Volume 8 Final Chapter Chapter 1100 The Financial Tsunami is About to Happen
the next day.
Nan Yi invited Fang Chong to play golf at Beijing High School. He told him about the plan for the white-collar apartments and asked him to refine it and come up with a plan as soon as possible.
The White-Collar Apartment Plan must also be accompanied by a TV series called "White-Collar Apartment" to show today's female high school students the "high-end" lifestyle of female white-collar workers in big cities, the "high-end" way of speaking, and inserting one or two English words in a sentence, which will make them appear more international.
There is no doubt that Nan Yi has another idea for an advertising drama, which mainly promotes Shepherd Coffee and office green plants. Zhuxian Company has a place to invest funds. Before starting the landscaping project, it will first plant some cacti and succulents; the others will be subtle and will not ferment so quickly.
After playing golf, Nan Yi went to Xiaoxiangyu to inquire about the progress of the wedding dress making of Fan Hongdou and Nan Ruoyin, and then went to Jiuxianqiao Factory 777, one of the branches of the "718 Joint Factory" built with the assistance of the Soviet revisionists and designed and built by East Germany - the third factory, code-named Factory 777.
After entering the 1980s, Factory 777 fell into financial difficulties and large areas of factory buildings were idle. In 1994, Factory 777 began its military-to-civilian transformation and was incorporated into the Seven Star Group. The old factory area where Factory 777 was located had no significance as a production base for the Seven Star Group, but rather as a real estate development base.
However, if you want to develop real estate, you will face two problems:
First, just across the road is Factory 751, whose main industries are thermal power and gas industries. There is a giant gas tank covering tens of thousands of square meters in the factory area, which supplies one-third of the gas in Beijing. It is not appropriate to build a shopping mall or a residential area next to it.
Second, simply, no money.
In 1995, Factory 777 rented some idle factory buildings to migrant artists who had no fixed residence or job. The price was quite cheap, 0.3 yuan per square meter per day. Based on this, Li Jing saw a glimmer of hope to buy Factory 777.
After many consultations and negotiations, at the beginning of 1996, Tota Construction bought the 620,000 square meters of factory area of Factory 777, including a construction area of 320,000 square meters, for 300 million in cash and 40% of the development income.
After the structure of Wangbei Media expanded, the foreign-related office building could no longer accommodate it, so the entire company was divided into two. The part that needed to frequently face customers moved to the office building in Guomao, and the part that did not need to face customers moved to Factory 777.
Tota Construction allocated an area of more than 30,000 square meters to Wangbei Media. The charge was not expensive, 0.5 yuan per square meter per day, and they verbally promised that the price would never increase. Wangbei Media tidied up its own place and set up offices, indoor set shooting areas and various studios.
It was impossible to demolish the 777 factory and redevelop it. The East German experts adopted the most advanced technology and Bauhaus design concept in the world at that time. The characteristics of Bauhaus are to focus on meeting practical requirements, give full play to the technical and aesthetic performance of new materials and new structures, and have simple shapes and flexible and diverse compositions.
The production plants in the 777 plant area are mostly zigzag cast-in-place shell structures with high indoor space. The sail-shaped plant adopts zigzag cast-in-place shell structure, and the beam-column form is an arc-shaped Y-shaped structure.
Combining the functions of the beam-column structure, the north roof adopts a horizontal skylight, and the window plane is tilted outward at a certain angle, which is conducive to eliminating the lateral shear force and making the structure more stable and reasonable. The unique internal space can both provide north-facing lighting and meet the rationality of the structure.
The Y-shaped columns are reminiscent of Nervi's Roman Sports Palace.
Without destroying the exterior of the building, the factory has a lot of room for renovation, and there is still a lot of open space in the factory area, so new buildings can be built in accordance with the existing architectural style. In Nan Yi's mind, Factory 777 has long been renamed Nanjiayuan. On the basis of developing into a film and television shooting base, it will also become a children's playground for his children and grandchildren.
