Chapter 531: A mere 200 million US dollars
Xu Dabing was so excited by Jin Mai's words that he said, "Really? Top ten richest people, that's amazing. Is it true? You're not lying to me, are you?"
Jin Mai said solemnly: "How could I lie to you? If I lie to you, I am a puppy, okay?"
Seeing Xu Dadan's expression, Jin Mai and Wang Xiujie were overjoyed.
As long as Xu dares to make the final decision and the deal is done, they can rest easy.
Two hundred million US dollars! If they use all of it to buy shares of Zhalang, maybe they can push up the share price of Zhalang. Then they can sell at a high price. Not only will they not lose money, but they can also make a profit.
Xu Dabing looked very excited, but in the end he felt that his IQ had taken the upper hand, and hesitantly said: "But, I remember that Mr. Lu said that he is not optimistic about your product."
Seeing that the matter was about to succeed, Jin Mai and Wang Xiujie didn't want to fail. After cursing Lu Yiming in his heart, Wang Xiujie said, "There is a personal grudge between the richest man and the founder of Zhalang, Wang Zhidong. Many people know about this, so this is just an angry remark by the richest man. It's normal for young people to speak with some subjective emotions. Think about it, this project can be listed in the United States, how could there be a problem?"
Seeing the two of them talking so eloquently, Xu Dabing was secretly dissatisfied in his heart.
Sure enough, those who deal in finance are all dirty!
There is no problem. If there is no problem, why are you in such a hurry to sell it? Could it be that the Buddha is merciful and is benefiting mankind?
But even Buddha won’t save the poor.
For a moment, Xu Dabing felt that he had lost interest in stock trading.
You think you are smart and brave, a financial expert who buys low and sells high, but in fact everything is controlled by the market makers, and retail investors are just tools.
In 1998, there was still a lack of news channels in China. The gradual rise of the Internet has doubled the number of people who go online to obtain information. It was also at that time that domestic portal websites emerged like mushrooms after rain.
Zhalang is one of them.
Zhalang, which has taken over the largest overseas Chinese information website, has its own unique advantages.
In 1998, France was hosting the World Cup, and football fans across the country were eager to have a platform and channel to easily obtain real-time information.
Wang Zhidong discovered this.
So before the World Cup started, many teams’ exclusive communities had already appeared on Zhalang.com for fans to discuss.
Not only that, after the start of the World Cup, Zhalang continuously updated information, creating a precedent for 24-hour live broadcast of football matches.
Even though there is no live video broadcast, the text broadcast still makes millions of fans enjoy watching it.
The Zhalang shot was launched.
Relying on its outstanding performance during the World Cup in France, it won the title of Xiaguo's No. 1 football news station.
It also boosted the popularity of the Zhalang.com portal.
After tasting success in the World Cup, Wang Zhidong successively stole the limelight in reporting on major events such as the Kosovo War, the Taiwan earthquake, China's joining the WTO, and the Sydney Olympics.
At that time, when it came to Chinese portal websites, Ding Lei's NetEase was probably slightly inferior.
It was the huge success on the portal website that made investors see the prospects of Zhalang.
In March 1999, Zhalang received an investment of 30 million US dollars. Six months later, it received another 60 million US dollars in financing.
When Zhalang was killing it hard, the Internet bubble came and many Internet companies went bankrupt.
Wang Zhidong led Zhalang to the top again.
On April 13, 2000, when the Internet bubble was at its peak, Wang Zhidong adopted a spin-off approach and used the "VIE" model to successfully list Zhalang on NASDAQ, breaking the bottleneck of overseas financing for domestic companies.
The "VIE" model was later also known as the Zhalang model.
VIE stands for Variable Interest Entities, also known as "agreement control".
Its essence is a method adopted by domestic entities to achieve overseas listing. It means that the overseas listed entity is separated from the domestic operating entity, and the overseas listed entity establishes a wholly-owned subsidiary in China. The wholly-owned subsidiary does not actually carry out the main business, but controls the business and finance of the domestic operating entity through an agreement, making the operating entity a variable interest entity of the listed entity.
