1994 was not a wonderful year for Wall Street. Just after waking up from the dream of sniping at the old Europe, it fell headlong on the Europa continent. In 1992 and 1993, the two consecutive European foreign exchange wars made major American hedge funds a lot of money. In 1993, the European bond market was fattened by the pockets of many financiers. As a result, in 1994, in order to strengthen the economy and curb inflation, the Federal Reserve announced to raise interest rates by 25 basis points. This modest adjustment to the stock market led to a collapse in the bond market.
No one could have predicted this collapse, and no one could even explain the cause of the collapse. All brokers knew that their bonds had hit rock bottom overnight, and the exchanges were selling like crazy, and no one was willing to spend even a penny on bonds. , As turbulent as it came, hedge funds have withdrawn from Europe. In just two months, the entire U.S. securities market has evaporated $600 billion, and the foreign bond market of $900 billion has been destroyed. The short-term godfather Michael Steinhardt lost as much as $1.3 billion, and Bankers Trust is on the verge of collapse. .
In this catastrophic change called "Hurricane Greenspan", few people can escape to the sky, and the whole Wall Street is gloomy and gloomy. Even if the stock market still climbs moderately and steadily, it cannot stop the tragic losses of financiers. Hedge funds instantly become Rats crossing the street were accused and condemned by everyone. But this kind of disaster and change is not a bad thing for Chen Yuanming.
In mid-May, Chen Yuanming returned to Wall Street, saved his own money and applied for a short-term low-interest loan from Citibank. At this time, major commercial banks were affected by venture capital and hedge funds, and they also fell into a period of loss. Although they were not as bad as Goldman Sachs, they were not much better. Bad credit is like putting a noose around the neck of a commercial bank, making them short of breath and nervous. Therefore, commercial lending has entered a short period of tightening. To borrow from a bank, a very high credit rating is required.
And what about Chen Yuanming? He is indeed a very credible lender. After reviewing his bank account, shares of Feiyan and Eagle Nest, as well as Dianjinshi Company and its as many as 7 or 8 venture capital projects, Citibank gave him a high credit rating. It is a good thing for the bank to have a very reliable lender in such a chaotic time. Therefore, using his own assets as collateral, Chen Yuanming easily applied for a loan of up to 1.5 billion US dollars from Citibank for a period of 6 months, and the interest rate was only a little more than 4%.
Since Feiyan was involved in this loan, Yan Qiaosen of course also learned the news, full of surprise, he called Chen Yuanming, Yuan New York, and asked him why he had to borrow such a large sum of money and what he needed urgently. money place? Chen Yuanming just smiled and gave him two words, "futures".
Yes, this year was a nightmare disaster for the bond market, but for the other trading floor, it was a completely different story. In the mid-1990s, gold, silver, and oil futures trades fell into a trough due to the sudden change in the world structure, but relative metal trades, especially copper and aluminum trades reached their peaks. This is not only due to the double impact of the collapse of the Soviet Union and China's economic take-off, but also because of the black-box operations of the financial giants.
In response to what happened during this period, any futures textbook will mention it in detail. Just one year later, the Sumitomo Incident that shocked the world happened.
As one of the super-large conglomerates in Japan, Sumitomo Group once ranked No. 22 in the world's top 5 rankings. Sumitomo Group once controlled some or all of the shares of many copper mines and smelters around the world, including Chile and the Philippines. It is the famous "Mr. Five Percent" in the copper futures industry. A large number of copper forward contracts have been established in the futures market, and they control more than 5% of the London copper market's trading volume and open interest. Such a strong alliance with Sumitomo can be called a A giant alligator in metals trading.
But the giant crocodile was restless.
From the end of 1993 to the beginning of 1995, due to the strong trading operation of Binzhongtaimen, the copper price once soared from about US$16/ton to the peak of US$375/ton. When he controlled LMe copper warehouse receipts, it accounted for as much as 9% of the exchange. Sit on the throne of the world's copper trade. However, such a terrible figure has long violated the normal value of goods. Binzhong Tainan himself has been warned twice by the London Metal Exchange. Who knows that the price of copper will not fall but rise, and it has completely turned into a purely digital game. The so-called Mr. Hammer Japan The man is simply arrogant.
However, there will never be more than one predator in the financial world. In the face of such high prices that are extremely contrary to market laws, others show their fangs unexpectedly. Quantum Fund, Tiger Fund, Canadian metal trader herbert Blanet itter and some large European metal traders responded and began to short the copper price. The trading commission and the London Metal Exchange both investigated Sumitomo Group's violations, and copper prices began to fall, but the tug of war continued for half a year. It was not until mid-1996 that the copper price plummeted 6% and Sumitomo Group lost US$400 million.
