On May 28th, the United Group held a press conference again, the meeting was chaired by Contini himself, because the United Whirlwind was very rapid in May, so many people came this time, so many that Contini had to use the New York City Hall as the venue for the press conference, and the New York City Government was also willing to lend, not only did not collect money but also helped to do a good job of various services - the president These orders are the tax of the city government.

"In 2 weeks, I will leave the United States and go back to Italy to get engaged to my girlfriend, she is a very quiet ......girl that many of you have seen," Contini smiled, "I received a lot of love letters during my time in the United States, and even received letters from enthusiastic American girls during my work in Italy, and I have a special life secretary to help me deal with this matter, and each letter is filed and kept safe, and it will be useful to write a memoir in my old age in the future." Thank you for loving me and I love you too! But I can only marry one, and she will be Ida Mussolini! ”

Everyone applauded enthusiastically to congratulate: the young and golden, talented, handsome and dashing, and rarely scandalous president has always been the public lover of American girls, and there are even many depictions of domineering presidents falling in love with me, although the temperament is varied, but the basic template is inseparable from the role of Contini.

"The news of my engagement is not one of the three important things to be announced today, and there has been a special press conference on Italy's endorsement of the agreement between the United States and France to join the Non-War Pact, and the important news to be released today is mainly about the economic aspect."

The reporters calmly waited for the president to say something.

"The first news is the package of contracts between the United Group and 27 industrial consortiums in the United States, which is the cornerstone of the grand vision of rebuilding Italian industry in ten years, with which we have signed a memorandum of understanding and a strategic cooperation agreement, which will be formally signed in September after clarifying the requirements and technical parameters, and these American companies will mainly include ......"

This is not strictly new, but it is an extreme shock to the list – the stock prices of these big companies have jumped up every time a memorandum and strategic contract has been heard in the past two days. The $2.4 billion contract would add an additional $500 million to a 20% net profit estimate, or $13 billion in market capitalization if measured by the current average price-to-earnings ratio of 26 times that of blue chips. At present, the market value of the entire US stock market is only about $60 billion, which means that the stock market will rise by at least 20%!

These rises have been reflected in the stock market in the last month, and that is the rise and rise! In the early stage, department store stocks rose particularly well, because some media revealed that the Agnes buying group spent at least a few million dollars! In the later stage, equipment and industrial stocks rose well, so the speculators on Wall Street especially welcomed the president, who they believed that the president was the god of wealth and the golden finger of the entire American stock market, and this thigh must be hugged!

Contini knew that they had put the cart before the horse, and the root cause of the white-hot trend of the US stock market was a series of measures adopted by the Federal Reserve in August 1927, the most important of which were two points, the first was the reduction of the dollar rediscount rate, from the original 4% to 3.5%, which was tantamount to publicly guiding interest rate cuts, and the second was that government bonds were also allowed to enter the market and trade freely, so speculation heated up again.

The reason why the Fed did this is not to ripen the stock market, of course, but because the stock exchange markets in France, Britain and even Germany have been sluggish, and Britain, France and Germany are struggling to prevent their currencies from depreciating. Since European countries still generally adopt the gold standard, if the Fed lowers the dollar rediscount rate, it will effectively prevent gold from accumulating further in the United States, which can help Britain, France and Germany get out of the shadow of currency depreciation - this exchange rate reconstruction is conducive to American exports.

In this state, the current purchase and transfer of gold by the Union Bank is not only not interfered with by the Federal Reserve, but also deeply encouraged, believing that this can support the credit of the lira, and the lira's pegged to the US dollar in fact The linked exchange rate system also makes the Federal Reserve very happy, and the United States has the right to speak German capital through the Dawes plan to export capital to Germany; The export of capital and equipment to Italy through the United Group, although the right to speak is a little worse, at least has a strong influence on the lira.

However, nothing can be perfect, and in the context of the general economic ties between the European and American powers, the close relationship between the United States and Italy will lead to the differentiation of other relations. In order to keep up the stock price of Contini, the United Group cooperates with very large companies in which it owns, and these large companies continue to expand their exports in the affairs of the United Group, not only squeezing the market share of Britain and France, but also the small and medium-sized companies that constitute the main force of US foreign trade cannot share, and the domestic market demand in Italy has been completely distorted by the investment of the United Group, so the traditional markets of Britain, France, and Germany are extremely important to other American companies.

