It was also December 1, across the ocean in Japan. After another interest rate hike by the Bank of Japan in November, the Nikkei 225 index still maintained an upward trend despite the shock, and broke through the 40,000 point mark in the afternoon of that day.
As of the afternoon close of local time, the Nikkei 225 Index was finally settled at 40039 points.
As people from all walks of life in Japan cheered for this record-breaking moment, a rumor from Wall Street quickly began to spread.
It is said that according to very reliable sources, Cersei Capital, which has been attracting attention from the financial world in recent months, has actually secretly withdrawn from the Japanese market.
All the financial securities product portfolios related to the Japanese market held by Cersei Capital Sub-Funds 1 to 5 were packaged and sold to the Japanese consortium by Simon Westeros. Therefore, during this period, many hedge funds that followed Cersei Capital’s operations around the Japanese market were actually not following Simon Westeros, but following the Japanese government!
In the past few months, at least tens of billions of dollars in funds across the entire financial market have been following Cersei Capital's pursuit of the Japanese stock market. Everyone knew what it would mean if the rumors were true.
The news was released after the Japanese stock market closed on Friday. Due to the time difference, it was still Friday morning in North America.
The Lehman Brothers team originally planned to let the rumors ferment over the following weekend to create enough panic before the market opened next Monday.
However, the news spread far faster than Lehman Brothers imagined. In just one day, not only Wall Street, but to be precise, everyone who should know and should not know knew it.
The first thing the local North American media thought of after hearing the news was to contact relevant people at Cersei Capital to confirm the authenticity of the news.
Immediately, many media discovered that Simon Westeros was not in North America. Even James Raybould, the president of Westeros Company, was far away in Europe. Janet Johnston, another important figure in Cersei Capital, also failed to contact with. I tried to contact Daenerys Entertainment executives on the West Coast, but still failed to get any useful reply.
Compared with the media, some investment bank executives and even high-level government officials tried to contact Simon Westeros, but they also failed to contact Simon himself. James Raybould, who could be contacted, also used an ominous cliché, which was undoubtedly a very obvious acquiescence.
So while the news spread faster than the Lehman team expected, there was one thing they were certainly not wrong about.
Panic begins to spread!
The goals of Cersei Capital were too obvious, there were too many insiders, and there were various connections that were difficult to conceal. From the beginning, Simon did not think that this matter could be hidden forever. The Japanese obviously did not expect this, and the two parties reached an agreement. The most important clause is actually that after the Japanese stock market turns, Simon will no longer participate in short selling on the Japanese stock market.
Athens, Greece.
Because it was too cold in London at this time of year, Simon and Janet only lived there for three days. The woman couldn't stand it, so they flew to Athens, the capital of Greece on the Mediterranean Sea.
Simon and Janet had just returned from the Johnston family's private island in the Aegean Sea and were in the mountains north of Athens. He rested in a mansion in the district and planned to go to Finland next Monday.
Westeros' acquisition team has negotiated the final contract details with Nokia, and the two parties will sign a contract next Monday.
Because he had expected this day, Simon was not surprised.
When he originally planned to remain silent as planned, Simon's leisurely aloofness was interrupted by a surprise visit from Haruo Maekawa, the former president of the Bank of Japan whom he met in Melbourne at the end of June at noon on Sunday, Athens time.
Haruo Maekawa and his party were four. In addition to himself, Yoko Kosugi, the 'gift' that Simon had always rejected, was still following. The reason for introduction was that Maekawa and others were the translators, and the other two were Haruo Maekawa's assistants.
After everyone briefly greeted each other, Simon led Maekawa and his party to the terrace in the backyard of the mansion.
This 6-acre mansion is also built on a mountain. The specially built viewing terrace can overlook the entire city of Athens, but it is too far from the seaside to see the sea level. However, since the surrounding area can become a wealthy area, the view is naturally excellent.
