Donald raised his eyebrows and smiled, "That's normal, isn't it?"

Mark said: "I can tell you as a person who has come over that you will regret your early marriage." ”

Donald said strangely, "Is there anything discordant between you and Giselle?"

Mark said: "No, we are very good, you are full of expectations before you get married, and you will find that your life after marriage is not what you want, and you do not have the freedom you want. He felt that he went home on time every night after getting married, and he had to maneuver between various lovers, fighting for power and grabbing interests, which was very tiring.

Donald shook the red wine from the crystal goblet, admired the red rippling on the walls of the glass, and said, "Ten years of Amber Mountain." ”

"You know, I don't have any requirements for wine, it's all Giselle's choice," Mark said. ”

"California wine consumers are younger, usually in their twenties and thirties, who don't care much about brands and are willing to try New World wines, and of course, many of the older senior collectors also have a cellar of California wines, but I still like the South of France, and it's hard to change habits," Donald said. He said something.

"A lot of times in the past, I've heard people talk about the 'intense' character of California wines, which means that California wines generally have a fruity aroma and therefore a more mellow flavor, and Giselle and I just liked that, so we kept a cellar," says Mark. ”

Donald laughed, "Do you want to teach me wine tasting?"

Mark smiled self-deprecatingly, raised the red wine glass in his hand and touched it remotely, and said with a smile: "I think too much, you will choose the right one." After a pause, Mark said: "What do you think about the fact that Kavalaug of Relativity Investment Company will invest in MM Group for thirty films in the next two Chinese New Year's Eve?"

Since mid-2003, it has become a major trend for investment institutions to launch film funds to invest in film projects of a major Hollywood studio for a certain period of time.

Cinema is a high-investment, High-risk industry, and financing is a fundamental part of it, how much investment, and how to distribute, can decisively affect a film, the reason why Hollywood movies can continue to produce blockbusters, success in the global market, and the strong capital support behind it is inseparable, in the past 100 years, Wall Street financial capital and Hollywood studios have developed a variety of cooperative relations, and Hollywood film fund platter investment, is a popular cooperation model in recent years.

After the 80s, all major Hollywood studios have been absorbed into larger media and entertainment groups, and the globalization trend of the Hollywood film industry has become increasingly obvious, with "high concepts" characterized by "big investment, big production, big marketing, and big market" According to a report by the China Film Association, in 1975, the average production cost of films in the United States was $5 million (big production), and by 1987, the figure had reached 20 million, and by this year, the average production cost of major studios had climbed to 60 million, and the marketing cost had also reached 360,000, with a total cost of more than $100 million.

With such a large scale of investment, it is difficult for even the big Hollywood studios to achieve large-scale production with their own funds every year, and their parent companies, although they are strong, are not willing to invest too much money in the production of high-risk films, and as a listed company, they do not want to have too many debt records on their company statements, so the introduction of external investors has become an inevitable choice for large Hollywood studios.

However, for a long time in the 80s and 90s, Hollywood did not feel much pressure to raise financing, because with the rise of new film distribution channels such as videotape, cable TV, satellite TV, and local television in Europe, Hollywood films were able to raise most of the money through pre-sale rights.

The tax incentives provided by foreign governments to promote the development of the film industry have also provided a lot of convenience for Hollywood's financing, the most special of which is the German tax incentives, which stipulate that investment in the film industry can obtain tax deductions, and does not require film projects to be produced locally or hire local creative personnel, and the tax reduction can also be lien, this tax loophole was quickly exploited by German investors and Hollywood, and the studio in the United States could sell the rights of the film to a German company, and then sell it for 10% less than the selling price The film is "rented" back at the left and right, and both parties profit from the tax benefits.

In the 90s, Hollywood film projects could get up to 80% of the budget through overseas pre-sales, but by 2002, they could only get 50% or even less.