Nan Ruoqi may not be able to catch up with the children's playground. The next door Factory 751 is going to build a second large gas tank, so the Girls' Playground should be able to catch up. According to the development trend of the capital, Factory 751 will definitely move away. Once the potential danger is eliminated, a playground can be built according to her preferences, even if she can't come many times.
When Nan Ruoqi gets tired of playing with it, or loses the function of pampering her daughter, with a little modification, it can be used as the background for the character of a young lady in a TV series.
Although Nan Yi's motives for film and television dramas are not pure, he will definitely not produce a drama with cheap special effects. The character of a young lady must have scenery and props that match her identity. It is outrageous to remove the logo of a Mazda and pretend it is a luxury car worth tens of millions.
Of course, the character of a rich person must be taken lightly and cannot be set too high. For example, the character of Sister Yangyang, who is a family director and owns an industrial park of 250 million square kilometers in Uganda, is better to decline. The entire Nan family can only produce a small part, the cost is too high, and it cannot build the scene. It will be much easier if you change the billion to tens of millions.
Nan Yi walked around the factory and came to the door of Gong Xue's office building. He passed through an area where Gong Xue usually practiced swordplay and a reception area, and came to the stairs to the attic. He climbed up the stairs and came to a glass door. He pressed a few times on the code dial, and the glass door automatically retracted into the wall.
In a small and slender office of less than 600 square meters, Gong Xue sat on the sofa, holding the remote control in her hand and constantly fast-forwarding and pausing. Directly opposite her, the screen of a Panasonic Paint King kept flashing.
When she saw Nan Yi, she patted the sofa beside her and motioned Nan Yi to sit over.
After Nan Yi sat down, she pointed at the TV and said, "Should we change the plot? After the heroine was insulted, the hero accepted her and married her. This part was still good, but the heroine later had an affair with the second male lead behind the hero's back and got pregnant with twin daughters. The hero knew about it but pretended not to know and raised the twins as his own children.
Until the heroine took the initiative to file for divorce, he generously let go and even helped to continue raising the twins. Then things got even more chaotic. The heroine and the second male lead went abroad and soon separated. The heroine married and divorced a foreigner and a Chinese. When she was middle-aged and had a terminal illness, she only thought of coming back to see her daughter...
No, the heroine knew that the hero already had a small fortune, so she came back on purpose to gain sympathy. The hero actually spent money to help the heroine with her medical treatment, and in the end they had a happy ending. Don’t you think this is seriously out of touch with social reality?”
Nan Yi waved his hand, "Reality is not important, what's important is the perception of the female audience. Which female audience doesn't want to go out and pursue the happiness of her imagination when she is young? If she can catch it, that would be the best. If not, she can go back to where she was and find the person who has always been infatuated with her, forget the hurt and troubles she has suffered outside, and sigh, it turns out that the happiness she pursued has always been by her side.
Sister Happiness, without realizing it, we humans have had a genetic mutation, not on the outside, but on the inside. A door has been installed between the mouth and the heart, and the connection between the vocal cords and the heart has been cut off. The words we say no longer come from the bottom of our hearts, but are conceived by our brains according to rigorous logic. There are no true words, only words that best suit our needs and interests.
Ask your head, then ask your heart, if you have a choice, do you want the world to revolve around you?"
"Who doesn't want to be the center of the world?" Gong Xue asked back.
"That's it. Once our TV series starts airing, there will definitely be a lot of criticism. The old will criticize, the young will criticize, the men will criticize, and the women will criticize even more fiercely. It doesn't matter if we are criticized. What we want is to win the recognition of the audience. Women should be little princesses from the moment they are born. If they can't get that in reality, shouldn't they be able to get comfort and satisfaction in the virtual TV series?"
Gong Xue spat, "I can't argue with you. Why are you here today?"
"I have a new drama that needs to be prepared. Let me tell you the general plot requirements... It's a chick flick, with three or four female characters with similar roles. Write the script first, then select the actors and let them experience the life of a white-collar worker.
