Chapter 546： It’s crazy.

"Since you have made up your mind, I certainly have to consider the long-term. △↗,."

Chris smiled and said: "As for the acquisition, the information you collected is very comprehensive. Although Nokia's recent sales of the 1011 mobile phone is good, Nokia's own dilemma has not been resolved, plus our Capital advantage, the acquisition of Nokia is not a big problem, we are only discussing which acquisition method, Eric, if the wholly-owned acquisition, the premium will be high, and your original plan to acquire the TV network will be hindered Nowadays, the four major TV networks in North America, Fox TV network is the fastest growing, certainly will not sell, and the other three major TV networks, the market value of any one of them exceeds 10 billion US dollars, using the stock exchange merger, you will even lose The absolute controlling stake in fireflies."

In fact, Eric has been considering these issues. The turmoil like the Gulf War will definitely not happen for the second time. When the stock market breaks out, it will take another few years to acquire the money. The thing about the TV network is as early as possible.

Eric vaguely remembers some data. In the original time and space, the order of the three major TV networks in North America and the film company was abc, cbs and nbc. In 1996, Disney completed the acquisition of abc, which was about 19 billion US dollars, but only after three years. In 1999, Viacom's acquisition of cbs cost $37 billion. The difference between the two TV networks is not too big. This situation is mainly due to the rising stock price caused by the rapid economic growth in the 1990s.

"Chris, do you think it is feasible to buy a TV network with the current situation of fireflies and the full issuance of corporate bonds?"

Chris thought for a moment, and Eric did not conceal many of his plans. If he followed the plan of Eric and him, the fireflies could raise $5 billion during the negotiations on the acquisition of the TV network. Cash, but want to annex any of the three major TV networks, insurance, the size of the funds is about $ 15 billion.

15 billion minus 5 billion dollars...

Think of it here. Chris suddenly opened his eyes and looked at Eric with an incredulous look: "Issuing $10 billion in corporate bonds, Eric, you are a madman."

Don't talk about $10 billion in debt financing. As of 1993, even in the world, there are very few funds involved in M&A involving more than $10 billion, not to mention the issuance of a company with billions of dollars in corporate debt. This can only be described as crazy.

Eric didn't care about Chris's frightened look. "Chris, think about it from another angle. We all know what MGM is doing now. MGM's current assets range from $1 to $1.5 billion. But the company’s debt is as high as $1.7 billion and its debt ratio is over 100%. But if the TV network acquisition is completed, the size of the firefly’s assets will reach $30 billion. There is absolutely no problem, then the existing liabilities will be added. Only 40% is less than."

"However, Eric, billions of debt and tens of billions of debt are no longer a simple numerical issue."

Of course, Eric knows this. Investors buy corporate bonds in general because the risk of bonds is relatively low, and they do not have to bear the risks of corporate performance fluctuations like stocks. Therefore, the greater the amount involved, the more cautious the investor will be, the one-time discovery of billions of dollars in corporate debt, even if the giants such as General Motors have not been so far.

However, Eric is full of confidence. In the memory, in the process of the acquisition of abc TV station in the original time, Disney successfully completed the tens of billions of dollars of debt financing, not to mention. Firefly's current business is much stronger than Disney in parallel time and space: "Chris, perhaps with other companies, a one-time issuance of billions of corporate bonds, the size of this fund is really large enough to make Wall Street investors It’s discouraged, but the fireflies are different. Last year, the net profit of Firefly’s film industry was close to one billion dollars. This year, it’s just the summer movie “Jurassic Park”, “Bug Crisis” and “World’s Big Crash”. The box office's net profit will reach 500 million US dollars, which is only part of the omni-channel operation of the film. Such profitability is enough to dispel the concerns of most investors."

Chris was about to talk, the car suddenly stopped, and Eric looked out the window and found that the car had parked in the hotel's underground parking lot.

Chris took the information back into the suitcase and said: "Eric, I will pay attention to this matter. When I return to New York, I will take the time to make a feasibility assessment. Joma Olila may return to Finland in the afternoon. So we only have one lunch time with him, or let's focus on Nokia first."

