I’m in Hollywood

Los Angeles International Airport.

Olivia spent ten days at the Pointe Manor and planned to return to London.

Eric wanted to use his private jet to send her back, but the relationship between the two parties has never been made public. Olivia was worried that taking Eric's private jet would be noticed by people who wanted to, and still chose a commercial flight.

At four o'clock in the afternoon, standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows of the VIP lounge of Los Angeles International Airport, watching Olivia's flight skid off the runway and rush into the clouds, Eric turned and left.

Today is May 21st, another Friday.

Although the attack last night was very painful at the time, it didn't actually hurt any bones, and then it was fine after three or four days of rest. However, Eric still 'cultivated' at home. Just over a week.

This week, with the announcement that Firefly System will stop cooperating with Blockbuster chain stores, Hollywood is very lively, and the media throughout North America and the world are closely watching the dispute between Firefly System and Viacom Group.

Lei Shidong was indeed worthy of his tough character, and he did not show any signs of softening for a whole week. After publicly criticizing the Firefly system on Monday, it handed over all the work that required public appearances to other Viacom executives.

However, Redstone's attitude is tough, but Viacom's stock price has not shown the same toughness as Redstone.

When Eric was eating with Olivia at noon, he received information on Viacom's share price on the East Coast as of the close of the week.

Although Viacom's stock price began to slow down in the next few working days after Monday's sharp drop, the company's stock price fell by 23% in a week, wiping out $16.8 billion in market value.

At this point, Viacom's market capitalization has plummeted to $56.3 billion after today's close, relative to its market value of $73.1 billion at the start of the week.

In just one week, the book loss of stock reached 16.8 billion US dollars. Even if Redstone himself could bear it, other shareholders of Viacom Group could not bear it.

The Redstone family still owns 56% of Viacom's voting rights at this time due to the dual-class ownership structure. Typically, there is hardly anyone who can threaten the Redstone family's dominance over Viacom.

However, the dual shareholding structure is not a panacea. Once the major shareholders with absolute control are unable to solve the problems faced by the company for a long time, which will seriously damage the interests of most shareholders, external shareholders can still convene an extraordinary general meeting to abolish the company by voting. A dual-class share structure, reorganizing the company's board of directors and management.

Under the U.S. Securities Exchange Act, abolishing the dual-class share structure requires the support of two-thirds of a company's shareholders.

After the merger of CBS Group, the Redstone family held only 13.5% of Viacom Group's shares through National Entertainment Corporation, and the remaining 86.5% of the shares were held by institutions and public shareholders. If Redstone went his own way and completely lost the support of all external shareholders, it would not be too difficult to win about 66.7% of the votes from the 86.5% of the stock.

Now, the company's market value has plummeted by $16.8 billion in a week, apparently reaching the limit of most of Viacom's outside shareholders.

Leaving the airport lobby and getting into the car with Caroline who also came to see Olivia farewell, Eric ordered the driver to go to Firefly Studios. Although it's almost time for get off work, but I haven't been to the company for more than a week, and I happened to be on the way, so I decided to go and sit for a while.

The driver entered Lincoln Avenue outside the airport, and Eric asked Caroline next to him: So, is there anything else I need to know today?

Although recently out of work, the assistant's office sends a daily memo to Eric's e-mail box listing company affairs that need to be known to Eric himself. This is also the consistent style of Eric's management of the company.

He will not easily intervene in the specific decisions of the companies in the Firefly system, giving the management full autonomy, but at the same time he knows the operating conditions of these companies well.

The shell company controlled by Nokia negotiated an $8 million acquisition price this morning with ntp, which holds the mobile mail patent, and the contract can be signed next week; Bourne Bourne has just completed a preliminary budget The production cost was $70 million; a work progress report on Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was sent in the afternoon from London and will be in your email by tomorrow morning; Ronald Hill has sent Adam Wembley, founder of the 'Hollywood Gossip' website, filed a lawsuit. If he loses the case, Adam Wembley may face at least five years in prison. Not only that, even if he gets all his money, he still has to carry millions of dollars compensation in US dollars.

Eric leaned on the back of the chair casually, listening to Caroline talking about the 'Hollywood gossip', and interrupted: You don't need to pay attention to these things in the future, just let Mary be in charge.