According to the requirements of the plot, all scenes must be experienced once, and I hope that the actresses can have the thinking of female white-collar workers and present a performance as real as possible. "
"Not stuffing any private goods in there?" Gong Xue said with a playful smile.
"The lifestyle of female white-collar workers is a private matter. Don't create a script behind closed doors. Find two or three female white-collar workers to come up with the idea. The same principle still applies. It can be higher than life, but it can't be made up. Break down the plot. There must be something that happened in reality or there are similar cases."
"I know. You've emphasized this several times. I haven't forgotten."
"Haha, Sister Xingfu is getting impatient." Nan Yi covered Gong Xue's face and rubbed it repeatedly.
Gong Xue pried Nan Yi's hands apart and rolled her eyes at him, "You ruined my makeup."
"It's okay, it's still beautiful."
Nan Yi said as he kissed Gong Xue on the face, then kissed her on the lips...
After being intimate for a while, the two regained their composure and continued to talk about work.
When thinking about the project of "Unforgettable", Nan Yi went through all the male actors he knew. He couldn't think of an actor whose age and acting skills were suitable to work with Winslet. After all, this project would be Hollywood-style, and actors who had been at ease in domestic films before would easily have difficulty acclimatizing.
It is not possible to shoot in the domestic style. Although Nan Yi does not care much about the box office, he would certainly prefer to make a profit rather than a pure loss. Moreover, the future world that "Unforgettable Lovers" wants to depict is to be shown to the whole world.
For the mobile phone that will appear in the plot, the logo and boot screen are of paramount importance. The name has been decided, Li, which is derived from the English translation of the tabby cat, "Dragen Li". There will be no cat elements in the brand logo, after all, not every target customer likes cats. Someone has been hired to design the animation. The Li-branded smartphone is scheduled to be launched in 2004 or 2005. Before that, Nan will have a try in the non-smartphone field.
Nan Yi threw the question of the male actor to Gong Xue. She thought about it for a while but couldn't think of a suitable person.
"How about inviting a group of male actors who are good at literary drama to audition?"
"That's the only way. When inviting the invitee, you can tell him that the salary will not be less than $200,000, and there will be box office dividends. When the script is out, the gunman in Los Angeles will be responsible for finding a production company, and then publicize it to make it bigger, so that the movie will be popular before it is even shot."
"The pay is not important, the film itself is important. There will definitely be people who ask not to receive the pay. How many people dream of going to Hollywood to make a movie." Gong Xue said wisely.
"Not wanting is the sincerity of others, giving is our principle. It's not that easy to get into Hollywood, especially for minorities. The color of your skin directly limits the possibility of becoming mainstream. You have to explain that filming is filming, and don't make random promises."
Wangbei Media already has its own film and television team, with all the necessary personnel in front of and behind the scenes. Talent often has little to do with character, and some dirty things, even if they don’t happen now, will definitely happen in the future.
It is the nature of the Chinese people to use the little power they have finally grasped to make things difficult for others and seek personal gain. The vicious cycle has already started, and it is impossible to control it. The only thing we can do is to warn them more often and advise them not to make promises without thinking, and to think more about the consequences if they cannot fulfill their promises.
"I'll pay more attention." Gong Xue responded and said, "White Light Company tried to release a compilation album before, but the response was not very good. Do you have any suggestions?"
"Loss?"
“Not too much.”
Nan Yi pondered for a while and said, "Find two female singers with good voices and preferably good looks to sign a record contract. There are many good songs in Taicun that are not well-known in the mainland. For example, Shen Yan has a song called "Treading on the Waves" and another song called "Castle in the Heart", both of which are good. You can go find a producer to buy the copyright."
"A small cloud is slowly coming towards me. Please take a break and stop for a while." Gong Xue hummed a few lines and asked, "Is this the song?"
"Yes, you can adapt it a bit, add some electronic music, speed up the tune, change it to a disco style, sing while dancing, don't you find that there are few singers with this style in the market?"
"Anything else?"
