New York.

At four o'clock in the afternoon, another day of trading in the North American stock market ended on time, and it was also the last trading day of the week.

As Wall Street elites pondered how to spend the rest of the weekend, a surprise announcement from Westeros shattered everyone's newly relaxed mood.

Westeros' announcement was not long, to the effect that the company would reduce its holdings of six technology companies, including Apple, in the near future due to the needs of corporate development.

After liquidating Motorola stock at the beginning of last year, Westeros has not made any public big moves this year. Moreover, the total value of the six stocks that Westeros is about to reduce this time is not too large, according to the stock price before the market closes today, even if all the positions are liquidated, the cash-out scale is only about 500 million US dollars, of which Apple shares alone account for more than half.

However, no one will forget the technology stock investment boom triggered by the 'Westeros portfolio', let alone the young man behind Westeros who created a series of wealth miracles in just two years.

Does the one-time reduction of six tech stocks mean that Simon Westeros is no longer bullish on the tech sector? Or is there something unknown going on within these six companies? Or is Simon Westeros raising money ready to do something else?

With a series of questions, many investment banks and securities companies have held temporary emergency meetings to discuss the possible impact of Westeros' announcement on the stock market next week. The phone in the office of James Raybould, president of Westeros, was also blown up at the first time.

Apple and six other companies became the object of close attention of many people in the following days.

Westeros chose to announce the reduction of its holdings after the market closed on Friday, in fact, to give everyone time to prepare and avoid a sharp decline caused by the panic sell-off in the technology sector.

After the news was announced, Apple, the core company of this reduction, held a high-level meeting overnight.

In recent years, Apple's market share, revenue scale and profits have continued to rise, and the company's CEO John Scully has not been too worried about Westeros' sudden announcement of a reduction in holdings.

After an emergency meeting, Apple released its 1988 annual earnings report ahead of schedule on Saturday afternoon.

As of December 31, 1988, Apple's total revenue for the year was $2.661 billion, up 39.9% from $1.901 billion in 1987. Net profit for the year was US$218 million, up 41.5% from US$154 million in 1987.

At the same time, Apple's market share increased from 9.3% in 1987 to 12.1%.

Apple's stellar annual financial data has reassured many investors, and the other five companies have also taken corresponding measures under Apple's influence.

James Raybould also publicly supported the Wall Street Journal in an interview with the Wall Street Journal on Saturday, saying that Westeros is still optimistic about the prospects of these technology companies, and only has to take measures to reduce their holdings due to the needs of the company's development.

However, when asked by a reporter from the Wall Street Journal where the money cashed out by Westeros would go, James Raybould did not give a clear answer.

This flickering statement immediately caused a lot of speculation in the media, and began to chase the inside story further.

New Monday.

Among the many media discussions around Westeros' shareholding reduction announcement, an article on the front page of the Wall Street Journal immediately attracted everyone's attention.

Beware, Westeros is going to make a big move!

At this year's joking Golden Globe Awards, Daenerys Entertainment only won two awards for Best Director of "Dead Poets Society" and Best Supporting Actress for "Steel Magnolia" for a series of excellent films produced by Daenerys Entertainment last year. ”

"I don't want to discuss the strong controversy caused by the 46th Golden Globe Awards, I am more curious about how much money Daenerys Entertainment made last year?"

"As a private company, Daenerys Entertainment has no obligation to disclose financial reports. However, we can make rough estimates based on publicly available data. ”

According to industry sources, Daenerys Entertainment and ABC have reopened talks for the second season of "Who Will Be a Millionaire" because Daenerys Entertainment has made far more revenue from this phenomenal puzzle reality show than ABC Network. ”

"Rumor has it that the pre-tax profit of the first season of 'Who Will Be a Millionaire' alone will reach a staggering $250 million!"

In addition, Daenerys Entertainment TV division's reality shows such as "Survivor," "Big Brother" and "Beverly's Wife," which launched last year, also brought the company huge profits. "When Harry Met Sally", "Vulgar", "Instinct" and a large number of blockbuster films have made Daenerys Entertainment make a lot of money. ”

"The local and overseas box office of films such as "Dead Poets" and "Rain Man", as well as peripheral distributions such as videotapes, will only contribute to Daenerys Entertainment this year and next. ”

However, even if we only calculate the income from the film, television and other business areas in 1988, minus the company's various expenses, debts due and taxes payable, the final net profit scale will not be less than 200 million US dollars. ”

"Many people may have begun to wonder, why do I talk about this?"

