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At this time, Zhang Ran and John Paulson were sitting opposite each other in the dining room, chatting casually about the housing market.

Early last year, John Paulson realized that something was wrong in the mortgage market and began raising capital to short the market. However, he was not well-known on Wall Street, and the entire real estate market seemed to be booming, with no signs of malaise, and he did not raise funds smoothly until Zhang Ran handed over $400 million to him, and he successfully formed his first fund. At the end of the year, Zhang Ran gave him another 400 million through an agent and let him build a second fund.

Just this month, the chill hit Wall Street, with New Century Financial Corporation, the second-largest subprime mortgage lender in the United States, forecasting quarterly losses, and two hedge funds from Bear Stearns, the fifth-largest investment bank in the United States, that invested in subprime mortgages, also collapsed. The subprime mortgage crisis was inevitable, and in just a few days, Paulson's two funds appreciated by 30 percent.

The feast was about to begin, and the two were in a very happy mood.

After chatting for a while, Zhang Ran picked up a towel and wiped his mouth and said, "There's something I want to ask you." ”

John Paulson also knew that Zhang Ran must have asked him that something must be wrong, and smiled: "What's the matter?"

Zhang Ran asked, "Carl Icahn, do you know each other?"

No one on Wall Street is unaware of Carl Icahn, who, over the past 20 years, has become a "corporate predator" that CEOs talk about with a series of well-known hostile takeovers.

In the eyes of critics, Icahn was concerned with profiting from acquisitions and sales, and never with the growth of the business. However, Fortune magazine described him as a sophisticated and multi-talented man who was well-versed in all sorts of ways to make money, and probably made more money for his shareholders than any other speculator on the planet.

John Paulson naturally knew: "We had dinner together the other day, why do you want to meet him?"

Zhang Ran didn't hide it, and said directly: "I want the shares of Blockbuster in his hand." ”

Mr. Paulson was stunned that Blockbuster was the largest DVD rental company in the United States, but that the company was doing badly because of the Internet and the rise of rival Netflix. In '04, Blockbuster had 9,000 chain stores in the United States, and now there are only more than 4,000. He was a little puzzled: "Are you interested in BesTV? DVD rental is a sunset industry, and there is no room for growth at all." Not to mention Blockbuster, even Netflix, which has better performance, Wall Street is not optimistic. Netflix's profits nearly doubled last year, but its share price has stagnated. ”

Zhang Ran's idea of playing Blockbuster is to lay out the global distribution network, which is the same as Wanda's acquisition of AMC. It's just that this thing is too complicated to talk about, and he said simply: "I have a film company in my hands, but you also know that Hollywood has a monopoly on distribution channels, even if I distribute it myself, but the TV network is in their hands, and advertising and post-TV income still have to be subject to them, so I need to set up my own distribution network." ”

Paulson was puzzled, "Why don't you choose Netflix?"

Zhang Ran smiled and said: "Netflix is too expensive, with a market value of nearly 2 billion, and it takes a lot of money to acquire it, and I don't have that much money, and the market value of Blockbuster is only 600 million now, so it is much easier to acquire." ”

Paulson's doubts are still not completely solved: "If you want to buy Blockbuster, you can directly launch a tender offer when the time comes, why do you want to buy the shares in the hands of Carl Icahn first?"

In fact, the reason is very simple, Blockbuster and Netflix are competitors, and now the war between the two companies has entered a critical period, Blockbuster has launched a plan called grid connection, which is to integrate stores and online businesses, consumers only need to pay a fixed monthly fee, whether it is online, or to the store, whether it is renting or returning DVDs, you can get a unified service, a bit of the meaning of the later generation O2O model.

This is quite a powerful move, and in just two months since its launch in November last year, nearly 1 million new users have been attracted to Blockbuster, including quite a few who originally subscribed to the Netflix service. 1 million users is not a big deal in 10 years, but now in 2007, Netflix has a total of 6 million users.

Financial experts have found that if the battlefield continues, Netflix's share price could collapse within two years, but at the same time, Blockbuster could go bankrupt within two years due to the rapid decline in store turnover due to its huge investment in promoting its online business, coupled with its high debt in the past.

This war is simply bloody, and whoever lasts a long time will be the final winner.

Before Zhang Ran's rebirth, Netflix's development was already booming, and it shocked the world with its self-made drama "House of Cards". He had read the relevant reports and knew that the war between Blockbuster and Netflix was unexpectedly ended not long after it began.

According to the incentive plan set by Blockbuster's board of directors, Blockbuster CEO Antioco should receive a bonus of up to $7.6 million for bringing in a large number of new users for promoting the grid connection plan. But Carl Icahn, the majority shareholder of Blockbuster, thought that the money was too high, and he thought that the company was in difficulty, and how could the CEO take so much money, so he cut Antioco's bonus by 2 million.

Antioco felt insulted, I worked so hard to bring so many new users to the company, why didn't I say a word, and cut my 2 million bonus. So, he refused to accept it and eventually resigned in anger. And Carl Icahn's new CEO used to be a chain store, but he immediately cut the grid-connected plan after taking office.

Netflix, which had been cornered, escaped, and has been out of control ever since.

Zhang Ran wants to buy Blockbuster, but most of his money is now in Paulson's fund, and he can only wait until after Paulson's fund pays dividends at the end of the year. So, before that, he has to let Carl Icahn go, otherwise history will repeat itself and Blockbuster will cut the online business, which will not make any sense to Zhang Ran.