By 1928, there were two extremes in the economy: the United States was financially and trade-driven, and Italy was investment-driven—the cement and timber it consumed was almost equal to the sum of Britain, France, and Germany. The over-the-top model, which is directly connected with Italy, is touted by Contini as a "new type of major-country relationship", which is actually weakening the strength and economic development of Britain and France in disguise.

Britain and France did not want to follow the practice of the United Group, but after thinking deeply, they found that they could not do it: there was no such a talk-filled enterprise in Britain and France; Second, the political system of Britain and France determined that it was impossible for them to do so; The three large British and French consortia have achieved symbiosis with politics, in other words, there are many partisans and consortia, unlike Italy, which has no too powerful consortia except for Art, but Mussolini does not like Fiat, which gives the United Group unlimited room for growth.

In February, when Contini arrived in the United States, the president of the New York Society of Philanthropy wrote a report: "The unemployment rate is now the highest in the post-war period, a record in history." In such a situation, stock commentators and some analysts have begun to warn investors repeatedly, Moody's said: "The stock price has far exceeded expectations, the stock market is operating in a very irrational state, and no one knows how much effort it will take to adjust the stock market to its normal state." ”

In March, Moody's again declared: "Only after the money has become too much and banks have to encourage credit expansion will it be possible for the public to gradually change the current state of mind in a bear market." Subsequently, the Harvard Economic Association also analyzed: "It can be seen from the stock market in February that the stock market is currently entering a stage of readjustment, and in the middle of the stock market, the stock price will inevitably decline, but it should not cause a sharp fall, and it will not evolve into a great depression in the stock market." ”

However, this kind of reminder has not been taken seriously by the market, and Contini will never allow the public to pay attention to it, so he wants to add fuel to the fire and say in public that "the Dow Jones index 300 points is the beginning of a new bull market", of course, today at such a large number of press conferences, he can not bring this rhythm, so after announcing the project, he only summed up one sentence: "This kind of cooperation not only means that the economic and trade cooperation between Italy and the United States is further deepened, It also means that the majority of American investors and the Italian people will witness a better future. ”

This reassuring voice is obviously in the same vein as the intention of other corporate executives to appease the market, and the reporters think this sentence is good, so they applaud and express their support.

"The second important news is that the United Group is preparing to issue $1.5 billion in long-term construction bonds this year and next year, with a ten-year period of 1.5% per annum!"

This news shocked everyone, because the United Group has just announced the successful issuance of 4-year bonds, and in the blink of an eye, it is about to issue bonds again? And it's a figure of 1.5 billion – that's bigger than the total number of bonds in the market in the first quarter, and the annual interest rate is only 1.5%, doesn't the president know that the current bond interest rate is generally between 4-4.5%? 1.5%？ How can he send it?

"You must have noticed the 1.5% interest rate, because this bond is not a simple long-term construction bond, but a convertible bond linked to the shares of the United Group." Contini dropped the bomb with a calm face, "There are companies under the United Group that continue to be listed, and eventually the overall listing will be achieved when the construction cycle is relatively perfect, and now there are voices in the media criticizing us for always looking for a consortium to make strategic investments before going public, and the price has increased by 20-30% before the IPO, and we are unwilling to share better corporate growth prospects with ordinary investors in the United States, I realized this mistake, so I decided to change." ”

"Of the $1.5 billion in long-term construction bonds, $1 billion will be reserved for institutional investors and another $500 million will be offered to ordinary investors through the joint banking system." "The bonds are expected to be issued in July, and after the expiration of one year, the company will start the buyback process, and investors can convert the principal + first-year interest into shares of the company, or only the interest into shares of the company," Contini said. The initial arrangement of the transfer price is $10 per share, the corresponding price-earnings ratio is 25 times, and the corresponding price-to-book ratio is about 2.5 times, in view of the fact that the United Group has not officially launched the IPO, in order to increase the protection of investors, the Group will currently hold the shares of Union Bank, United Petroleum (Algeria), and the upcoming United Motorcycle and United Petroleum (Libya) to be jointly and severally pledged, with a total scale of nearly 1.5 billion! ”