Because this is the most critical basis for the conclusion of this article. ”

Just Daenerys Entertainment earned Simon Westeros $200 million last year, and the dividends of a series of technology stocks invested by Westeros are also very impressive, so Simon Westeros is obviously not short of funds. ”

However, Simon Westeros' recent series of large investments still chose to be financed through bank loans. ”

According to the investigation, in recent months, Simon Westeros has first secured a $200 million loan from France's Credit Lyonnais, rumored to be used for real estate investment in Europe (a failure, but, who knows, this is Westeros). Subsequently, Daenerys Entertainment took a stake in Blockbuster, Melisandre acquired Gucci, and Simon Westeros raised $250 million from Citibank again. ”

"With two new debts, excluding a small amount of repaid installments, Simon Westeros' personal debt remains close to $900 million. ”

"Such a large amount of debt obviously means a huge amount of interest expense, and even if Simon Westeros has the strength to repay it, it is obviously not wise to increase his personal debt rashly when he has sufficient funds to do so. ”

"Is Simon Westeros an unwise man?"

The answer is obvious. ”

So, here's the problem. ”

Daenerys Entertainment has been hoarding large sums of cash, and Westeros has begun to cash out Westeros' technology stocks, even selling stocks like Apple that have a lot of growth potential. However, in the company's foreign investment behavior, it still continues to choose loans. ”

"So, what exactly does Simon Westeros want to do as he continues to accumulate cash?"

The author can't help but think that in 1987, "Lola Run" continued to be popular at the box office, and Simon Westeros, who held all the rights of the film except for the distribution rights of the North American local theaters, did not choose to seriously manage the film, but hurriedly sold it all at a low price. ”

It is said that the subsequent copyrights only brought Simon Westeros $80 million. Warner Bros. obtained $35 million for overseas distribution rights, of which only $200 million at the overseas box office, allowed Warner to double the revenue, and Simon Westeros's out-of-sale behavior can be called stupid. ”

"Yet. ”

"What happened next, everybody knows. ”

"What Simon Westeros is doing now, it's just as similar to what it was two years ago. ”

At the same time, on the other side of the ocean, in Japan, the Nikkei 225 index has broken through the 31,000-point mark, an increase of 138% in just three years. The Japanese stock market is now behaving in the same way as the North American stock market madness in 1987. ”

The author boldly guesses that Simon Westeros's next target is Japan. ”

Even, at the time of this article's publication, Simon Westeros may have already begun his own layout of the Japanese stock market. ”

"In the end, let's wait and see. ”

The most immediate consequence of the Wall Street Journal's front-page article was that it succeeded in diverting much of the attention from Westeros' reduction in technology stocks. At the start of the day, the North American stock market technology sector did not see the sharp decline that many investors feared.

Apple's shares rose 1.7% during Monday's session, supported by an excellent earnings report released on Saturday.

On the other hand, the Wall Street Journal expressed the view in the article that Simon Westeros is clearly shorting the Japanese stock market, and most people apparently hold this view. However, Simon is actually going long.

Due to the time difference, when the article was published, it was already Monday evening, Tokyo time, and it was temporarily escaped.

However, if this view is allowed to spread, it is not difficult to imagine that Simon's already established long position in Nikkei 225 futures will face a huge loss tomorrow.

Simon even thinks that the article is likely to be secretly promoted by some hedge funds that are short the Japanese stock market.

After a brief decline in 1987, it continued to rise sharply for more than a year, and the bubble component of the Japanese stock market has far exceeded that of North America, and a large number of short-selling forces have already entered the market.

Although he has no good feelings for Japan in his bones, out of his own interests, Simon cannot be the 'straw that breaks the camel's back'.

The bears make money and do not share the benefits to themselves.

Therefore, after urgently discussing with James Raybould on the phone, in the afternoon, several mainstream evening newspapers in North America published some insider information: Simon Westeros has indeed entered the Japanese stock market, but not short, but long.

To Simon's surprise, in addition to his arrangement with Raybould, a well-known Lehman Brothers analyst said in an interview that according to reliable sources, Westeros was indeed long.

Obviously, the news of Simon's previous entry has already leaked.