The main purpose of domestic entities going public overseas through the VIE method is to circumvent the restrictions on the proportion of foreign investment in specific industries imposed by domestic laws and regulations and to maximize financing.
The listing of Zhalang was Wang Zhidong's highlight moment. He was so proud of himself that he got carried away. Wang Zhidong did not realize at that time that his success was created by the times, not just his personal efforts.
The most important thing is that he met Lu Yiming.
In later life, Lu Yiming, from the perspective of an ordinary citizen, despised Zhalang. They used whatever means to incite opposition and provoke conflicts for traffic. Many of their remarks made people itch. Lu Yiming thought more than once, why didn't the country ban Zhalang? All the people in this company should be executed for "spreading rumors" and "picking quarrels and provoking troubles" without any injustice.
But obviously this is impossible.
Now, after being reborn, he meets the weakest Zhalang. How can Lu Yiming, who has a lot of wealth in his hands, tolerate Zhalang to follow the previous path?
Just at this time, the ignorant Wang Zhidong talked nonsense to Lu Yiming again. Lu Yiming naturally took advantage of the situation and strangled Zhalang in the cradle.
Wang Zhidong has actually been thinking about this issue recently.
Although he put the blame on Cao Guowei, he knew better than anyone why Lu Yiming targeted Zhalang.
At the Zhalang headquarters, he was pondering and unable to sleep at night.
Seeing the bad news coming one after another, Wang Zhidong became very depressed. The person who brought him so much trouble was his "fellow villager from Guangdong Province", Xiaguo's richest man Lu Yiming.
Wang Zhidong turned his head to look at a man next to him and asked, "Old Jiang, do you think I did something wrong this time?"
He challenged Lu Yiming not only because he was indeed inflated, but also because Lu Yiming was the most talked-about person. Stepping on Lu Yiming to get to the top could bring huge traffic to Zhalang.
But unexpectedly, Lu Yiming was not a pushover. He didn't waste time talking to him and directly shorted Zhalang. He even took direct action now to destroy Zhalang.
Jiang Fengnian is the chairman of Zhalang and is from Taiwan. Although he is ten years older than Wang Zhidong, they are good friends who can talk about anything on the Internet. Jiang Fengnian also holds an extraordinary position within Zhalang. It can be said that without him, there would be no Zhalang today.
Wang Zhidong still attaches great importance to Jiang Fengnian's attitude.
Jiang Fengnian also had a gloomy face. He did not blame Wang Zhidong, but sighed and said, "I understand your thoughts, but you really chose the wrong person. You shouldn't have provoked Lu Yiming. He became the youngest richest man in the mainland at such a young age. How could such a person not have a temper?"
According to normal people's logic, one would not spend hundreds of millions of dollars and risk losing money just to vent one's anger, but Lu Yiming did just that.
Wang Zhidong, who was caught off guard by this, finally realized how stupid he was to provoke such a ruthless person. Lu Yiming's style of doing things was too sharp. You could say that he was young and hot-tempered, but if he wasn't hot-tempered, could he still be called a young man?
Wang Zhidong asked himself, if he became the richest man at the age of 20, he would probably be more arrogant than Lu Yiming.
But now that things have come to this, there is no point in saying any more.
Wang Zhidong regretted it so much that he just wanted to slap himself in the face.
Before we knew it, it was seven o'clock in the evening, the time when the financial channel broadcast the "Today's Financial News".
This is a must-watch program for Wang Zhidong every day.
At this time, the TV hanging on the wall had already started broadcasting programs.
However, the first piece of news almost made his jaw drop.
What was reported in the news program was the news of the change in Zhalang’s equity!
Lu Yiming used Xu Dadan to come up with a plan to cover up the truth and bought 18% of Zhalang's shares from Joe Bert at a very low price.
Because Zhalang is a listed company, when the shareholding exceeds 5%, it has to raise a placard and its identity cannot be concealed at all.
And Lu Yiming didn't need to hide anything, he just wanted to tell everyone that he was here.
