After Tom Freston's meeting with Eric, Viacom did not respond for several days.
Since Lei Shidong is still lucky, Eric will naturally not be polite.
As a result, rumors that Paramount Pictures may face a broken capital chain quickly spread, which continued to hit Viacom's falling stock price.
On the other hand, the fact that Wall Street tycoon Carl Icahn was secretly buying shares of Viacom Group was soon exposed. For a while, the pressure on Viacom Group's major shareholders and management was doubled.
In fact, during the last lunch, Carl Icahn knew that Eric had no intention of supporting him in taking control of Viacom.
However, Carl Icahn still formed a tacit understanding with Eric, and took the initiative to release the fact that he was absorbing Viacom Group shares, intending to force Redstone to submit. As long as the Viacom Group and the Firefly system reconcile, Viacom's stock price will definitely rebound quickly, and Carl Icahn will be able to make a lot of money from this wave of buying low and selling high.
Compared with Viacom Group's stock price falling against the market, the crazy rise of the entire Nasdaq market has no intention of stopping.
The last day of May happens to be Monday.
After breaking through the 4,000-point mark last week, the Nasdaq index hit a new high at the opening of the market today, reaching 4,135 points.
Due to the great success of "Iron Man" and Eric himself accompanied by the Nasdaq index's skyrocketing asset figures almost every moment, a large number of newspapers and media began to pay more attention to his personal net worth , There is even a dedicated real-time statistics website on the Internet.
As of last Friday's close, Eric's personal assets have reached a dazzling figure of 475 billion US dollars.
However, at this time, Eric himself didn't care much about this asset figure with a large bubble component for the time being. In comparison, he is now more concerned about the cash-out progress of the technology stocks held by the Clover Fund.
Firefly Studios.
From late March to now, exactly ten weeks have passed, and Caroline compiled the latest financial data of the Clover Fund early in the morning.
"Last week, various trading studios once again cashed out a total value of US$2.322 billion in technology stocks, and the accumulated cash reserves of Clover Fund have reached US$21.671 billion. According to the current stock price, the total value of remaining technology stocks in the hands of Clover Fund is It is 12.855 billion U.S. dollars. If the Nasdaq index maintains the current upward trend, the remaining stocks are expected to gain about 50% in value, which means that the total amount of funds that can be cashed out by the Clover Fund is about 40 billion U.S. dollars. "
In the office, while listening to Caroline's report, Eric flipped through the more detailed data report in his hand.
40 billion US dollars in cash, compared to the inflated book net worth, this is the real capital. Even after paying taxes, the remaining funds are enough to support the next expansion of the Firefly system. Once the next stage of layout is completed, the assets under Eric's name will never have such a serious bubble.
After thinking about it for a while, Eric said to Caroline again: "We only have about six weeks left, and we must speed up the progress of the sale. You can draw up another plan for me today."
Caroline nodded and turned to other topics.
Production on Gravity is in its final stages, and Eric will be focusing most of his energy on it for the next few weeks.
After a short work briefing, Eric was about to leave the office and go to the post-production center in the studio when his personal cell phone rang.
Looking at the caller ID, Eric sat back again, leaned on the leather chair to answer the call, and said, "Good morning, Summer."
There was a moment of silence on the other side before Redstone's voice came over: "$1.5 billion, Eric, this is the bottom line I can accept. If you disagree, Viacom can fight Firefly to the end."
$1.5 billion is obviously Redstone's offer to Showtime.
This price is 25% higher than Firefly's valuation of $1.2 billion for Showtime TV, but compared to the development prospects of paid cable stations, the price of $1.5 billion is far from Eric's upper limit.
"Yes." After a short pause, Eric nodded, and immediately said: "There is also Shirley Lansing."
"Viacom will announce Shirley's resignation in the afternoon. At the same time, Firefly must immediately cancel all measures against Viacom Group."
Eric nodded simply again: "No problem."
As soon as the voice fell, the other party hung up the phone.
Eric didn't mind, he continued to call Katzenberg and others, explained something, and then got up and left the office.