However, Zhang Ran definitely can't talk about these things, and he found a very appropriate reason: "You also know that I don't have enough funds to complete the holding now, and I can only buy some shares." After the acquisition, I will promote a series of reforms, and the company will continue to lose money in the short term, and the stock price will continue to fall. With Carl Icahn in place, these measures are difficult to move forward. ”

Paulson understood what Zhang Ran meant, that is, he wanted to get rid of Carl Icahn, so as not to affect the reform; in fact, Zhang Ran was looking for himself, and he should also want to probe from himself to see if this was feasible, so he said: "Blockbuster is a quagmire, there are a lot of debt problems, Carl Icahn should also want to get out, as long as you offer a reasonable price, Carl Icahn will definitely be willing to throw this burden to you!"

Zhang Ran was relieved when he heard Paulson say this: "Then please make an appointment for me, I want to meet him." ”

Paulson nodded and said, "Yes." ”

After the meeting with John Paulson, Zhang Ran got out of the restaurant and took a taxi to Chinatown.

At this time, the red lanterns are hung high in Chinatown, and the salute is slammed, and the annual Chinatown Float Parade has begun.

I saw two teams of policemen whizzing past on motorcycles, and after the sound of sirens, the parade floats slowly drove over. The float is surrounded by inverted New Year's decorations such as the character "Fu" and "Wishing you prosperity", and the shapes of "God of Wealth" and "Fuwa" with full of annual flavor appear on the car, causing the people to burst into cheers.

The parade was dressed up in colorful Tang costumes, some dressed in Chinese minority costumes, some wore Peking Opera robes, and the most comedic thing was that a black man actually wore Bao Gong's costume, and his gestures were quite fantastic, the only shortcoming was that there was no moon on his head.

In the parade, a cute red pig is particularly eye-catching, reminding everyone that this is the Year of the Pig. I saw it greeting the audience along the way, and running to the side of the road from time to time to hand out red envelopes to the audience. Zhang Ran waved at the little pig and shouted: "Pig pig, come a red envelope!"

Little Pig really ran over and stuffed a red envelope into his hand: "Zhang Ran, Happy New Year!"

Zhang Ran felt that the voice was familiar, like Ma Wen from the creative group of the opening ceremony, and asked carefully: "Ma Wen?"

Ma Wen's laughter came from the piggy mask: "I didn't expect it, why are you here?"

Zhang Ran also laughed: "Come and talk about business, I heard that there is a float parade here, so I stopped by to take a look." I didn't expect to meet you, this looks good!" In addition to Ma Wen, Cai Guoqiang and Shen Wei all live in New York. The creative group had a Spring Festival holiday, and they all went back to New York. Zhang Ran looked up and looked around, "Who else is there?"

Ma Wen pointed to the God of Wealth who was standing on the float and kept waving, and said, "That's Lao Cai." ”

Zhang Ran laughed loudly, Lao Cai, Lao Cai, you are a dignified artist who is actually pretending to be the God of Wealth, are you not afraid of sticking to the smell of copper? He shouted "Lao Cai" vigorously and waved at Cai Guoqiang; Cai Guoqiang on the float seemed to see Zhang Ran and waved at him.

Ma Wen wanted to continue the parade, but it was inconvenient to stay longer, so she said, "I have time to eat together," waved her hand at Zhang Ran, and ran back to the parade.

Just then, the phone rang. Zhang Ran saw that it was Liu Yifei. He walked to a relatively quiet place next to him and connected the phone: "Baozi, why did you remember to call Master?"

Liu Yifei looked very excited: "Master, I have good news for you. ”

Zhang Ran asked, "What's the good news?"

Liu Yifei said excitedly: "I passed the audition for "The King of Kung Fu", do you know who the leading actors are? It's Cheng Long and Li Lianjie! It's a Hollywood blockbuster!" Liu Yifei said proudly: "Master, you always think that my acting skills are not good, so you don't take me to film." Now Hollywood is looking for me, and I'm the heroine!"

Zhang Ran was stunned, "The King of Kung Fu" has Huayi's shares, he thought that Liu Yifei had no role in this matter, and said with a smile: "What's so proud of being a vase in a Hollywood movie!!"

Liu Yifei snorted angrily: "Master, you are so annoying, you say it so ugly." Can't you boast about me?"

Zhang Ran said with a smile: "Okay, good, I'll praise it! My apprentice's acting skills are getting better and better, and they can all play vases!"

Liu Yifei said angrily: "Stinky Master, you are so annoying!" At this time, she heard the sound of gongs and drums, and asked, "Master, where are you? It's so noisy over there!"

Zhang Ran smiled: "Watch the float parade in Manhattan's Chinatown!!"

Liu Yifei said in surprise: "Really, my mother and I are on Long Island, you can come to our house to play!"

Zhang Ran knew that Liu Yifei's family had a house on Long Island, but he didn't expect them to be on Long Island now: "Please, do you think Master is like you, doing nothing all day? Master is here to do things, not to play, there are a lot of things waiting to be done!"

"You're obviously watching the float parade!" Liu Yifei said in a coquettish tone, "Master, why don't you come to our house for dinner?"

Zhang Ran was very speechless, this kid's IQ is only 75, even if you invite me to your house as a guest, you have to tell me the specific location, right? After three or four minutes, the mobile phone rang again, and Liu Yifei sent the address.

Well, IQ 80!