At this time, because of the recession of the stock market, coupled with the very low interest rate of banks, Wall Street's funds are very abundant, and even some super private equity funds with a fund-raising scale of more than 10 billion US dollars have appeared, and Wall Street's financial capital urgently needs to seek new profit points, and Hollywood, whose market performance is stable, has entered their sight, and they have found that the market situation of Hollywood movies is good, and in the decade from 1990 to 2,000 years, the box office of the United States has increased by 52 percent, and the foreign market has also experienced explosive growth, and with the development of technology, Hollywood movies have a wide range of income sources, and can have a considerable return on investment。

In addition, Monte-Carlo simulation, an analysis method based on probability and statistical theory, began to be believed in and widely adopted by investment institutions, who found that the portfolio theory applied in the stock market can also be applied to the film industry, when the investment in 20 to 25 film projects is less volatile, so the "platter investment" project of Wall Street capital in Hollywood movies came into being.

As early as '03, under the leadership of Paramount's vice president of commercial operations, Isaac Pammer, Merrill Lynch and Paramount reached a partnership to establish a private equity fund called Melrose, planning to invest 18% of Paramount's 03 and 04 planned production films (including "War of the Worlds" and "Mission Impossible 2").

Paramount Pictures first took 10 percent of the box office as a distribution fee, and the rest was distributed to investors, and the three-year fund successfully raised $240 million to invest in 25 Paramount films, and the investment share eventually reached 12 percent, Paramount's killer feature to attract investors is that, according to Merrill Lynch, the average hedge fund seeks an internal rate of return of 12%-18% Even in underperforming years, Paramount's internal rate of return reached 15%, and if it was the year of "Titanic" or "Forrest Gump", the internal rate of return could be as high as 23%-28%, which is undoubtedly attractive to investors.

Last year, young Wall Street investor Ryan Cavaraug established the Relativity Management Company, committed to providing a channel for Wall Street funds to enter Hollywood, he constructed a set of models, based on the film's director, starring, genre, release date and other factors to predict the film's market success probability, they plan to within three years, Relativity Management Company raised more than $2.5 billion to invest in Warner, Soney and Universal and other major studios Platter investment projects, the Hollywood platter investment to a climax, according to the "Peng Bo Information" It is estimated that in '06 and '7, various Wall Street funds and major investment banks including Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers invested about $15 billion in the film industry.

In Hollywood, a bank or investment company generally sets up a film fund to raise funds from private or institutional investors, and this fund is then used to invest in a larger number of film projects within a certain time frame for a particular production agency, and the general film platter investment project will involve between 10 and 30 films, and the investment amount is between 10% and 40%.

These sources of funds are diversified, and can be roughly divided into three different types according to their consideration of profit and risk, one is senior debt, usually from banks or lending institutions, this type of funds will be repaid preferentially and the risk is relatively small, the second is intermediate financing, and the third is share financing, where investors occupy the corresponding shares according to the proportion of their invested funds in the overall platter. When the debts of the project are paid off, it can obtain the profits corresponding to these shares, the risk is the greatest, but the possible benefits are also the highest, the second and third types of funds mostly from private equity funds, individual financiers and some institutional financiers.

Platter investment is usually directed to the big Hollywood studios or large film companies, because only the production scale of these companies is enough to achieve the stability of profitability expected by the investment fund, last year, almost all the big Hollywood studios have made platter investments, and which film projects will be included in a financing platter, it depends on the strength game between the investment fund and the big Hollywood studios, the fairer way is that the investment fund participates in all the film projects of the big studios in a certain period of time, and the other way is that the big studios provide the films, and the investment fund then selects projects from the film to join the platter。

Like Warner's "Harry Potter", Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean", Twentieth Century Fox's "Star Wars", and MGM's "007", these are sure to make money and never participate in any platter investment.

In fact, Cavaraug had long been in contact with Soney, hoping to invest in Soney's 25 films, including "Spider-Man", but was rejected by the wealthy Soni Group, but they were willing to give the investment rights to the 25 films except "Spider-Man" to Relativity Management.

But without the big fat of "Spider-Man", Sony's platter investment attraction has been greatly reduced, which makes the relativistic Cavalaug of little interest, and now MM dominates Columbia and MGM, and the capital chain is tighter, they should be interested in the money of relativity, and he has come to test Mark again.

I wish you all book friends a happy new year.