At two o'clock in the afternoon, Viacom announced through its official website that Shirley Lansing, one of the two leading women in Hollywood, would resign as CEO of Paramount Pictures due to personal reasons. Com co-president Tom Freston was in the role until Paramount found a new and suitable candidate.
Under normal circumstances, the resignation of the heads of the seven major Hollywood film companies will definitely cause heated discussions in the media.
However, although I was shocked when I heard the news suddenly, most of the North American media showed a very cautious attitude.
After so many days, the media industry has basically understood the reasons for the dispute between the Firefly system and the Viacom Group. Even ordinary people can easily understand the facts from the explicit or implicit hints in many media articles.
Viacom ordered the gossip website to expose the information of Eric Williams' children behind the scenes. After the incident, it was retaliated by the entire Firefly system. People will only hold a posture of eating melons and watching a show.
However, the final development of the situation is beyond the imagination of many people.
In just two weeks, the market value of Viacom Group has evaporated by nearly 20 billion US dollars. Even if the situation is reversed immediately, it will be difficult for Viacom's stock price to return to its original high point in a short period of time.
Seeing that the incident subsides, the general public will only gradually turn their attention to other things. However, the media industry has deeply felt the terrifying strength of the Firefly system since the last Internet gossip incident was exposed.
Although after Viacom released the announcement, the Firefly system soon announced a settlement with the Blockbuster chain store, and some directors of Wall Street film funds also took the initiative to clarify that there is no problem with the cooperation with Paramount Pictures. Viacom’s After the stock price stopped the decline, it began to rebound quickly with the overall trend of the Nasdaq index.
However, the price Viacom paid for its secretive tricks can be described as very heavy.
In addition to the stock price that does not know when it will recover, the forced resignation of Paramount Pictures CEO Shirley Lansing not only caused the entire Viacom to lose face, but also Viacom, which has been struggling to maintain in recent years, Com film business is sure to be even worse.
Afraid of the influence of the Firefly system, Paramount will definitely not be an easy task to find another qualified helm.
Subsequently, Viacom Group announced that it would transfer its Showtime TV station to Firefly Group for US$1.5 billion, which dealt a severe blow to Viacom's cable TV business.
After careful calculation, from the exposure of the gossip news about Eric Williams' children to the present, the counterattack of the entire Firefly system has left no room for it. This has made many media who flaunt the freedom of the press and self-proclaimed the uncrowned king once again deeply understand the horror of capital, and become cautious about any news related to Eric Williams, for fear of inadvertently provoking the fierce capital monster of the Firefly system .
When many media felt sorry for being unable to report on a wonderful collision of giants, another incident happened, which quickly diverted everyone's attention.
On June 7, after three months of review, the U.S. Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Federal Communications Commission finally announced that they had formally approved the merger between AOL and Time Warner.
In three months, the combined market capitalization of the two old and new media giants, AOL and Time Warner, had skyrocketed to 277 billion US dollars. The merger of the two companies surpassed Firefly Group and Yahoo in one fell swoop, becoming the largest comprehensive media group in North America.
Steve Case, enjoying the glory of the peak of the Internet frenzy, seemed even more energetic. He even put aside a series of frictions between America Online and Firefly Group since last year, and took the initiative to call Eric, hoping that he could participate in the New York Plaza Hotel A reception celebrating the successful merger of AOL and Time Warner.
Although busy with the final work on "Gravity", Showtime is also based in New York. Firefly Group and Viacom have signed a transaction contract. Although there are still many follow-up handover tasks that have not been completed, Eric decided to go to New York to talk to the person in charge of Showtime, so he flew over despite his busy schedule.
The Plaza Hotel near Central Park, the sky was still bright, and countless elites and celebrities in Manhattan began to gather here.
It was already five o'clock in the afternoon when Eric arrived in Manhattan. After taking a short rest at Cindy's residence, he rushed over with a girl in a costume.
After getting off the car, Cindy walked through the media area with Eric on her arm. After signing and taking pictures by the photo wall, the two walked towards the hotel's grand banquet hall.
As soon as he entered the banquet hall, Steve Case greeted him personally.