This incident can be described as a gorgeous scene in the futures market in the mid-1990s. Even the Soros Quantum Fund could not resist the pressure and returned with a feather on the eve of the decisive battle. Only the Tiger Fund became famous and made huge profits. At the same time, due to the soaring copper price, it also drove the aluminum price to rise. It can be said that these two saved some financial giants in the bond market from huge losses.
When he read relevant materials in the early years, Chen Yuanming was not overwhelmed by the ups and downs of the situation. Now that a great opportunity is in front of him, how can he bear to let it go. As early as March, when the U.S. bond market collapsed, he began to pay attention to changes in copper prices. In mid-April, the securities market initially stabilized. At the end of April, those hedge funds and investment banks that suffered heavy losses began to look for profit points, and copper prices began to climb in early May. At the same time, the price of aluminum has also climbed steadily amid the worldwide production reduction. All these price changes have verified the correctness of the information in the books of the previous life. For this wave of short-term profits as high as 6% or more, he must give it a shot!
After getting the loan, according to the size of the disk, Chen Yuanming established a copper warehouse at a price of 195 US dollars / ton and bought a long position of 100 million US dollars. At the same time, it cut into the metal aluminum market at the price of 1375 US dollars / ton, and bought a long position of 50 million US dollars. The rest of the money was invested in Cisco and Microsoft stocks, respectively, which is Microsoft's disk. Now that inds95 has not been released yet, and Microsoft's share price has not yet started to soar, it is the perfect time to start. Chen Yuanming purchased 30,000 shares of Microsoft with US$15 million. , completed a 3% stock acquisition for only $8 million.
Such an amazing handwriting shocked a group of people. Yan Qiaosen, Meng Lisheng, and even Jonathan called to inquire, but Chen Yuanming didn't say much, and he couldn't even explain in depth. Not to mention the changes in the futures market, the explosion of the Internet in the next 6 or 7 years will be unpredictable and unbelievable for most people. In the past few years on the eve of 2 years ago, almost without exception, the Nasdaq-listed technology stocks created a multi-fold increase. Those giants and the leaders of the times created a miracle of a thousand-fold increase.
Chen Yuanming was not moved by this immeasurable profit, but he was currently struggling to cope with the lack of funds, and one more important point was that he could not easily get involved with these real giants, even if he had money. His nationality means that he cannot intervene in the core high-tech industries of the United States at all, nor can he point fingers at these behemoths that are related to people's livelihood. Technological barriers are like a fortified wall, blocking the flow of technology between developed and developing countries, and also causing developing countries, including China, to suffer for technological innovation. In the near future, countless failed mergers and acquisitions will give Chinese people a head start, making them realize the necessity and urgency of independent innovation.
This kind of dreadful obstacle is not something that he can easily jump over as a small person, so it is his best and even the only choice to increase angel investment. This is a real barren land. Those who are growing like seedlings are now the US government will not intervene, and they are also blind spots in the vision of those giants. They use a small part of the funds to support them to start. Slowly nibbling away in this way, he will be able to obtain a new forest, and relying on these forests to breed fertile soil will also become the source of his blood transfusion to China.
When these dense forests truly mature, the Internet bubble era will come. At that time, Silicon Valley will experience a real catastrophe, a large number of elite talents will face unemployment, a large number of potential companies will go bankrupt or be acquired, and once prosperous small enterprises will fall into the real world. Painfully purged and reorganized, adding incalculable nutrients to those giants and establishing their dominance. At this time, he can collect talents who are beneficial to China like choosing vegetables at a supermarket with reduced prices. It was not until 23 years ago that the United States once again tightened the export of software and high-tech products to China. Before that, he had too many time, isn't it
After a series of intensive operations, it was not until the end of June that Chen Yuanming completed his Wall Street layout. Since stocks can be held for a long time and futures are half-yearly, they do not need much attention at all. Dianjinshi Company finally ushered in steady development after a few months of running-in. Several competent general partners have also reached a consensus on Chen Yuanming's investment direction, and the pressure on Chen Yuanming has naturally eased.
The burden here is lighter, and there is spare energy to look around. At this time, Yan Qiaosen Studio has already launched the MPeg-2 format, and through the MPeg forum demonstration, it has obtained the corresponding patents and qualifications, and has become the next-generation compression format standard. However, this compression mode cannot be extended to applications. At present, the optical disc medium still has defects, and there are obvious deficiencies in capacity and logical partition, which cannot meet the needs of MPeg-2.
Since the acquisition of the first optical disc studio, it has only taken half a year for the company to make a major revolution in the dye layer of the optical disc. Nitrogen dyes constitute blue disks, and the anti-photosensitive and optical drive read and write stability have been significantly improved. After a period of testing, this product has been officially put into production. Feiyan has quickly improved its optical disc production line in Shantou. With downstream production capacity, it is believed that blue discs will replace green discs and become the mainstream of the market.