"Don't ask me. Just hire a musician from Taiwan and another from Japan. If you look through the music from these two places, you can find a lot of excellent works. It's not difficult to buy the copyrights and sing covers to make a few singers famous. I just hope that when you make money, the musicians you hired can fight for their reputation and create something of their own."
Nan Yi sighed and said, "Find a few more, within three years. If they can't come up with anything, they'll leave. If we can't produce a famous musician in six years, we'll give up on this one. From now on, we'll directly cooperate with outside parties for theme songs and interludes.
There is a guy named Richie Jen in Taiwan who hasn't made any headway in the past few years. He released a new album at the end of last year, which sold like hot cakes in Hong Kong and Taiwan. I've already seen people selling it in Guangzhou, and it won't be long before it's sold over here too. While he's not yet popular in mainland China, I should contact his record company as soon as possible so we can collaborate on a few concerts.
Sister Xingfu, if you hand over Baiguang Company to me, I can make 50 million this year and over 100 million next year. Now is a great time to make music and release records. If I hear that Baiguang not only doesn’t make money but actually loses money by the end of the year, I will beat your ass to pieces.”
Gong Xue said dissatisfiedly: "You only know how to criticize me. Wangbei Media is your business. Can't you help out a little?"
"I have to do everything myself. Why should I support you? Do what you love and put more thought into it. Wangbei Media's performance last year was not good. Your salary increase report was approved, but your report on increasing dividends was suppressed. You have been put on observation. If there is no significant improvement this year, you will receive a warning letter."
"The higher-ups just send this letter and that letter. Last year, Wangbei Media's profit increased by 27.3% compared to the year before. And yet they still say that I didn't do a good job?" Gong Xue became increasingly dissatisfied.
Nan Yi stood up and walked to the water dispenser to get himself a glass of water. "You should do better. In the past few years, the talent below has grown very fast. In two or three years, we will need to promote a few of them to the ranks of branch managers.
Talents should be paid more and promoted to positions that match their abilities. When new people take over, the relatively unqualified old employees will naturally give way. This applies not only to you, but also to other management staff."
"A major reshuffle of the top management?"
Nan Yi crumpled up the paper cup and threw it into the trash can. "A major change is impossible. It's just a small-scale change. Forget it. Let's not talk about this. I'm going to Seoul in a while. Do you want to go with me to play for a few days?"
Gong Xue pouted and said, "Are you doing this on purpose? You just asked me to focus on my work, and now you're inviting me to play?"
“Are there any conflicts between the two?”
Gong Xue did not give a direct answer, but asked: "When do you leave?"
"It's not decided yet. I have something else to do. Wait for my notification."
"good."
After leaving Factory 777, Nan Yi spent a few more peaceful days. He handled official emails and surfed the Internet during the day, occasionally went fishing, and sent Liu Zhen to do aerobics in the evening. During this time, he would occasionally chat with Rui Xiaodan.
When March came, Nan Yi and Gong Xue flew to Seoul.
Once you enter Seoul, it's like entering a deep sea. Nan Yi accompanied Gong Xue for a week. After sending her away, he immersed his mind in observing the economy of South Korea. While he was observing everywhere in Seoul with his eyes, Zhao Shixian, who was already in Bangkok before the end of the first month of the year, was very busy. This time, she not only represented the identity of the president of PY Securities, but also served as a member of the financial team, the Thailand investment agent of South Kingdom Bank, and the executor of Scarlett Fund's 97-98 Asian strategic plan.
It can be said that Zhao Shixian is Nan's arbitrageur for this financial crisis. If she does a good job, Nan will make a lot of money, and she will be able to share in the generous commissions outside of PY Securities. At the same time, she will also have the opportunity to challenge the position of deputy leader of the financial group.
Once she takes the position of deputy team leader, she can almost manage all the financial business of Nan's. In principle, except for Adam Bank and Nan's Investment Holdings, which have not had a strong presence but are the core of Nan's, she has the right to supervise and a certain say in all funds, investment holdings, and investment companies.
Her identity also began to split. She was led by Scarlett and Nan Ruoyin, but she could also lead them in turn. It all depended on what identity she used to stand up and have the conversation.