On the TV screen, a group of reporters surrounded Lu Yiming who had just walked out of the Securities Building.
A reporter asked: "Mr. Lu, what do you plan to do with Zhalang after you buy it? You shorted Zhalang's stock price before and were bearish on portal websites. Is it all for the purpose of acquiring Zhalang now?"
Lu Yiming smiled and said, "I still say that portal websites have no future. I bought Zhalang out of personal grudges."
Obviously, the reporter's question was a trap. If Lu Yiming followed the reporter's words, it would be equivalent to admitting that he was playing tricks. Although this kind of thing is not illegal, it will also damage his image.
However, Lu Yiming's answer gave the reporters an unexpected answer.
Grudges and love affairs are obviously more interesting topics than the intrigues in the business world.
A reporter asked, "Mr. Lu, after you buy Zhalang, what are you going to do with it? This is a listed company with a market value of nearly 10 billion. Are you really going to destroy it with your own hands?"
Lu Yiming sneered and asked back: "Why? Is it not possible?"
The reporter was startled by Lu Yiming's laughter and spoke in a much lower voice: "But wouldn't the money you spent on buying the shares be wasted?"
Lu Yiming said casually: "It's just a few hundred million US dollars, not worth mentioning."
Such a domineering speech directly caused internal injuries to the reporters present.
This is probably the best interpretation of what it means to be rich and willful.
Hundreds of millions of dollars, and it’s just a mere sum?
At this moment, Zhang Chaoyang and Ding Sanshi, who were also watching the news, shuddered inexplicably, obviously frightened by Lu Yiming's "arrogance".
Their companies, Sohu and NetEase, are also preparing to go public in the United States in the next few months.
If I accidentally offend Lu Yiming, this evil star, wouldn't I end up following in Zha Lang's footsteps?
It’s scary just thinking about it!
Zhang Chaoyang called the head of the content department directly, pointed at the screen on TV and said to him: "In the future, you must not touch any negative news about Lu Yiming, understand? If it is not necessary, try not to touch any news about him. Although this guy has traffic, he is also toxic! I don't want to wake up in the morning and find that Sohu's surname is Lu."
On the NetEase side, Ding Sanshi also issued a similar order.
Not only them, but all content creators who saw the news held meetings with similar content. In order to live longer, if you can avoid provoking Lu Yiming, then try not to provoke him!
Slag wave.
After watching the news, Wang Zhidong's hands and feet were cold, and he only came to his senses after Jiang Fengnian called him several times.
"Huh? What? Oh yeah, I have to ask."
Wang Zhidong hesitated for a few seconds, then threw himself on the desk, dialed Joe Burt's number, and asked loudly: "Joe! What is going on? I need an explanation!"
On the other end of the phone, Joe Bert hadn't even put down the champagne in his hand.
He also learned about this incident from watching the news.
He was originally going to open champagne to celebrate the fact that he finally sold his shares.
But what surprised him was that he had clearly sold his shares to a man named Xu Dadan, so how come it suddenly became Lu Yiming?
When he received the call, he was questioned by Wang Zhidong before he could even say anything. As a noble white man, how could he bear this? He was too lazy to even reply, and just hung up the phone, then called a few of his men and ordered them to investigate the matter.
The shares were sold from Joe Burt, and Wang Zhidong's first thought was to ask Joe Burt for clarification. You know, because of the VIE structure, his current shares in Zhalang have been diluted from 30% to 3.8%.
What's worse is that he had signed a bet agreement with the investors, promising that the development of Zhalang must meet the various requirements stipulated in the contract. If any data fails to meet the standards, he will be held accountable, or even... kicked out of the company he founded!
Wang Zhidong felt numb at the thought of this possibility.
Now Joe Bert is still hanging up on him!
After hanging up the phone, Wang Zhidong expressed his concerns to Jiang Fengnian. Jiang Fengnian suggested: "Find a way to get more shares, contact other shareholders, unite, and fight against Lu Yiming together. There is still hope."
"Ah, yes, his share is less than 50%, I still have a chance!"