Eric reached out to Steve Case and said, "Congratulations, Steve."
"Thank you, Eric, I'm glad you came over tonight," Steve Case said with the same impeccable expression. He shook hands with Cindy again and exchanged a few pleasantries before the other party left to meet other guests.
After greeting some other familiar guests, Eric took Cindy to a dining table and sat down.
After taking two glasses of red wine from the waiter's tray, and waiting for the other party to leave, Cindy whispered to Eric: "I had an examination last week, and the doctor said it was probably a boy."
Eric took a sip of the red wine and said with a smile, "It's only been two months, how can you tell?"
"I hope it's a boy," Cindy said with anticipation in his eyes, "The doctor probably said that because he saw what I was thinking. Anyway, I like to hear it."
"Oh, then it will be a girl, it depends on what you do."
"Then make another one," Cindy replied immediately, and then looked at the man beside him worriedly: "Eric, can I have another one?"
"Of course, it's fine for you to have two more."
Cindy was a little surprised by Eric's straightforwardness, and subconsciously said, "I'm talking about your child."
Eric reached out and pinched the girl's delicate chin: "If you dare to have someone else's child, I will throw you into the Hudson River."
Cindy realized that she had said the wrong thing, shrunk her neck in embarrassment, and touched her belly confidently in a blink of an eye, and said, "It must be a boy. Boys will not suffer when they grow up."
Eric smiled and said, "Are the arrangements for "America's Next Top Model"?"
"It's arranged, and Fanny will take over my duties."
"I don't think she's a good fit."
"Yeah," Cindy nodded and gave Eric a white look: "But you've secretly 'audited' for others, what else can I do?"
"You can pretend you don't know."
"I don't want to be such an asshole to you. Moreover, her personality is actually very suitable for this show. Anyway, she is not really a supermodel. The most important thing is to attract the attention of the audience."
"Oh, what kind of personality, why didn't I feel it?"
"Who knows how you feel."
"Um, it's not good for you to be like this, be careful for the children to hear."
Cindy looked at Eric's embarrassment, laughed, and said: "I asked Joan Huai Xia Xia, and I have been learning from her during this time, but there is no book yet. After reading it, I plan to find a few Ivy League graduates to be life assistants, and they will read to me during this time."
Although he didn't think it would be useful, Eric didn't object, and said, "You can call Kelly and ask her to help you choose."
"I can just pick it myself, but the bill will be sent to you."
"It must be a woman."
"Well, try to be as ugly as possible."
"No, it's said that when the mother sees too much during pregnancy, the child's appearance will also be affected."
"I don't want to listen to your nonsense. How could my child not be beautiful?"
"If it's a boy, it can't be too beautiful. It's better to be slightly worse than my father."
"hehe."
I don't know if it's because of the mention of Stephanie Seymour just now. While chatting, Stephanie Seymour and his wife walked over together.
Eric and Cindy had no choice but to stand up and greet each other.
Perhaps she finally got her wish to return to the front stage and got the position of host of "America's Next Top Model". Stephanie Seymour looked more and more radiant, but there was always a little bit of eyes in her eyes when she glanced at Eric. The obvious teasing made people want to press down this beautiful young woman again and give her a hard meal.
So, during the reception, he went to the restroom and found a slim figure following behind him. Eric dragged the woman directly into the restroom without any politeness.
Stephanie Seymour didn't expect Eric to be so direct. Fortunately, there was no one in the bathroom, otherwise she really didn't know what to do. Pushed into the cubicle by Eric and staggered down on the toilet, the woman came to her senses, trembling with obvious excitement: "Eric Williams, you, you bastard, you can't so."
Snapped-
The woman's body suddenly softened, and she leaned on the toilet seat, accusing with a half-truth and half-fake voice: "Woo, you hit me again, and you were almost caught last time."
"Shut up and lie down."
"I don't," the woman propped herself up and wanted to get up, but she got another unceremonious slap, and she no longer had the strength to resist, so she could only beg in a low voice: "Eric, no, you can't get the dress off If it's dirty, it will be seen."