GTA 5 Lester's Assassinations Guide: How To Make $2 Billion with Stock Market

In this GTA 5 money guide, we show you how you can make the most money out of Lester's Assassinations missions that lead to fluctuations in the stock market: when to buy, what to buy, and when to sell.

In Grand Theft Auto V, the player has the ability to buy and sell stock on the two Stock Exchange websites available in-game, BAWSAQ and LCN-Exchange. Lester Crest has great knowledge of the stock market and knows how to force stock prices to increase or decrease for his own good - to buy at a low price and sell at a high price.

For this, he hires Franklin for five Assassination side missions, asking him to take down targets that are of great influence in their respective companies. Killing them leads to some stock prices dropping heavily, with others increasing drastically.

Despite being considered Story Missions, four of the five of Lester's Assassinations are optional and should be played after the main storyline is completed.

Thanks to Lester's Assassinations missions and the stock market, you can make huge profits in GTA 5 (with all three characters) by purchasing and selling certain stocks at the right times.

How to Make Money in GTA 5 with Lester's Assassinations Missions:

Below you find a step-by-step guide on how to make up to $2 billion from Lester's Assassinations by investing in the stock market, allowing you to have more than enough money to buy everything in the game, including all properties and any vehicles you like.

With the exception of the very first one, Assassinations can be done after the end of the main story. So you should first complete the Story Missions before doing any other Assassination Mission, in order to have the most millions of dollars to invest.

All assassination missions are marked with a green "L" on the map.

 When waiting for the Stock Prices to rise up after making an investment, you can make the in-game time advance faster by sleeping or simply entering the save menu from a character's bed without saving.

You can also click on each Lester's Assassination mission below to see the full details, walkthrough, and Gold Medal Objectives for all five Assassinations.

Pre-Assassinations Money Making (Optional)

The following tips include profitable Strangers & Freaks missions and Random Events that you can do to increase the amount of money you have available to invest before playing the first Assassination mission.

These endeavors are not necessary if you care about end-game money, as the final heist will give you over $40 million to invest during the other four Assassinations.

However, these events can be useful to give you a higher amount of money to invest in the first Assassination, and thus to play with during the actual story mode:

• At this point, you will have already completed The Jewel Store Heist, which gives Micheal about $1 million dollars, and Franklin about $300,000.
• As Michael, complete the Epsilon Program: it rewards you with $2.1 million if you betray the organization.
• As Trevor, complete Maude’s Bail Bond missions: if you’ll deliver the criminals alive, you’ll get a total of $40,000.
• As Trevor, complete the “Drug Shootout” random event: you can pick up a briefcase with $70,000.
• As Trevor, complete the “Altruist Cult Shootout” random event and take the four briefcases for a total of $100,000.
• Purchase the Sonar Collections Dock and collect all the Nuclear Waste: the net profit will be $690,000.
• Complete the “Bike Thief City 1” random event: you will receive $100,000 in Animal Ark shares, which can be immediately sold.
• Complete the “Burial” random event: you will be rewarded with $60,000
• Complete the “Deal Gone Wrong” random event: you can pick up a briefcase with $25,000.
• You can complete the "Hitch Lift 1" random event (or you can decide to leave this until after the last heist): invest every protagonist's money in Tinkle stocks on Bawsaq.com BEFORE completing this encounter. Afterward, wait for the Tinkle stocks to increase by 30% and sell them all.

1. The Hotel Assassination

The Hotel Assassination is the first assassination mission given by Lester to Franklin, and the only one that is mandatory for story progression.

In this mission, Lester asks Franklin to take down Brett Lowrey, CEO of Bilkinton Research, who is staying at the Von Crastenburg Hotel. Killing him leads to the decrease of Bilkington Research stock values and the increase of Betta Pharmaceuticals stock values.

Before this mission:

• Invest all the money of all three protagonists in Betta Pharmaceuticals (BET) stocks on the Bawsaq site.

After this mission:

• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the BET stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~80% (21% on Next Gen).
• Invest all the money of all three protagonists in Bilkington (BIL) stocks on the LCN site.
• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the Bilkington stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~80%.

2. The Multi Target Assassination

Lester Crest tasks Franklin with a new assassination mission: taking down four corrupt jurors that are planning to throw a class-action lawsuit against Redwood Cigarettes.

