Eric ignored the crowd with different expressions on the other side of the screen, looking a little nonchalant, and said, "So, Steve, you won." www.biquge.info I officially announce that from today onwards, Firefly Investment will no longer meddle in any of AOL's internal affairs, and you can manage this company as you see fit. ”

In the conference room in New York, everyone breathed a sigh of relief when they heard Eric's words.

However, listening to Eric's cold tone in the speaker, Steve Case's heart was also relieved, but then there was a burst of panic.

No one knows better than him, the CEO, that the importance of the Firefly system to AOL is definitely not just the status of the largest shareholder.

Over the years, in addition to financial support, the Firefly system has spared no effort to tilt AOL's resources in media and technology.

AOL's web portal not only has the same treatment as Yahoo in terms of the Internet news distribution rights of Firefly Group and News Corp's media, but also has more than 2,000 patents authorized by Yahoo in e-mail, instant messaging and even browser software technology, and the cooperation between the two sides in specific projects such as built-in search engines and online payment platforms is even more intertwined.

For most of the cooperation, AOL has received resources far more than the price paid, which on the surface is a big advantage for AOL, but it also unwittingly deepens AOL's dependence on the Firefly system.

It is not difficult to imagine that after the parting of ways, once the Firefly system severes the cooperation established by the two sides, AOL, which is already far behind Yahoo's Internet media business, may even fall into a direct collapse.

What's more, this situation is definitely not the most serious situation, Firefly System is the largest shareholder of AOL after all, which is the deep-seated source of pressure for everyone on the scene.

A series of possibilities flashed through his mind, and Steve Case's panic even turned into fear, and he couldn't help but say, "Eric, I think I need to explain. ”

"I just said, I said, listen," before Steve Case could continue, Eric interrupted the other party mercilessly, and when Steve Case shut his mouth in embarrassment, Eric continued: "Secondly, I am here to promise that within two years, the cooperation between several companies of the Firefly system and AOL will not change in any way. And, in order to mend the impact of that incident just a few days ago, Chris Hansen, Ian Gnier and Robert Iger will announce their resignation from AOL's board of directors at a press conference tomorrow. So, Steve, you've won again, and I'm really not going to take control of AOL in a way that could hurt the interests of this company. ”

During the initial funding process, Eric promised not to interfere in the management of AOL for three years. The three-year period expired in 1995, and AOL reorganized its board of directors to coincide with the listing.

Firefly Systems has earned three spots from AOL's 11 board seats.

Chris got one board seat as shareholder representative, and Yahoo CEO Ian Gnier and ABC Group CEO Robert Iger each got two other board seats as sole directors.

Eric originally wanted Katzenberg to join AOL's board of directors, but Katzenberg was based in Los Angeles, and moved his headquarters from Virginia to New York on the eve of AOL's IPO, so a sole board seat left for the Firefly Group was given to Robert Iger.

The stated role of the directors of the board of directors of a large company is to provide constructive advice on the development of the company, but in reality, they are basically the advocates of the interests of the major shareholders or management. Even if you are a lone director, it is absolutely impossible to actually remain independent.

Often, the board of directors of a publicly traded company is in fact the core of a company's power, with the power to appoint and remove the company's management. As a result, every board seat is fraught with a game of forces, and which party controls the board seat represents which party actually controls the control of the company.

Hearing that Eric was going to give up three seats on the board of directors of Firefly Systems on AOL, it was difficult for everyone to calm down in the conference room in New York. This news surprised and agitated everyone present more than hearing Eric's promise that he would not change the status of cooperation with AOL for two years.

Although even if Firefly Investment relinquishes its seat on AOL's board of directors, it is unlikely that anyone will dare to ignore the influence of the largest shareholder.

However, giving up these seats means that Firefly Investment has given up the power to directly exert influence on the decision-making level of AOL, and the rights and interests of Firefly Investment, a major shareholder, will no longer be adequately protected.

As long as they wish, AOL's other shareholders and management can easily join forces and adopt means such as mergers and acquisitions, additional issuances, and the introduction of other investors to gradually dilute the shareholding of Firefly Investment, the largest shareholder, and marginalize Firefly Investment step by step, and may even take some means to directly damage the interests of Firefly Investment.

But now that the facts are that Firefly Investments really intends to do just that.

