[mlinhares]

Nah, they very much wanted to do missionary work and find Preston John, they invested in a lot of shitty missions for absolutely no reason other than to try to convert people to the church.

Conquerors is a great read on the subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conquerors:_How_Portugal_Forge...

And don't get me wrong, they were very successful at filling their pockets with gold, but could have been even more if they were mostly mercenaries like the brits and the dutch.