Chapter 201

After a week at Bell Labs, baozixuan tackled both money and dreams. Jul Engel joined the black cloud mobile phone company with his technical team. He also served as the chief engineer of the mobile phone R & D department, and his assistants also made proper arrangements.

At the same time, baozixuan also purchased UNIX operating system and charge coupled components at Bell Labs for patent authorization of bar code readers, cameras, scanners, copiers and other products. These technologies are now more common in the market, so the price is not very expensive. But anyone who wants to produce must also buy patents at Bell Labs. This laboratory is so powerful and profound that it can't see the edge at all.

After arranging the research and development of mobile phones, baozixuan came to New York again. The vacation of Blackstone fund employees has ended and a new round of feast will begin. This time he will fight silver and gold, and this is the best opportunity in the next few decades.

Before 1980, the hunter family once ranked among the richest families in the world; Today, its status has declined, but it still can not be underestimated. The founder of the family, H.L. hunter, was born in rural Illinois in 1889 and is the youngest child in the family. His parents run farms and his family is relatively rich, but he has not received formal education since childhood. In 1912, hunter, 23, began to operate a cotton plantation in Arkansas; The first World War brought about an increase in the price of agricultural products (8.000, - 0.89, - 10.01%), so Hunter made the first pot of gold.

In 1957, Fortune magazine estimated that H.L. hunter had a wealth of $400 million to $700 million, which was one of the eight richest people in the United States at that time. The members of the second generation hunt family did not enjoy their success, but looked everywhere for new investment opportunities: Nelson hunt was committed to developing Libyan oil fields, but later, the oil fields were confiscated due to the political turmoil in Libya, and the potential investment loss may be as high as $4 billion; Caroline hunt opened the hotel and hotel group and served as its chairman; Rama hunt participated in the formation of the North American Football League and the North American Football League, and named the annual Football Finals "super bowl"; Sweeney hunt once served as U. S. ambassador to Austria and taught at the Kennedy School of government at Harvard University. It can be said that the hunter family's influence on American politics and economy has penetrated into most people's lives.

Soybean was one of the most important exports of the United States in the early 1970s. It is not only widely used in feed and edible oil production, but also on the American table. In the summer of 1973, the rising demand for soybeans even ran out of stock, and the government was forced to suspend the export of soybeans - such treatment is very rare for an agricultural product that is not a staple food. Everyone in the government and the company is talking about soybeans. Since this commodity is so popular and so scarce, isn't it a good target?

So Nelson hunt began to use the power of the whole family to speculate on soybeans. Soon, he will have his first confrontation with the U.S. government, which is just a preview of the 1980 silver crisis.

In 1973, Nelson hunt began to buy silver spot in the Middle East and silver futures in the futures markets in New York and Chicago. This decision was very strategic. The hunter family seized the last calm moment before the rise of silver price and established a large number of positions at the bottom of the valley. In December 1973, the hunter family had purchased $20 million worth of silver spot and 35 million ounces of silver futures at a cost of $2.9 per ounce, making them one of the largest silver holders in the world.

In the summer of 1979, Nelson hunt finally launched a general attack. He wants to give the slowly rising price of silver the last push and make it blowout like gold. One of the largest tragedies in the history of commodity futures has finally officially begun.

In the summer of 1979, the hunter family began a duel with silver dealers all over the world. Nelson hunt, through the "International Metal Investment Company" controlled by him, issued a cumulative purchase order of 40 million ounces to the futures exchanges in New York and Chicago“ The international metal investment company actually has only two groups of shareholders, the first group is the hunter family, and the second group is the prince and rich man of Saudi Arabia. If you can't understand the nature of this investment company, you can think about the equity structure of "Blackstone" - a greedy board of directors and a foreign exchange investor from developing countries, which is the routine of "International Metal Investment Company" in those years.

Nelson hunt and his brother William hunt complete purchase orders through many Wall Street brokers, including large investment banks such as Hilson and Becky. People found that there was a huge buying in the market, and the price of silver quickly rose from $6 to $11, but everyone didn't know who was buying. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission investigated the trading records and found that most of the purchases came from the international metal investment company, which is registered in Bermuda. After closer investigation, the fox tail of the hunter family finally came out. Soon, every trader in New York and Chicago knew that the hunter family was the back boss of the international metal investment company. This family was one of the richest families in the world!

Interestingly, when the news spread that the hunter family was manipulating silver, the price of silver continued to soar, and many small speculators poured into the market. The reason is very simple. Since the hunter family is "making a fortune" for silver, small speculators should of course choose "following the fortune". Although it is very dangerous, they have the opportunity to make a lot of money. With the continuous influx of speculators, the price of silver has become increasingly crazy - from $11 to $20, then $30, and simply exceeded $40 by the end of 1979! The price ratio of gold and silver fell to about 12 times, a record low. The futures market has completely lost control of silver. When will it end?

Large futures traders in Chicago and New York are very worried about the monopoly of the hunter family. At the end of 1979, the hunter family manipulated 53% of the silver futures contracts of the New York Mercantile Exchange and 69% of the silver futures contracts of the Chicago Trading Commission, holding a total of 120 million ounces of spot and 50 million ounces of Futures - not including the silver held by Saudi Arabian investors in the name of individuals. At that time, the global silver trading volume was only about 20 million ounces a year, and the hunter family had cut off the channel of silver circulation! The largest grain dealer of the Chicago Trading Commission said a very classic sentence: "we would rather let the by market close down than see it monopolized." It seems that the hunter family has violated public anger, and the big traders in the United States have stood on the opposite side of them.

Silver producers all over the world were excited. They quickly started the plan to find new silver mines, and many closed silver mines were mined again. Ordinary residents in the United States and Europe were also surprised by the rise in silver prices. They rummaged through their boxes and found ancestral silver tea utensils and decorations. All utensils with silver as raw materials were sent to smelt, made into standard silver pieces and sold on the market without hesitation. As a result, the silver supply in the market increased, and the hunter family's efforts to monopolize the silver price were challenged. Although Nelson hunt tried his best to keep buying, he was already a little weak - no matter how rich the hunter family was, it was still a little too much to fight the world.

Moreover, the biggest enemy of the hunter family has not yet taken action. This enemy is the U.S. government. The U.S. government has a large amount of silver, including silver pieces used as the Federal Reserve and silver coins recovered after early issuance, which may total tens of millions of ounces. Central banks all over the world also hold a large amount of silver reserves. Although any central bank can't hold more silver than the hunter family, as long as they jointly intervene in the market, the hunter family will die.

By January 1980, the hunter family had made great achievements - the price of silver rose to $48 and was rising to $50; Most of the short traders who are enemies of the hunter family have admitted their losses, and no one dares to sell short on a large scale. However, the hunter family also feels heavy pressure, because the price of silver is too high, and the capital held by the hunter family has been difficult to continue to raise the price. In order to maintain its monopoly on the by market, Nelson hunt was forced to borrow at high interest rates from several major banks in the United States, with an average interest rate of 19%. Several investment banks on Wall Street also lent a large number of loans to the hunter family, enabling them to continue to play the game of market manipulation for the time being.

According to the survey of the U.S. Commodity Exchange Commission, in the winter of 1979, the total value of silver futures contracts held by the hunter family had reached $3 billion; By January 1980, its total value could exceed $5 billion! Within more than two months from the end of 1979 to the beginning of 1980, the hunter family lent tens of millions of dollars to major American banks and more than 200 million dollars from Wall Street brokers. It has almost become the largest borrower in the United States and even the world. They spend millions of dollars just paying interest every month. Manipulating silver has become a money burning game, even more than war.