Killing them all leads to a decrease in the value of Redwood Cigarettes stock and an increase in the value of Debonaire stocks.

Before this mission:

• Finish the main storyline of the game first.
• Before starting this mission, invest all the money of all three protagonists in Debonaire (DEB) stocks on the LCN site.

After this mission:

• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the Debonaire stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~80%.
• This is the most important step: invest all the money of all three protagonists in Redwood (RWC) stocks on the LCN site.
• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the Redwood stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~320%.

After these steps, you could have about $330,000,000 on all three of your characters!

3. The Vice Assassination

Franklin must find and kill Jackson Skinner, the head of product development at Facade. Lester knows Jackson has a fondness for working girls and that he has a regular that works at a pickup in La Puerta.

Franklin finds him picking up the prostitute and assassinates him, leading to a decrease in Facade stocks prices and an increase in the values of Fruit stocks.

Before this mission:

• Invest all the money of all three protagonists in Fruit (FRT) stocks on the Bawsaq site.

After this mission:

• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the Fruit stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~50%.
• Invest all the money of all three protagonists in Facade (FAC) stocks on the Bawsaq site.
• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the Facade stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~33%.

By this point, you should have now reached over $650,000,000 on all three of your characters!

4. The Bus Assassination

Lester tells Franklin about a man called Isaac Penny, who is about to take a controlling share in the Vapid Motor Company. Despite being a millionaire, Isaac rides the bus to and from work every day - so Lester asks Franklin to take a bus and find Isaac by acting as a bus driver.

Assassinating Isaac leads to a decrease in the value of Vapid stocks.

After this mission:

• Invest all the money of all three protagonists in Vapid (VAP) stocks on the Bawsaq site.
• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the Vapid stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~100%.

At this point, you should have over $1,300,000,000 in your bank for all three protagonists.

5. The Construction Assassination

Lester tells Franklin about Enzo Bonelli, a mafia member turned real estate developer. Enzo is at one of his construction sites in Downtown Los Santos, but as he knows he is being targeted, heavy protection is being set up for him at the construction site.

Taking him down leads to a heavy increase in the values of GoldCoast stocks.

Before this mission:

• Invest all the money of all three protagonists in GoldCoast (GCD) stocks on the LCN site

After this mission:

• Get home, make a quick save, go to sleep, and then check the stocks. If the value has increased, repeat the process of quick saving, sleeping, and checking the stocks. If the percentage of price starts decreasing, reload the save where it was the highest.
• Sell the GoldCoast stocks with all three characters once it reaches the maximum value; the maximum percentage of return is ~90%.

And now, after completing this step, you should have the crazy amount of $2,000,000,000 for each of the three protagonists, if not more based on your returns. That's $2 Billion dollars!

You now have enough money to buy literally anything you want in GTA 5, such as Vehicles, Properties, Weapons, and modifications, without having to worry about your budget ever again.

What is the Maximum Money You Can Have in GTA 5?

The maximum amount of money you can have in GTA V is $2,147,483,647.

The reason for this is due to the way the game has been coded: the number 2,147,483,647 is the maximum value for a 32-bit signed integer in computing, and thus the maximum possible score, money, etc. for many video games.

Even if you invest further in the stock market, you won't be able to get a return that goes over the maximum GTA 5 money limit.

However, you're just fine with $2.1 billion in your bank in GTA 5, as $500,000,000 is enough money to buy and customize everything in the game.

Video: How To Make Money in GTA 5 with Lester's Missions (Stock Market Guide)

Below you find a video by GTASeriesVIdeos showing you all the steps described in this article, as well as a complete Stock Market guide on how to make money in GTA 5:

So this is how you can make the most money out of Lester's Assassination missions in GTA V, using the Stock Market to your advantage. As you can see, depending on your take from the last Heist (The Big Score), you can obtain up to $2 billion dollars thanks to Lester's Assassinations.

We hope you found this guide useful, now enjoy being a billionaire in Grand Theft Auto V!

Assassinations / Phone Missions in the GTA Series

GTA V: Lester's Assassinations

GTA IV: The Fixer's Assassinations

GTA Vice City: Phone Assassinations

GTA III: Phone Missions