Compared with other previous itineraries with various aspects of work, the scheduled New Zealand schedule was originally the easiest.
Eric has full confidence in Peter Jackson and does not intend to interfere with the filming of the "Lord of the Rings" series.
This time I came here purely to experience the filming process of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy and relax. Once back in Los Angeles, it's going to be another busy few months as filming on "Gravity" begins and post-production on "Iron Man" begins.
It's just that the AOL incident completely ruined Eric's expectation of his trip to New Zealand.
Arrived in Queenstown on Wednesday, New Zealand time, until all the dust settled on Saturday morning, Eric only stayed for a weekend before leaving early for Los Angeles.
At the same time, in New York, when America Online held a press conference on Saturday morning local time, announcing that the company would continue to stick to its original development strategy and that Chris Hansen and the three had resigned from the board of directors of America Online, the media was full of enthusiasm. Time was in an uproar.
The "New York Times" directly used the "Firefly System's Great Rout" as the headline to describe this event.
However, there are also a large number of media predicting that Firefly Investment will let go of the control of AOL. For AOL, it will be a huge crisis.
After all, many people can see that the complete letting go of Firefly Investment may mean that it will gradually sell off its stocks.
As the largest shareholder with a shareholding ratio of more than 30%, once Firefly Investment sells off its stocks in a large scale, the impact on AOL's stock price will be almost devastating.
On the other hand, as long as there is a little rational person, they will not believe that the two parties will continue to maintain the previous close cooperation posture as stated in the press conference. Without the support of the media resources of the Firefly system, AOL will directly face the dilemma of content shortage in the process of developing Internet media business.
However, although the two parties could not reach an agreement on the development concept of AOL, Eric did not deny that Steve Case was a very capable professional manager.
Faced with the public opinion situation AOL encountered after the press conference, Steve Case decisively took a series of corresponding remedial measures.
The next day, that is, Sunday, after urgent consultations, Steve Case held an emergency press conference again, announcing that in order to express confidence in the company's development prospects, AOL's management would pledge its own shares in the company and other means , to raise $1 billion in capital for the acquisition of AOL stock.
The buying and selling of stocks by the management of a company is undoubtedly the best indication of their attitude towards the company's development prospects. This move by Steve Case directly reassured many hesitant investors.
At the same time, Time Warner Group executive Chad Parsons also appeared at the press conference, and jointly issued a statement with Steve Case that Time Warner and AOL will reach a strategic partnership in terms of media content .
It stands to reason that Richard Parsons is the CEO of Warner Bros. Pictures, a subsidiary of Time Warner. If AOL wants to develop its portal business, what it needs more is content support from the news media. Richard Parsons' appearance at the press conference seemed out of place.
But in fact, the media and investors with a little bit of sense of smell are very clear that Richard Parsons is an executive of Time Warner's major shareholder Gerald Levine. Richard Parsons came forward, basically representing the attitude of Gerald Levine.
Before the establishment of Time Warner Group, Gerald Levine was the head and majority shareholder of Time Media Corporation, which owns a large number of print media such as the famous "Time" magazine.
Even though Time Warner has been established for many years, Gerald Levine still maintains a strong influence on the newspapers and magazines of Time Media, which is exactly what AOL needs to run portals and other Internet media businesses. of.
What's more, Time Warner also owns CNN, the largest cable news network in North America and even in the world.
Even if there is a competition for the control of the company with Ted Turner behind CNN, there is no big obstacle for Gerald Levine to match the company's beneficial media cooperation. As long as a cooperation with Time Warner can be reached, even if it completely fails with the Firefly system, AOL's portal can still obtain enough media resources from Time Warner.
Moreover, Richard Parsons' attendance at AOL's press conference once again reminded Wall Street and major media of rumors that the two giants might merge.
The marriage between the established comprehensive media group and the emerging Internet media giant, in the eyes of many people, is a powerful alliance where one plus one is greater than two.
The capital market is far more blind than many ordinary people imagine.
Stimulated by a series of targeted positive news, when AOL stock reopened on Monday, in just two hours, the stock price returned to the price before Steve Case's interview with CNN last week.
By the end of the day, AOL's single share price had reached $262.39, a surge of 11.2% compared to $235.76 at the opening, and AOL's market value had thus reached $43.294 billion.
Driven by the stock price of America Online, the Nasdaq index finally broke through the 2000-point mark on Monday, and the market situation was booming.
Faced with this situation, the most tangled is undoubtedly the major shareholders of AOL except Firefly Investment.
Firefly Investment’s reduction of AOL’s shares is irreversible. To prevent AOL’s share price from plummeting or even collapsing, other shareholders must inherit the shares sold by Firefly Investment.
In the video conference last week, Eric directly offered a price of US$4 billion for the 10% stake that was about to be reduced, and did not agree to any discount. However, AOL's market value before applying for an emergency suspension was only US$38.9 billion, and major shareholders naturally disagreed to buy 16.5 million shares of Firefly Investment at a price of US$4 billion.
But just the day it resumed trading, AOL's market value exceeded $43 billion.
According to Eric's intentions at the time, if he wanted to continue the deal now, the price would be calculated at 4.3 billion U.S. dollars, and he would have to pay an extra 300 million U.S. dollars in just three days. Anyone would feel distressed.
Eric was already on the plane flying back to Los Angeles at that time, and the representatives of the major shareholders had to test Chris. Eric's attitude in this matter was very firm, and he did not give Chris any autonomy. Naturally, the temptation did not yield any results.
And so on until the next day.
According to the usual market rules, after yesterday's retaliatory rebound in AOL's stock price, most people thought that today's stock price would drop, but the fact that many shareholders were delighted was mixed with incomparable entanglement.