No one would think that Eric Williams made this crazy decision because of his own stupidity, and there was only one possibility, that Firefly intended to withdraw from AOL, and quickly in a very short period of time.

From Eric's words just now, it is not difficult for everyone to speculate that the period for Firefly Investment to sell stocks and withdraw from AOL is about two years.

For AOL, a listed company with a market capitalization of $40 billion, the largest shareholder holding more than 30% of the shares took two years to reduce all the shares in his hands and cash out, which is definitely very quick and short-lived.

At the very least, it can be expected that if Firefly Investments continues to sell large amounts of shares into the public market in the next two years, even if the market is more optimistic about the company, AOL's stock price will definitely not improve.

With all of this in mind, AOL's shareholders and executives, who were still excitedly pondering how to seize the three board seats after Firefly Investment's exit, looked wonderful.

"Well, that's my promise, and the rest is what you're going to do," Eric looked down at the document in his hand, then looked up, noticed the faces of everyone on the screen, and said, "I think you've guessed something." The current situation is that Firefly Investments holds a 32.6% stake in AOL, for a total of 53.79 million shares. Since 1992, in order to show its support for AOL, Firefly has never reduced its holdings of AOL stock even three years ago, but has continued to increase its holdings. But now, since everyone can't agree on the direction of the company's development, Firefly will no longer insist on its status as the largest shareholder. ”

In fact, Firefly Systems holds a total of 58.9 million AOL shares, accounting for 35.7% of AOL's total share capital of 165 million.

However, another 3.1% of the shares are in the hands of Firefly Group's Clover Fund.

With a stake of less than 5%, Firefly is not required to file with the Federal Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under the Federal Securities and Exchange Act, nor is it required to notify AOL's other shareholders and management if it is not necessary.

Although there are no shortage of people at the scene who know that Firefly System also holds a large part of AOL's shares, since Eric ignores this part of the shares, everyone will not take the initiative to mention it.

Even so, the idea of a one-third of AOL's total stock rushing to the market is a bit of a thrill.

Historically, the stock market crash that caused the Great Depression in the United States in 1929 was caused by the frenzied reduction of major shareholders and cashing out. After the stock market crash that year, in order to maintain market stability and protect the interests of small and medium-sized shareholders, the SEC imposed very strict restrictions on the reduction of major shareholders of North American listed companies.

If the largest shareholder of AOL like Firefly Investment wants to reduce its holdings through the secondary circulation market, it must first submit a report to the SEC to reduce its shareholdings, and disclose information such as the shares and reasons for the reduction to the market. Secondly, Firefly Investment must also disclose AOL's operating conditions and financial data in the recent period to prove that the major shareholders did not get inside information in advance and reduced their holdings.

However, in the final analysis, these restrictions are only to prevent major shareholders from deliberately infringing on the interests of other shareholders and investors.

However, stocks are private property after all, and as long as the reduction of major shareholders' holdings is formal and legal, even if it may cause the stock price of the company concerned to plummet or even collapse, no one else has any right to stop it.

All AOL stocks held by Firefly Investment are common shares that can be freely traded, and at the same time, AOL went public three years ago, and the shares held by Firefly Investment have long passed the six-month lock-up period, and they can be reduced and sold independently.

Imagining the various situations he might face, someone in the conference room soon took the initiative to speak: "Eric, you want to sell all the stocks in a short period of time, this is not realistic at all, have you considered this kind of consequence?" ”

Eric listened to the sound coming from the stereo, looked at the monitor, and the person who spoke was a somewhat bald middle-aged man, Eric vaguely remembered meeting the other party during the IPO of AOL three years ago, and it seemed that he was the president of the First Boston Investment Bank.

Eric didn't ask the meaning of the other person's name, but said, "Of course I have thought about it, everything I said today was well thought out. ”

Interrupted by his thoughts, Eric looked down at the document in front of him again, and then continued: "My decision now is that Firefly Investment will reduce its holdings of 16.5 million shares in the first batch. As for how much each of you intend to take, it's your business, and I'll give you a month, and after a month, if you don't get a positive answer, the fireflies will choose to sell to the open market. ”

16.5 million shares, which is exactly 10% of AOL's total share capital.

Based on the current AOL share price, the shares are worth around $4 billion.

For the major investment banks and funds that hold AOL stocks, 4 billion US dollars will definitely not be available in the short term. However, if it is apportioned, although it is still a large business, they can still afford it.