Caroline pursed her lips and blinked her eyes, seemingly dissatisfied: Eric, I'm not a child.

I know.

I'm not a porcelain doll either.

Of course, Eric smiled, reached out and pinched Caroline's face affectionately, and said, You are a rag doll.

Caroline shrank her neck in anger, blushing slightly, and said, Eric, you are bullying me again.

Well, sorry, right? I'm sorry, I shouldn't have bullied little Carly, Eric smiled insincerely and said, Hey, let's continue.

Caroline wanted to imitate Mayer and ignore Eric for a while, but she still couldn't hold back, saying: As of today's close, the Nasdaq has reached 3976, and it will break through next week. 4000 points. We got news that Tiger Fund has completely stopped short-selling and started buying technology stocks, but the capital size of this fund is now only $8 billion.”

In the wiretapping incident some time ago, Firefly caught the Tiger Fund, one of the masterminds behind it, so Eric's assistant office has been paying attention to the operation of this fund all this time.

Compared to its peak two years ago, Tiger Fund's capital has shrunk by more than half.

Hearing Caroline say this, Eric couldn't help shaking his head slightly.

If Julian Robertson were to stop in time now, Tiger Fund would be able to survive even with only $8 billion in capital.

But the other party followed the trend and began to buy technology stocks at this time. This is obviously because Julian Robertson has already been riding a tiger. He is like a gambler who has lost a lot of money and completely lost his mind. Constantly betting chips in an attempt to turn the tables, only to fail miserably.

Since mid-March, the Nasdaq has risen from 3,000 points to a high of nearly 4,000 points in more than two months. At this rate, in another two months, at the latest in early August, the Nasdaq will reach the peak of 5,000 points in Eric's memory.

And, very sensitively, July and August are just the time when listed companies announce their financial data for the second quarter of 1999. Although it is not an annual financial report, if the quarterly financial reports of a large number of new technology companies generally show huge losses, the Nasdaq index, which has already peaked, has a high probability of ushering in a collapse.

Of course, Eric didn't dare to be 100% sure at this time.

Because, as the main technology stock company in the Nasdaq stock market, the revenue data of several giants such as Microsoft, Cisco and Yahoo are all very good.

Microsoft will not say, but in the first quarter, this new technology giant, which has basically monopolized the desktop operating system, achieved a net profit of 1.925 billion US dollars, and it is expected that the net profit for the whole year may reach 8 billion US dollars. , nearly doubled last year's $4.5 billion profit.

As the largest router equipment manufacturer in North America, Cisco can almost be said to be the infrastructure equipment supplier for the entire Internet industry. Although the market value in recent months has been chasing Microsoft furiously, the revenue performance is also dazzling enough.

However, when it comes to revenue growth, none of the other giants can match Yahoo.

In order to greatly increase their traffic and attention in the short term, major new technology companies have invested more and more heavily in advertising and marketing in recent months.

As the world's largest online advertising platform, Yahoo began to benefit from it last year, generating $1.6 billion in revenue for the year.

But this year, in just the first three months, countless Internet companies have spent more than $700 million in advertising on various advertising channels of Yahoo Portal, which has a market share of more than 70%, including Yahoo Music Store, business email service, yahoopay Other revenue such as interface licensing, Yahoo's first-quarter turnover soared to $ 937 million.

It can be expected that in just the first two quarters, Yahoo's revenue data will exceed the full year of last year.

Throughout 1999, Yahoo's full-year turnover is likely to reach $4 billion if it follows the momentum of the first quarter. With a huge revenue of 4 billion US dollars, as long as the management is willing, it is completely easy to make a net profit report of hundreds of millions of dollars.

Of course, all this is just the most optimistic expectation.

Once the Nasdaq collapses, Yahoo's rapid momentum at this time is destined to come to an abrupt end.

However, in any case, as the purest Internet company in the new technology sector, Yahoo's revenue data in the first two quarters is so good, it will definitely further stimulate the Nasdaq index.

On the one hand, it is the rapid growth of new technology giants, and on the other hand, there is a large number of losses of countless small and medium Internet companies. It is difficult to imagine what will happen when the Nasdaq index breaks through 5,000 points in July and August.