AOL's stock price not only showed no signs of falling the next day, but rose again by 3.1%, with a market value of US$44.636 billion, hitting the US$45 billion mark.
Even if some small shareholders who predicted that AOL's stock price may have peaked secretly sold millions of shares, it did not stop this strong upward trend at all.
In addition to Firefly Investment and management shares, AOL’s other shareholders are basically major investment banks and retirement insurance funds of various states in the United States. Even if these institutions do not buy stocks for a long time, they are better than those for short-term arbitrage. Hedge funds hold for a much longer time, and they are also the main capital of the US stock market.
Due to the nature of capital, especially the retirement insurance funds of various states, the investment principles are based on prudence. Now that the bubble component of the Nasdaq stock market is becoming more and more obvious, the brokers of these investment institutions have naturally considered cashing out while AOL's stock price is high.
But in the face of Firefly Investment, which is determined to reduce its holdings on a large scale, these investment institutions have to endure this mentality for the time being.
Everyone knows that cashing out together will only result in nothing for everyone. If AOL's stock price collapses and Firefly loses billions or tens of billions of dollars in investment, it will not have a serious impact on the company, which already holds more than $200 billion in assets. But for the major investment institutions, even if the stocks in their hands are only worth hundreds of millions of dollars, they will lose their money, and many people will lose their jobs.
In the current situation, only by taking over the 10% of the shares of Firefly Investment, they will have half a year to gradually sell the shares in their hands.
Of course, there is another prerequisite for this, that is, the relevant managers can endure the temptation of AOL's stock price to keep rising. After all, most people are waiting until the stock market crashes in the expectation of "maybe it can go up some more". Only then did I wake up and regret it.
Therefore, when Eric's private plane landed at Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday afternoon, Morgan Stanley President John Mark, who was elected as the shareholder representative, also arrived in Los Angeles at the same time.
Although after more than ten hours of flying, Eric did not feel the fatigue of the long-distance travel because the whole journey was a very luxurious and comfortable private jet. After a few hours of sleep on the plane, he arrived in sunny Los Angeles. Tian's depressed mood dissipated a lot.
I gave the two female assistants and a group of bodyguards who accompanied me around the world a holiday, and sent them to leave separately. Eric returned to the Pointe Manor by car. He was still on the way when he received a call from John Mark. , the other party was already waiting for him outside the gate of Jianjiao Manor.
Although I don't really want to deal with these people at this time, but when others blocked the door, Eric and I couldn't avoid it.
Get off the car at the gate of the Angle Manor, Eric went up to shake hands with John Mark, and the two walked into the manor.
Walking side by side with Eric on the tidy corridor leading to the Shell Villa, John Mark looked at the well-built green trees and lawns around, and complimented: "Compared with a few years ago, this place is more beautiful."
Eric seldom entertained guests at Angle Manor. However, during the process of selling Disney’s hand-drawn animation department and acquiring Marvel a few years ago, Eric held a meeting for major investment banks and fund managers at Angle Manor. A business party, and John Mark was there.
"John, you can also buy a manor in Los Angeles. It's good to come here for vacation occasionally. The environment in Los Angeles is still very relaxing."
John Mark shook his head with a wry smile: "Maybe, I won't have this kind of time until I retire."
The two were chatting, and the twins from the villa greeted them together, walked up to them and called their master softly, and followed Eric.
John Mark has been in a high position for a long time, and there is no shortage of women around him, but facing the twins who are exactly the same in figure and appearance and are both stunning, he still can't help but look a few more times, and he is somewhat envious of Eric's beauty.
Eric didn't mean to introduce the twins to John Mark, but just asked, "Where's Drew?"
Natasha said: "The boss is in the company, he will come over after get off work."
Eric nodded, and said, "Help me and Mr. Mark make a pot of coffee later. My luggage is in the back car, and everyone's gifts. Carly has already sorted it out. You two have it too. Look for your own The name will do."
After the order, Eric and John Mark came to the reception area by the glass curtain wall of the villa to sit down, chatted for a while, waited for the twins to bring coffee, poured it for them, and left before Eric took the coffee cup, leaned on the sofa relaxedly, and asked, "So, John, what's the matter with you this time?"
John Mark smiled bitterly, and said, "Eric, what you actually understand in your heart is the matter of AOL stock."
"Actually, I just got off the plane," Eric shrugged and asked, "What is the stock price at the close today?"
"$270.52," John Mark said, "compared with yesterday, it has increased by about 3%."
Carefully sipping his coffee, Eric said: "It seems that it's time to split the stock. I think it's more appropriate to split the stock directly. There is still a lot of room for AOL's stock price to rise."
John Mark said: "In this case, Eric, why do you still insist on selling it?"
"Everyone..." Eric paused, not knowing how to translate "differences do not seek each other", so he said: "If the direction is not right, the current glory will only be temporary after all."
"Eric, none of us know what the future holds. How can you be sure that AOL is not looking for its own direction?"
Eric turned his head and glanced at the open blue sea outside the curtain wall, he seemed a little absent-minded and said: "Yeah, so, we can only stick to a direction that we think is right, I have my insistence, Steve has Steve's Persistence, you have your persistence. Everyone insists on different things, and if you barely get together, you can only drag each other down, so it's better to separate."
Feeling that Eric wanted to change the topic, John Mark had to take the initiative to mention the purpose of this trip: "Eric, according to the price you offered last week, how about a 10% discount, we can finish it within a week Transaction, cash payment."
Eric smiled at the corner of his mouth and said, "John, have you noticed the recent fluctuations in the Russian ruble?"
John Mark froze for a moment, wondering why Eric would suddenly bring up this question, and shook his head: "Eric, I'm not in charge of foreign exchange business, is there any problem with the ruble?"