Chapter 779： Pay transcript

With the popularity of the "Quanwang City" and "National Supermodel Competition" in the second quarter, Lifetime TV launched several other original dramas.

Although the results can not be compared with the two viewers, it is enough to fill the content of other Lifetime TV viewing time, instead of the "Flying Bridge" and "American Supermodel Contest" last fall, other The viewing period is still cold and clear.

While Lifetime TV began to discuss the new annual share contract with cable operators more eagerly, other media groups that have been paying attention to Lifetime TV also began to study the reasons for the rise of the TV station. Yes, they intend to follow suit. Things can be more than now in the film industry, even if the Firefly three are preparing for the FFM toll cable station, in fact, it is also intended to follow the trend HBO.

However, although the cable TV industry is in the midst of a major outbreak, Eric is not worried about these follow-ups. After all, in a country where all walks of life are tightly controlled by capital, they want to be completely in the situation. There are not many people who are decisive and unscrupulous when there is no clear situation. When they react, Lifetime has already established its own industry status.

Similarly, in this country of capital, in the first few months of each year, it is the moment when major corporate giants pay transcripts to investors, the media, and the public.

At the Seventh National Congress, after last year's sea tactics, coupled with the natural growth brought about by the strong recovery of the US economy, Time Warner's 1995 annual revenue reached 11 billion US dollars.

However, in the 25 films released by Time Warner in the whole year, in addition to "Forever Batman" invested 100 million US dollars to recover the world's $330 million box office, coupled with lucrative periphery, barely profitable, and other budgets The large-scale production of more than 50 million US dollars basically ended in disappointment.

In particular, the Future Water World, which costs US$175 million, has a box office of more than 80 million in North America. Although the global box office has reached 260 million, Warner Pictures is only at the global box office because of the low global tax rate. The share was recovered more than 90 million US dollars, and this one project alone brought Time Warner a loss of more than 100 million US dollars.

Although Time Warner's Turner Broadcasting Company and HBO and other cable TV businesses are profitable, they can't afford the bleak movie business. In the end, the entire group's annual loss reached 280 million, more than three times that of last year. The financial report was released, and Time Warner re-emerged within the turmoil. Ted Turner, the founder of Turner Broadcasting and the majority shareholder of Time Warner, even proposed a split Time Warner proposal on the board of directors, although the general trend in recent years is resources. Integration, this proposal still has a lot of corresponding board members.

The Viacom Group, which is firmly controlled by Summer Reishi, relies on the strong revenue performance of the Baishida videotape rental chain, and its annual revenue also exceeds 10 billion, which is close to Warner and reaches US$107. However, compared to Time Warner's huge losses, Paramount achieved a net profit of 760 million U.S. dollars for the whole year.

If you want to talk about comprehensive strength, News Corp., which has a business scope throughout the Western world, can compete with Time Warner. However, News Corp., which has a business scope all over the world, is too complicated in terms of financial system and shareholding structure. Will be settled separately. As a result, the 20th Century Fox, a subsidiary responsible for the US domestic film and television business, became the main representative of News Corporation. Because of this, the status of the 20th Century Fox is very similar to that controlled by Seagram Group and Sony controlled by Colombia. Coupled with the rapid recovery of MGM, the subsequent four major profits and losses, but can not be compared with the top three giants.

In the first few months of the year, the US media continued to count the performances of the six major Hollywood giants, but still could not wait for the most eye-catching annual report of the Firefly Group.

Although the media people who were eagerly awaited were all scratching their hearts, after several low-key board meetings and consultations with the group's major creditors, a group of senior officials finally decided not to release the Firefly Group financial report.

For non-listed companies, the publication of financial report data has a very clear purpose. For example, last year, because of the huge bond of up to 8 billion US dollars, the integration of ABC Group has not been completely completed, plus Ron. · Perelman acquired events such as firefly bonds. In order to prevent unnecessary speculation and worry in the capital market, Firefly released the annual financial data.

This year, everything within the group has been on the right track. There is no internal worry or no external troubles. There is no need to do this kind of thing to satisfy the curiosity of the capital market or the public.

Of course, Eric doesn't want to be too swaying is another important reason.

After several months of financial statistics, the Firefly Group's annual revenue data was finally fixed at 23.9 billion US dollars, achieving a net operating profit of 2.57 billion, if you counted the sale of ABC paper assets and Disney's hand-drawn animation studio's $1.25 billion follow-up payment The firefly's annual profit income has reached 3.82 billion US dollars, and not to mention that this data is enough to say "you come together" to the remaining six arrogant. If you look up, in 1995, among the top US corporate giants, the most profitable Ford, the annual revenue of 128.4 billion US dollars, and net profit is only 5.3 billion US dollars. Even with the $1.25 billion non-operating profit of fireflies, the net profit of $2.57 billion is enough to squeeze into the top ten of the US corporate earnings rankings.

The detailed annual financial data is only known to the Firefly Group's board of directors and the core executives. Even some of the important creditors only know about one. The professionalism of these people will certainly not be disclosed to the media.

Therefore, with public data such as movie box office and TV program ratings, relevant media and analysts can predict that the annual profit of the Firefly Group will be very scary, but in the absence of any detailed data, they can only rely on known information. Self-assessment.

Because of the lack of the official endorsement of the Firefly Group, even if these media data are similar to the real data, it is unlikely to be universally recognized. Some publics even see the financial magazine’s horrible annual profit figures for the Firefly Group. Questioning the accuracy of these figures, after all, if the annual profit data of nearly 4 billion US dollars is true, the profit of the Firefly Group is enough to compete with the other six. By splitting the 50% profit of the entire Hollywood by itself, it has not happened in the history of Hollywood.