This improvement alone is enough to have a major impact on an industry, but the next-generation optical disc needs leather is far from being as simple as surface coating. After careful consideration, Zero Time Company adjusted its strategic pattern, tightened the R&D line, and gave up. For the further research and development of the read and write speed of the optical drive, the energy is put into the improvement of the optical disc medium and the laser head.
This kind of outsider seems to put the cart before the horse in the direction of research and development, but it is the key. In the past few months, improvements in optical disc technology have emerged one after another, and now it has steadily entered the threshold of the next era. You must know that at this time, it is more than zero to develop the next generation of optical discs. Sony -Not to mention the Philips Alliance, and even Toshiba has entered the war, joining hands with Time Warner to secretly exert force. Therefore, breaking through technical barriers early and getting results is the key to everything.
Now standing in the zero-hour workshop, Chen Yuanming picked up the CD in front of him and looked at it carefully.
"This is how you developed the disc."
From the appearance alone, this disc is no different from ordinary CD discs. It is a 12-round disc with a single-sided structure. The dye used is not Feiyanxian mass-produced blue discs, but pure white gold.
"That's right!" Yan Qiaosen nodded with excitement on his face, "Don't think it looks like a CD, but its function is completely different! The idea is similar to what you mentioned before, using two layers of six matrix layers. The laser head is made of concentrated red laser technology, which can accurately locate and focus on the disc. The length of the small pits is also reduced by half compared with the original CD834μ, the track spacing is only 74μ, and the surface coating is Titanium Qing…”
A lot of professional terminology hit him like an avalanche, Chen Yuanming looked at each other with tears in his eyes, "Professor Yan, say the key point..."
"Cough..." Suddenly realizing that the other party is a layman without any basics, Yan Qiaosen coughed awkwardly, "In short, it meets the basic requirements of the hDVA grp organization, but the effect is not very stable, and the development of the corresponding player will take a long time."
"That doesn't matter." The topic finally changed to the level that he could understand, Chen Yuanming smiled, "Since the finished product is available, what needs to be done now is to stabilize the technical standards first, and publish the format specification in the name of Feiyan. If the group communicates well, it is easy to establish a firm foothold in joint release. In addition, it is necessary to continue to develop anti-theft measures. Only one Css is not enough. It also needs some functions that can prevent the CD-ROM from reading the disc and prevent the VCR from stealing and copying. Now the three major groups are competing , the decisive factor is not only the quality of the disc, but the theft is even more important than the capacity issue... ”
Yan Qiaosen nodded as he listened, "What about the development of the optical drive? Do you want to restart..."
"Of course. And you can give up the rewritable function. This kind of flashy video tape function is no longer suitable for optical discs. It is the key to grasp the speed of burning and reading and writing. This aspect can be dominated by Zero Hour, and the development of the player will be directly handed over to Feiyan technical department is good, after all, we have accumulated a lot of experience in the development of VCD machines, and this patent right cannot be easily handed over to Wen Group..."
In this way, the two of them sat in the office chatting about various matters related to the first-generation CD until the sun went down, and they woke up at the same time when a protest rumbling sounded.
"It's all because of this Silicon Valley temperament..." Yan Qiaosen laughed. He was used to working overtime. He had long been used to starving, but the boy in front of him obviously hadn't learned this trick. "Let's go, I'll treat you today, let's celebrate!"
Chen Yuanming felt a little embarrassed and touched his stomach. He didn't lose to anyone in terms of working overtime and staying up late, but his recent physical development was too great, so he couldn't keep up with the consumption, but he smiled relieved after just a moment, "Okay, but let's say it first, but we can't. After eating steak, this guy can't wait..."
"Haha, it's easy to say, there is a restaurant next to it. I'm there every day. I'm very familiar with it." Yan Qiaosen pushed the bridge of his nose and put on his glasses, stood up, and was about to take Chen Yuanming out, when he suddenly remembered something. " By the way, after talking about it for so long, what do we want to call the next-generation CD?"
After being asked this, Chen Yuanming was stunned for a moment, then suddenly grinned, "Let's call it Digital Versatile Dis, Digital Versatile Disc, or DVD for short."
Seeing that the situation in the United States is very good, Chen Yuanming and Yan Qiaosen are enthusiastic and put in a round of overtime. Who knows that the DVD standard has not been officially established, and a message is sent back from China. In just two sentences, it is like a basin of cold water. Doused the enthusiasm of the two.
Meng Lisheng's voice on the phone was surprisingly serious, "You and Lao Yan come back quickly, we are going to file a lawsuit!"
The author has something to say: Greenspan, then Federal Reserve Chairman
I have nothing to say about the weight today. QAQ is all dry stuff.
Yesterday, the nest was really frightened by the surging of my friends. Thunder is like raindrops. Hey QAQ 嘤嘤嘤, it cost everyone a lot of money, but the speed and data limit cards are really difficult. QAQ, please don't dislike it...