of Tianjin. Ye Ye had such belief in his son's ability that he put all his life savings into the new company. He made Father promise to look after everyone in the family financially. Ye Ye became the new business's chief financial officer. The company did well from the start. Many businesses were moving out of Tianjin because of the Japanese, and Father bought some of them at a good price. Grand Aunt's bank also helped. The company made money from everything it did. Father began to be known in the business world as the magic boy who had the power of changing iron into gold'.