Eric nodded, got out of the car, arranged for Chris and his party to be near noon, and Eric and Chris greeted Yoma Ollila on behalf of the fireflies in a nearby restaurant.

According to the discussion of Eric and Chris, Firefly Investment will issue an offer to Nokia within three days. Before the completion of the acquisition, their position with Jorma Ollila will be temporarily opposed, so this luncheon will be on both sides. The conversation didn't involve too many substantive issues. Eric just made a fuss about Yoma Olila and why he was interested in Nokia. Joma Olila was talking about it. The prospect of the digital mobile phone and the global mobile communication network (gsm) is the last one.

Joma Ollila returned to Finland in the afternoon to have initial communication with the current major bank shareholders of Nokia Group.

Eric and Chris rented the hotel's meeting room and began to discuss specific acquisition options.

Although Nokia Group has gradually divested or sold lost paper, rubber and television businesses in recent years, as a diversified Finnish giant, in addition to the mobile communications equipment division, Nokia Group currently owns energy, pharmaceuticals and cables. As for other businesses, this part of the assets has not been sold off because it has remained profitable and accounts for about one-third of the group's total assets.

Although mobile communication companies in some European countries have started to operate gsm networks, and thus upgraded the sales of Nokia's first gsm mobile phone 1011, but the gsm network has not yet been fully popularized, coupled with the huge amount of research and development investment in the early stage, the prospect of gsm mobile phone Broad, but Nokia's mobile phone department is still in a state of loss, and funds have been backed up by other profitable departments. Except for Eric, the passer-by, no one can predict the explosive growth potential of gsm mobile phones in the next few years. Without seeing the actual profits, Nokia Group shareholders will not tolerate this situation. This is why Jorma Ollila urgently needs external investment.

Anyone knows that energy and pharmaceuticals are full of huge profits, but Eric is not interested at all, after all, in terms of scale. These businesses of Nokia are not even a small shrimp in front of those giants.

After a detailed discussion, Eric finally decided that the highest priority is to acquire Nokia's mobile communications department, which not only includes the mobile phone business, but also the communications equipment business, which mainly produces base station equipment for the gsm network, as the first country to use the gsm network. Nokia's technology in this area is much ahead of other communication equipment manufacturers.

In the afternoon of the next day, Eric and Chris walked out of the conference room. Chris still held a stack of documents and said: "In order to develop gsm mobile phones, Nokia Group has been losing money for the past two years, which means that Nokia will make those profits. All the profits generated by the department have been invested in the development of gsm mobile phones. Now that the results have been released, I feel that Nokia shareholders will not sell the mobile communication department to us if they have a little foresight."

"Who knows, maybe Nokia's shareholders will be rushing to cash out," Eric said. "But in any case, we must at least get Nokia's absolute controlling stake."

This is the bottom line of the team’s acquisition in the past two days. Chris also nodded and said: “So. I will send a formal offer to Nokia tomorrow morning. Also, regarding the name of the offshore investment fund just negotiated, you Come and name it."

Because the tax rates vary from country to country. In the process of cross-border acquisitions, the circulation of large sums of funds will always involve tax issues. The usual solution is to inject funds into an offshore company and then invest in offshore companies. At the same time, this offshore investment can also Play the role of hiding assets. Although it is only 1993. However, due to the convenience of offshore investment, the scale of funds of various offshore capital centers in the world has exceeded one trillion US dollars.

Eric remembered the voice of two little guys when he was on the phone to New York yesterday. He quickly said, "Let's call the Hawaiian fund."

Chris nodded and smiled. "Do you like daughters?"

"Yeah, haven't you heard of that statement? The son is the enemy of his father's past life, and the daughter is the lover of his father's previous life."

"It seems that there is such a saying, and I think it is quite scientific. For a long time, my relationship with my father is not very good, but Emily has been very harmonious with her father, maybe you don't know, I There were several disputes with Emily’s father, and she was standing on her father almost every time.” Chris’s mouth smirked and said: “Then I will register the name.”