Haruo Maekawa was not interested in enjoying the beautiful scenery. Simon, Janet, Haruo Maekawa and Yoko Kosugi sat down at the round table. When the servant brought the coffee, Haruo Maekawa, who looked obviously tired, cheered up and smiled: "I would also like to congratulate you first, Simon. That "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" game seems to be selling well during this period."
Simon picked up the coffee and took a sip, smiled and nodded: "Thank you."
"I learned about it in advance before coming here. The royalty system that Yamauchi has adopted for Nintendo in recent years is really too much. Since Daenerys Entertainment intends to enter the field of video games and has achieved such outstanding results, I feel that Nintendo will In addition to Capcom, Konami and other companies, it is also appropriate to give Blizzard Studio a preferential quota overseas."
Nintendo's royalty system, simply put, is to review the content of game manufacturers and extract a royalty equivalent to the licensing fee from each game cartridge.
In addition, Nintendo also personally monopolizes the production of game cartridges, which further reduces the profit margins of game manufacturers.
Because Capcom, Konami and other six game companies were the first to become Nintendo's game content suppliers. After Nintendo's rise, it granted these six companies a preferential policy. Capcom and other companies deliberately produced game cartridges on their own and needed to pay The royalties are also much lower than those of ordinary game manufacturers who cannot enjoy special discounts.
The "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" video game released by Daenerys Entertainment last month sells for US$60 on a cassette. Taking into account the cost of cassette production and royalties, Nintendo will take away US$20, minus the profits of channel distributors and other aspects. Daenerys Entertainment only earns about 30% gross profit from each box of cassettes.
In comparison, companies such as Capcom and Konami can achieve 50% gross profit on each box of game cartridges due to their preferential policies.
Nancy had previously predicted that the original "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" game could earn the company $100 million in profits in the next year. If Nintendo receives special preferential policies, this number can increase by at least 50%.
Haruo Maekawa offered such a generous bargaining chip with almost no groundwork. Simon couldn't help but be a little surprised. He did not doubt that Haruo Maekawa was making an empty promise. Although Nintendo's president Hiroshi Yamauchi is strong, Japanese companies are basically under the control of various consortiums, and Nintendo is no exception.
If the top brass of the Japanese consortium puts pressure on him, no matter how strong he is, Hiroshi Yamauchi will have no choice but to give in.
Nintendo can maintain its heyday for at least another five years, and such a special offer may mean hundreds of millions of dollars in profits for Daenerys Entertainment.
However, Simon's face did not show much emotion, and he did not immediately accept Maekawa Haruo's promise. Instead, he said: "Actually, I still very much approve of Nintendo's royalty system."
When Haruo Maekawa heard what Simon said, he realized that he was acting too eagerly. He followed the tone of the young man in front of him and said: "This surprises me, Simon. In recent years, some people have been criticizing Yamauchi's decisions. Last year, there were Two preferential manufacturers broke with Nintendo as a result."
Simon said: "If there are no constraints, many business fields will rapidly prosper and then decline rapidly, just like the collapse of Atari. Nintendo's system is a constraint on the market, which can make the field of video games move towards a unified A sustainable and healthy development state. Therefore, Nintendo’s system is not wrong. If those manufacturers who broke with Nintendo had the opportunity to become the rule makers, they would actually do the same."
Haruo Maekawa nodded and asked with a smile: "Simon, what about you?"
"Of course I am the same," Simon said: "In fact, everyone has the ambition to become a rule maker, but most people do not have this strength."
Haruo Maekawa suddenly asked: "Simon, do you want to defeat Nintendo?"
Simon shook his head and said: "Daenerys Entertainment does not plan to get involved in the console field. We will only focus on the development of game content. However, both Atari and Nintendo have proven the huge profits in the game console field, and this industry is destined to usher in a new era." Many new players. Moreover, Nintendo is well known for its slowness in the new generation of game consoles. Sega's 32-bit game console has been launched for nearly a year, but Nintendo's SFC continues to delay. Therefore, it is destined to decline. This decline is only due to its own lack of ambition, not because of the royalty system."
Simon said this, but he was thinking of Apple.