Jiang Fengnian's words reminded Wang Zhidong, who quickly found his phone book and began to look for support from Zhalang's shareholders one by one, especially the main members of the board of directors.
It's really a desperate attempt to find a cure.
In addition to the American capital background, there is another major shareholder in China who owns the most shares of Zhalang, and that is the chairman of the Soitong Group, the first angel investor who invested in Wang Zhidong, and also the "village chief" of Zhongguancun - Duan Yongji.
In order to show his sincerity, Wang Zhidong personally visited Duan Yongji the next morning.
"Mr. Duan."
When the two met, Wang Zhidong behaved very humbly and took out his gift as soon as he entered the door.
"I know Mr. Duan likes to drink tea. Recently, a friend gave me a jar of this silver hair. I don't know anything about it. In my hands, it was like a pearl covered in dust. So I brought it to Mr. Duan as soon as possible."
Of course, this tea was bought by Wang Zhidong.
Duan Yongji took the tea leaves and said with a smile, "Look at you, you came just for the sake of being here, why do you bring any gifts? Sit down."
The two sat opposite each other. Duan Yongji knew that Wang Zhidong would not come to visit for no reason, so he immediately asked, "Mr. Wang, you are free today and you came to visit me. It should not be just to bring me tea, right?"
Wang Zhidong sighed and said, "Mr. Duan, I'll be frank . I have some personal grudges with that Lu Yiming. You should know about this, right? As a result, he is now not following the rules of martial arts. Not only did he short Zhalang in the US stock market, he also took over many shares of Zhalang. I have a feeling that he may have to hold a board meeting. I hope that Mr. Duan can help me at the board meeting."
Duan Yongji had also read the news. After hearing what Wang Zhidong said, he agreed without hesitation: "No problem. With our friendship, I will definitely support you. Don't worry, I will support you to the end."
The two men were old acquaintances. Wang Zhidong did not doubt Duan Yongji's words and felt more at ease.
"Mr. Duan is still very righteous."
Duan Yongji holds a lot of shares. If he stands firmly on Wang Zhidong's side, Lu Yiming would not dare to act rashly even if he gets so many shares.
After dealing with Duan Yongji, Wang Zhidong couldn't wait to find other shareholders, so he stood up and said goodbye immediately.
As soon as Wang Zhidong left, Duan Yongji called Lu Yiming.
"Boss Lu, Wang Zhidong just came to see me."
"Well, don't worry, Mr. Lu, I will help you stabilize him."
"Okay, happy cooperation."
Duan Yongji hung up the phone happily. If he had to choose between Wang Zhidong and Lu Yiming to support, anyone with a sound mind would know what to choose.
China Overseas.
When Lu Yiming received Duan Yongji's call, he was at Pudong Airport, welcoming Li Yiwen who had flown in from Baiyun City.
On the way back to the city, Li Yiwen said to Lu Yiming: "The profit from the short selling of the $2.7 billion we invested previously has reached about 70%."
$1.9 billion in net income!
Less than two months after shorting the U.S. stock market, Lu Yiming had earned more than 150 small goals, an astronomical figure that many people would find difficult to imagine in their entire lives, and a huge fortune that many industrial business families could not accumulate in several generations.
However, this is not the peak. After all, the US stock market is still falling and short selling is still continuing.
After finishing the report, Li Yiwen asked, "I just heard that you spent $200 million to buy shares of Zhalang?"
Lu Yiming got what he wanted and laughed happily, "Yes, after the reorganization of the board of directors is completed, we can kick Wang Zhidong out, and then skin and tear Zha Lang apart."
Now, the largest shareholders of Zhalang have been dealt with, including Duan Yongji from China and Lu Yiming from the US who acquired 18% of the shares through Xu Dadan. The rest are in the hands of Bill Gates and Paul Allen.
These people have all received promises from Lu Yiming, so they will not stop his actions.
Only Wang Zhidong was kept in the dark and still thought he could turn the tables and fight back.
However, the world of capital is ruthless. From the moment he chose to believe in capital, he had actually lost.
Now, it's just a dying struggle.