However, this is not what everyone is thinking about.

Reducing his holdings by 16.5 million shares, but Firefly Investment still has more than 37 million shares left, how does Eric Williams plan to take care of this part of the stock, do you want them to continue to take over in the next two years?

The Nasdaq is now close to 2,000 points, and everyone understands the serious cost of the bubble.

Nothing else, just AOL.

Based on recent AOL market capitalization and earnings estimates, the company has reached a price-to-earnings ratio of 131 times, which would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.

In previous years, even companies with very good prospects often did not have a price-to-earnings ratio of more than 30 times. For many investors, a company's P/E ratio of more than 30 times makes the investment risk very large, but now, AOL's P/E ratio has exceeded 131 times, and the risk is self-evident.

While countless media outlets and investors are touting that investing in tech stocks is investing in the future, the current earnings of these tech companies cannot be used to judge the industry's prospects. But in reality, everyone knows the frightening bubble behind the high stock prices of these companies.

At a price-to-earnings ratio of 30 times, AOL's market capitalization should be only $9 billion, which is already overestimated, but now AOL's market capitalization is about $40 billion, more than four times higher than normal.

Against the backdrop of this serious bubble, no one knows how long AOL's current high stock price will last.

Therefore, although all the shareholders in the conference room of AOL's headquarters in New York have reaped huge paper gains from the continuous rise in AOL's stock price in recent years, at this time, most people are still very resistant to spending $4 billion to buy the 16.5 million shares sold by Eric.

In the eyes of many people, this money is actually enough to buy half of AOL.

However, if they are unwilling to take over, they will face a public sell-off of Firefly Investments.

They also know that Firefly Investment will not desperately sell all the stocks at once, but the long-term continuous sell-off is more abrasive, and in the face of long-term uninterrupted influx of buy orders into the circulation market, it is impossible for AOL's stock price to think about any improvement.

The crowd was silent for a moment, and John Mark, the president of Morgan Stanley, who was familiar with Eric, asked, "Eric, at what price are you going to sell these shares?" ”

"If you agree now, $4 billion." Eric looked over and said, "If you're going to think about it for a month, settle it at the stock price in a month." ”

John Mark immediately shook his head and said, "Eric, this is too expensive. AOL's actual situation is well known to everyone, not to mention such a large stock transaction, if you are willing to give a discount, I can subscribe for 3 million of these shares on behalf of Morgan Stanley right now. Therefore, I think that 7% off is a price that everyone can afford. ”

John Mark's voice fell, and everyone in the room nodded in agreement.

They also know that in order to avoid the long-term downturn in AOL's stock price due to the continuous reduction of Firefly Investment, it is inevitable that this part of the stock will be sold by Firefly Investment. But if Eric sells his shares at 70% of the current price, they are more than willing to take over, even if Eric sells more shares.

Based on the market capitalization of AOL at its peak of $180 billion in memory, the total value of AOL shares held by Firefly Systems will exceed $60 billion.

However, even if Firefly Investment puts 1% of AOL shares into the liquid market in a day, it may crush AOL's stock price, let alone sell all 35.7% of its shares at the highest point of the stock price, which is simply a fantasy.

Eric has never been a greedy person, and he will be satisfied with the AOL stock in his hand as long as he can cash out one or two billion dollars in the next year or so. After all, AOL's actual value is not even worth $10 billion in Eric's opinion.

If AOL's stock price growth potential for the next two years is not clear, Eric is indeed willing to sell his shares at a lower discount, of course, he will definitely not accept a 7% discount such a diving price.

But at this time, Eric didn't plan to make any concessions, but shook his head resolutely and said: "Since that's the case, then you can think about it for a month, and that's it for today, and you can talk to Chris about the rest." ”

Just about to hang up the video, Steve Case, who had been sitting on the opposite side of the conference table and had been a little silent, finally spoke again: "Eric, what about the remaining shares other than the 16.5 million shares, what are you going to do?" ”

Eric glanced at Steve Case, then glanced at the people in the conference room opposite, and said, "The rest will be discussed next year, it will be set in half a year, it is still 16.5 million shares, you choose to take it or not." As I said, I'm not going to act too aggressively, but you also have to pay the price you deserve to keep it that way it is. ”

With these words gone, Eric ignored the crowd and turned off the video call.