Eric sighed, the meeting room was at the bottom of the hotel, the two came to the end of the corridor, the rest of the team went straight to the restaurant for dinner, Eric had to go upstairs to change clothes, Chris also had something to go A glimpse of the room, when waiting for the elevator, Chris curiously asked: "Which company is dating tonight?"

In addition to Nokia, in order to cooperate with the GATT negotiations, Eric will also take into account the cooperation with the European film forces.

"The people at the top of MGM's largest shareholder, Lyon Credit Bank, and the two movies released by MGM in the summer are all in huge losses. Lyon Credit auctioned MGM last year and now wants to get rid of MGM. This is hot, but before they get out of the hand, they hope that MGM's performance will recover, so that it is easier to find the next home."

The elevator door opened, and Chris and Eric walked sideways, letting the guests in the elevator leave, and then went in. Chris pressed the button and then just asked the question: "Don't you think about buying MGM? ?"

"Of course I think, I am very eye-catching to MGM's huge library. If I can take MGM's library, I will not only be able to fully utilize the current omni-channel operational resources of Firefly, but also for the future TV network. The development of the TV also has great benefits. After all, the TV network still needs a lot of high-quality content. But apart from the film library, MGM has nothing to make me tempted."

In 1986, Ted Turner left MGM's film before 1948, which is why Time Warner's Turner Broadcasting Company has been playing MGM's old movies in recent years. However, MGM still has more than 4,000 movies copyright and a large number of TV series copyrights, the size of the library is second only to Time Warner. However, because MGM's losses for many years have made this once-famous movie giant unable to take advantage of the huge scale of the film library, it can only continue to struggle in the vicious circle of continuing borrowing and continuous losses.

Chris said: "Is there still 007 copyright?"

"With MGM's current debt scale, according to the annual interest rate of 5%, the annual interest on debt will be as high as 80 million. MGM has launched an average of 007 for two years, and the profits generated are not enough to pay interest on corporate bonds. So MGM has been losing money all these years, and the debt is getting more and more." Eric casually said that MGM's things, suddenly a move, could not help but kick the tip of the elevator wall. Some excitement said: "I suddenly thought of a good idea."

Chris looked puzzledly: "Well?"

"Compared to the giant credit bank of Lyon Credit Bank, all the film companies in Europe are small fish and shrimp. If they are joined by Lyon Credit, and then operate with MGM's 'shell' as a carrier, fireflies can Get out of this matter, no longer need to interrupt the established operational trajectory."

Chris has already understood what Fireflies have to do in order to cooperate with the GATT negotiations. After listening to Eric, he immediately understood what he meant. Many of the production plans of Firefly next year or even the following year have already been made. It is determined that in order to cooperate with the GATT negotiations, the fireflies need to allocate some resources to share with the European film forces, then the firefly's established development plan must be adjusted accordingly, but if the fireflies indirectly through the MGM with European movies With the cooperation of the company, the headquarters does not have to make too much adjustments.

However, Chris’s thoughts on Eric are not too optimistic: “You just said that MGM’s current annual profit may not even have enough interest on corporate bonds. I think those European film companies will not know this. Do you think they will promise?"

"Then invite the parties to sit down and negotiate. MGM is in this situation. I think that as long as the company can lead the company out of the predicament, those creditors will agree to temporarily give up some benefits, otherwise once the company goes bankrupt, MGM The assets are not enough to repay the debts, and MGM’s biggest problem now is that there are not enough funds to start more movie projects. Creditors have demand, European film companies have funds, and fireflies can provide quality movie projects. Together, these conditions can almost revitalize this dead film company. Do you think they will be heart-warming?"

Chris nodded, but said: "Are you just saying that you are very excited about MGM's film library? If MGM is really returning to life as you said, in the future you want to buy this film company, the price it costs. It’s even bigger.” (To be continued.)