Everyone had only quietly followed Simon into the village before, and even took the initiative to limit the spread of the news. Without the unpreparedness of the Wall Street Journal article, some people would have followed Simon's muffled fortune all the time.

However, plans can never catch up with change.

At this critical moment, those who also bet heavily on the bulls may be worried that Simon will be too slow to react, so they can only take the initiative to jump out to help him 'clarify'.

Lehman.

When Simon heard the news, he could only smile bitterly.

After those events, Simon had no contact with Lehman Brothers, but after witnessing Simon's miraculous stock index futures operation in 1987, Lehman Brothers apparently never gave up trying to get some more opportunities from him.

At this point, there is no need to hide the matter.

James Raybould simply contacted the NBC financial channel, and in an interview that evening, he publicly said that "Westeros is still very optimistic about the growth potential of the Japanese stock market", which is equivalent to officially acknowledging the fact that Westeros is going long.

On the Japanese side, after the publication of the "Wall Street Journal" article, all circles of Japanese politics and business circles were involved.

Of course, the Japanese government is also aware of the serious bubble in its own stock market, and has been introducing various policies to restrict the blind growth of the stock market for more than a year after the 87 stock market crash.

If other media and individuals are singing about it, the Japanese government will only decide whether to ignore it or routinely refute it based on the influence of the other party.

However.

Simon Westeros.

Although the Wall Street Journal article predicted that Simon Westeros would have access to only a few hundred million dollars, it was nothing to mention in the face of the sheer size of the Japanese stock market. However, whether it is the entertainment industry or the financial industry, what Simon Westeros has done in recent years can only be described as a 'miracle'.

This strange demon star that suddenly rose is really careless.

At an emergency meeting of the Japanese authorities, some officials even began to ask major consortia to prepare funds to take measures to rescue the market.

A few hours later, the situation suddenly reversed.

Simon Westeros is not shorting the Japanese stock market, but is going long.

Overjoyed.

After suffering all night, a group of Japanese political and business tycoons with dark circles finally breathed a sigh of relief after seeing the interview report of James Raybould, president of Westeros, through live TV.

Still, it seems that something more can be done.

Since Simon Westeros is optimistic about the Japanese stock market, there must be a lot of benefits to wooing it at this time.

Tokyo time is only an hour ahead of Melbourne.

Monday night was still an eight-hour night shoot, and as soon as Simon woke up in the morning, Jennifer told him that the Japanese ambassador to Melbourne had arrived at the Kendall Hotel before eight o'clock and had been waiting in the restaurant, hoping to talk to him.

Simon understands that the Japanese just want him to make a public statement in person, which is not a problem, anyway, it is necessary to turn when the bulls turn shorts.

Downstairs to the restaurant, in addition to introducing himself as the Japanese ambassador to Melbourne named Takagi Mian, there are two other people, a man and a woman, the middle-aged man is a reporter from Japan's "Asahi Shimbun", and the girl who is beautiful and smiles and has unexpectedly very straight teeth is a translator, named Yoko Kosugi.

Simon actually knows some Japanese that can meet the needs of everyday conversation, but Takagi and the Asahi Shimbun reporter, whose surname is a little unknown, are both fluent in English, so Simon communicates directly with them in English.

As a result, the translator named Yoko Kosugi seemed to be a little redundant, but the girl took the initiative to sit next to Simon while everyone was having breakfast together, and she seemed very attentive.

During the meal, he briefly answered a few questions from the Asahi Shimbun reporter, and finally took a photo with Takagi Tsutomi, which was obviously used as a picture for the interview article, which is probably the most important.

Then, when Takagi Tsutomu left, it was natural to suggest that Miss Kosugi could stay and help Simon take care of his daily chores. He also said that the girl was actually a Japanese student at the University of Melbourne, and if Simon was willing, he could take it as an opportunity for the girl to work and study.

Simon was still a little puzzled before, the Japanese have always been very polite, and this time they obviously asked for themselves, and it was too unusual to come empty-handed.

It turned out that he had brought a 'gift'.

It's just that, although Jennifer next to her looks like a casual little thing, this 'gift' obviously can't be accepted.

rejected the kindness of the Japanese, and just sent the other party away, Janet's eldest brother Anthony Johnston called and invited Simon to Johnston's house for lunch at noon, and Simon directly agreed.

Now that the news has been released, these things must not be avoided.