In the previous life, Apple's commission on the sales of APP software was actually imitating Nintendo's royalty system. On the other hand, compared to Nintendo's lack of progress, Apple has always been able to surpass the Android field. This also destined the Android camp to find it difficult to compete with Apple.
"I will convey your words to Yamauchi," Haruo Maekawa took a sip of the coffee in front of him and began to talk about the topic: "Simon, I came here this time because I hope you can make some public statements."
Simon nodded and waited for Haruo Maekawa to continue.
Maekawa Haruo said: "We have found out. The news came from Lehman Brothers, a subsidiary of American Express Company. In the past two days, the situation in North America and Asia has been very bad. We hope that you can publicly express your optimism about Japan in some media Economic rhetoric.”
Simon said: "What about Cersei Capital sub-funds 1 to 5?"
"This is also an important point. We hope you will tell the media that you have changed hands in the investment portfolio of Cersei Capital Sub-Funds 1 to 5 in June, but the Japanese stock market did not decline in the following six months. This is enough to show that the Japanese economy is much worse than People predict more dynamically.”
Simon didn't care that Haruo Maekawa unknowingly moved the transfer time of Cersei Capital's sub-funds 1 to 5 to June. Strictly speaking, this is correct. The two parties did confirm the transaction at the end of June: "Actually, Maekawa, you should understand that my statement now does not mean much. Now that Lehman Brothers has released the news, they must have established a large number of short positions, and perhaps, many financial institutions have also done so in advance."
"But there are also more long capitals that have not left the market," Haruo Maekawa continued: "Simon, as long as you express your stance, those funds that are still long will definitely make efforts. We will also try our best to maintain the stability of the market."
Simon said: "Maekawa, you should know that there is indeed a serious bubble in the Japanese economy, and the turn of the Japanese stock market is inevitable."
"I understand, Simon. We just hope that this turn of events can be gentler and give us more time to relax."
Simon rubbed the coffee cup still in his hand and weighed it.
The Japanese stock market has exceeded 40,000 points. It has obviously reached its peak and cannot continue to rise. A decline is inevitable.
In my memory, it took four months for the Japanese stock market to fall from a high of over 38,000 points to 28,000 points. This is indeed quite mild, and it also shows that the Japanese government's rescue measures at that time were very effective.
Now, if he does nothing, with the panic accumulated in the market in the past two days, even if the Japanese stock market has a rise and fall limit and will not have a Black Monday like North America in 1987, it is likely to be a collapse after the market opens next week. Continuous decline.
Once this happens, some hedge funds that were misguided by Cersei Capital in the early stage are likely to suffer heavy losses, and Simon will inevitably be blamed.
On the contrary, if Simon now shows some tendency to be optimistic about the Japanese market, delaying the decline of the Japanese stock market and giving those hedge funds time to flee, this will actually save him from the possible targeting. Since the Japanese stock market has been determined to decline, what he did is just to let those short sellers make money later, and there is nothing wrong with it.
Having made up his mind, Simon raised his head again and looked at Maekawa Haruo and said, "Then, what should I do?"
Haruo Maekawa called to the two assistants waiting not far away, took out a piece of information from the handbags they brought and handed it over, saying: "We have prepared some information, you can take a look first. In addition, we I have already contacted various media outlets in Japan and North America. As long as the manuscript is finalized, it will be on the headlines of many newspapers and periodicals early tomorrow morning. Also, if you are willing to accept TV interviews, that would be even better."
Simon picked up the information and looked through it, shaking his head and saying, "Forget about interviews, I don't really like appearing on TV."
"Then, as long as you can express your position in the newspaper," Maekawa Haruo did not force it, and took the initiative: "In addition, all the press releases we completed will be given to you in advance to ensure that there will be no surprises between the two of us. differences beyond."
Simon nodded.
Very satisfied with this arrangement by the Japanese.
He didn't want opinions to appear in the newspapers that he didn't know anything about.
At the same time, I also understood in my heart that the Japanese were so cautious not because they respected him, but more because they were worried that he would suddenly regret it.