Therefore, Eric has now completely abandoned his forecast for the Nasdaq market. Just step by step to clear out the shares in the hands of the Clover Fund, and then plan to ignore the onlookers.

After taking Caroline to Firefly Studios, he worked in the office until more than six o'clock, and after get off work, he invited two female assistants to have dinner together before Eric returned to Jiaojiao Manor.

Just as the black luxury Mercedes entered the gate of the manor in the dark, Eric heard the news that the front row driver communicated with the manor bodyguard, and Elizabeth was already waiting in the villa.

Eric walked into the villa and soon found a lazy girl leaning on the sofa beside the curtain wall holding a magazine.

Leaning over and kissing Elizabeth's lips, Eric asked with concern, Have you eaten yet?

No, Elizabeth sniffed habitually, her expression immediately resentful, and said, If you don't come back tonight, I plan to starve to death here and talk to you every night in the future.

Eric squeezed the girl's chin with a smile, and said, It's so vicious, you didn't tell me you were coming, where's Julia?

Elizabeth held down Eric's strange hand that was about to slide down her chin and said, Isn't the filming of Never Compromise started, she has been with the group these days, living in a small town near Nevada superior.

Oh, let's go then, I'll take you out to dinner.

Don't want to go out, you do it for me.

Okay, Eric nodded, pulled the girl up again, and said, There is something to eat in the kitchen. If you are too hungry, just eat a little.

Elizabeth didn't resist this time. She got up and followed Eric to the kitchen. They picked the ingredients from the refrigerator together. After working with Eric for a while, she suddenly said, Dad asked me to break up with you.

Eric put the egg into the bowl, stirred it, and said, It doesn't matter, you tell him that you and Julia are actually a couple.

You want to see me killed.

Not all your brothers are fine, and besides, your old man can't beat you.

You bastard, Elizabeth raised her hand and tapped Eric on the shoulder, Dad arranged a girlfriend for Lachlan and let them get married at the end of the year.

I'm quite familiar with several major modeling agencies. If they don't have time, they can find a dozen male models to hold a bachelorette party for Lachlan, and they are guaranteed to be the most beautiful.

Then my father is really going to be mad at you, Elizabeth finally couldn't help laughing, hammered Eric again, and said in a blink of an eye, Don't gloat over the misfortune, you can't tell in the future. You have to deal with this, too, with a lot of kids, and that Cindy Crawford is pregnant too, right?

Eric automatically ignored Elizabeth's last question and said: I originally planned to raise a group of little bastards who did nothing to turn the world upside down. It's just that Kevin, Xia Xia, and Emma are too much right now. I'm disappointed, I don't have the potential to become a bad guy at all, Eric said and turned to the girl beside him: I'll leave this arduous task to you.

Elizabeth blushed, and she didn't bother to hit Eric again, and said, If that's the case, I'd rather strangle him to death in advance.

Rough enough, it seems that this matter can only fall on you.

Elizabeth threw away the carrot in her hand, glared at Eric and said, I'm going to be full of you if you talk about it.

Eric's hand stirring the eggs stopped, put down the bowl and chopsticks, turned around and embraced the girl in his arms, and said in a gentle tone: Okay, I apologize, I know it's unfair to you.

Elizabeth put her chin on Eric's shoulder, enjoying the man's hug, and her voice softened: You are finally willing to say something serious.

Seeing that you are quite hesitant, so liven up the atmosphere. Are you feeling better now?

Um.

That's good, Eric patted the girl's back lightly, and said, However, this world is inherently unfair, so it's time to face the reality.

Eric.

Um?

I suddenly want to bite.

Oh ah!!!

...

After being squeezed a lot last night, it happened to be Saturday again, the sky was already bright, and Eric still had no idea of ​​getting up, but Elizabeth ran to prepare breakfast in high spirits early in the morning.

While in a daze, the bedroom door was suddenly pushed open, and Elizabeth rushed in, slapping Eric while picking up the remote control to turn on the wall-mounted TV in the bedroom, gloating: Eric, look! Viacom's press conference, your plans are probably going to fall through.