In the midst of a noisy, the publication of Forbes magazine's 1996 rich list once again caused the media to burst.

After the release of Windows 95, with the Microsoft operating system unifying the east wind, Bill Gates, who owns 40% of Microsoft's shares, has jumped from $12.9 billion last year to $18.5 billion. Behind him, Warren Buffett and other three The super rich, the assets also crossed the threshold of tens of billions of dollars.

However, in the first place on this list, the $67.7 billion eye-catching figure, like the bright moon in the night sky, illuminates all the little shimmer in the surrounding stars.

Compared to last year's 46.5 billion, in just one year, Eric's personal life has soared by $21.2 billion at a rate far beyond the rich list.

At the same time as the list was announced, Forbes Group President Steve Forbes personally wrote: "If Eric Williams was bet on the Kuwait war six years ago, it would still be a reckless gamble. Over the years, Eric Williams has proved by fact that he not only has an amazing talent in film and television media, but as a pure investor, he also has a keen eye that ordinary people can hardly match."

"Since the beginning of Yahoo in 1991, in the past five years, Eric Williams has invested nearly $5 billion in huge amounts of money into the emerging high-tech industries such as the Internet and mobile communications. Five years later, these investments are at least It has quadrupled and the value has exceeded $20 billion."

"Of course, although Eric Williams' investment in the high-tech industry is very successful, it is undeniable that Hollywood's increasingly powerful Firefly Group is the real foundation of Eric Williams. It is these years that fireflies have been The group has a long-term profit for Eric Williams, and he has been able to show his talents in the investment industry."

“The Firefly Group did not publish annual financial data for 1995 compared to publicly held companies such as Time Warner and Viacom, but according to publicly available information, Firefly’s annual turnover in 1995 should be $24 billion. Around the clock, this figure even exceeds the total annual revenue of Time Warner and Viacom."

"In terms of profit, the profitability of the Firefly Group is even more horrible. Compared with Time Warner's annual loss of 280 million US dollars and Viacom's annual net profit of 760 million US dollars, the firefly group's net operating profit in 1995 should be 2.3 billion. Between $2.6 billion, four times the size of Viacom, and even close to the combined profits of Time Warner, Viacom, Twentieth Century Fox, Sony Pictures, Universal, and MGM. ”

"This amazing profitability makes the author feel that, perhaps, the IRS can really consider levying an extraterrestrial immigration tax on someone. Well, this is a joke."

The new Forbes Rich List was released, and the most direct impact of the discussion in the media was on the day of the latest issue of Forbes magazine, because Eric’s investment in the high-tech industry was mentioned in detail in the magazine. And the return, the US Nasdaq index was directly stimulated, the day rose by 5%, and many high-tech star stocks including Cisco, AOL, Microsoft even rose more than 10%.

Forbes magazine's credibility is still very strong, compared to other financial magazines on the Firefly Group or exaggerated or conservative earnings estimates, the data published by Forbes magazine is clearly more recognized.

The continued outbreak of the global film market and the fact that Hollywood is attacking the world around the world is almost universally known, but after seeing the horrific profitability of the Firefly Group, despite the losses of Warner Bros. and Sony Pictures, it still failed to stop. A lot of capital power has once again flocked to Hollywood.

In this situation, on March 25th, the 68th Oscar Awards Ceremony was held as scheduled at the Holy Citizens Hall in Los Angeles.

Although Eric was invited as usual, he was also absent again.

It’s not too busy or anything else. The main reason is that it’s not a pleasant thing to sit for three hours at the Oscar ceremony. What's more, Firefly's films still only received some nominations for corners this year, and Eric did not have any need to attend.

Eric didn't want to go. Drew, who had already begun to look for a dress, also pushed down the invitation. The two men watched the live broadcast in the Beverly Hills mansion in Shantou.

The script of "Shawshank's Redemption" is still lying in the corner, and this year there is no Oscar legacy.

In addition to the award-winning popular "Forrest Gump", several other nominated films, "Apollo 13" and "Pig Baby", did not show the heat and influence that rivaled Forrest Gump.

In the end, "Forrest Gump" successfully won six awards such as Best Film and Best Director with 13 nominations. Tom Hanks also succeeded in connecting the filmmakers, creating a new milestone in Oscar history.

Although not attending the Oscar ceremony, the celebration party is definitely indispensable.

Because the fireflies and MGM are together, this year's main nominee film is only the "Forrest Gump", there is no need to hold a separate celebration. In addition, Tina Brown, who was the former editor of Vanity Fair, personally called, and Eric decided to place the celebration tonight at the Oscar party at Vanity Fair.

Tonight's Vanity Fair party is held in an art center under Beverly Hills, less than five kilometers from the Trousdale Estate where the Drew Mansion is located. Eric and Shantou are not in a hurry and will continue to broadcast the awards ceremony. After reading it, I set off to go to the party location.

Western time just passed at nine o'clock in the evening, the car stopped at the parking lot outside the art center, Eric and Drew just got off the bus, the media reporters who were outside the crowd rushed, and the dazzling spotlight flashed up. .

The interview opportunities inside the Vanity Fair party will certainly not be open to the public, but outside the party, the organizers will be unable to manage it.

"Eric, do you think the figures published by Forbes magazine are accurate?"

"Mr. Williams, what do you think of Tom Hanks' best actor in Oscar?"

“Does this have public relations factors?”

"Eric, how is your new film preparation?"

"Drew, are you planning to get married with Eric?"

"When are you going to have children?"

"..."

Eric and Shantou just smiled and smiled at the camera. In a series of messy questions, several bodyguards and the organizers' security guards quickly came around to protect the two people from entering the party.