Last June, Zhao Shixian mobilized 1 billion US dollars to enter the Russian stock market. Taking advantage of the fact that the Russian stock market was open to foreign investment but the stock prices were relatively cheap, he bought a lot of Russian companies' stocks. Now, the fire of the financial crisis is about to ignite, and Japan and South Korea are in trouble. It won't be long before the funds from these two places will withdraw from Russia in large numbers. It is time to retreat.
Zhao Shixian was in Bangkok, but she was remotely controlling the trading team in Moscow. There were twelve LCD monitors hanging on the wall of her office, showing several major stock markets and foreign exchange prices in Asia, and she was issuing instructions from time to time.
She was eating only snacks, the main meal had been prepared several years ago, and until January this year, she also borrowed $5 billion worth of one-year baht from Thai banks and shorted about $2 billion worth of baht in the forward market.
Southland Bank lends money and she borrows money, and both lending and borrowing generate huge profits.
At this time, the US dollar interest rate remained at an annualized level of 5.25% for the entire year of 1996, but in Thailand, due to the threat of inflation brought about by economic overheating, the one-year interest rate usually remained above 8% to 10%. What's more interesting is that the interest rates of each bank are different, but generally above 10%.
The direct consequence of this situation is that there is a huge amount of hot money for arbitrage. Even local commercial banks in Thailand are very happy to borrow US dollars, Japanese yen or marks from overseas with interest rates at least 3 to 5 percentage points lower than the Thai baht, sell them on the market, and then convert them into Thai baht for lending.
The total amount of overseas borrowing exceeds 1 trillion US dollars, of which more than 95% are short-term loans with a term of less than one year. This means that when the value of the Thai baht becomes unstable, these hot money will flee Thailand at the first opportunity, and the whole of Thailand will be reduced to ruins.
Naturally, this crisis would not go unnoticed. In fact, the Bank of Thailand has already discovered the problem. At this moment, the Governor of the Bank of Thailand, Runchaknuang, is holding a telephone conference with allies to discuss how to jointly deal with the impact of international financial institutions on the Thai baht.
“What’s going on with the banking system?”
The question was asked by Hu Cidao, chairman of the board of directors of the Monetary Authority of Thailand. He was more concerned about the credit status of the Thai banking system than the large-scale short selling of Thai baht in the market.
Unlike the central banks of most countries in the world, the Monetary Authority of Singapore does not rely on rising or falling interest rates to influence finance, but instead uses foreign exchange exchange mechanisms to regulate the Singapore dollar market.
The reason for this is that the Lijiaopo Monetary Authority at that time did not have the authority and responsibility to issue currency, and naturally could not change the increase in market liquidity. It could only change the entire social liquidity by changing the form of the stock, and then affect the entire financial market. Therefore, the Lijiaopo Monetary Authority has a certain degree of control over the foreign exchange market that exceeds the central banks of other countries.
Hu Cidao was not worried about the sell-off , because the combined funds of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and the Bank of Thailand were enough to cope with the current situation. However, Hu Cidao knew that the castle was most easily breached from the inside. Thailand's current economic situation was not optimistic. It was rumored that the operating conditions of its banking system and financial companies were extremely poor, and there were even rumors that some large banks were on the verge of bankruptcy.
Just last month, rating agency Moody's downgraded the credit ratings of three major banks in Thailand, namely Ayutthaya, Kyoto and Thai Military Bank, from A2 to A3, and to the extremely dangerous B1 level. The rating falling into the junk range means that the international financing market is closed to Thais.
If the problems of the banking system cannot be solved, even if the Thai government withstands the blow in the foreign exchange market, the collapse of the banking system will still lead to a crazy outflow of funds, followed by a new round of blows.
"I have discussed this issue with the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance. New policies will be introduced soon to further increase the margin for banks' bad debts," Malajaynuan vowed.
In fact, except for Lijiapo, central banks in Southeast Asia have all focused their attention on the Thai baht. They know very well that once the Thai baht fails to hold up, the next one will be one of them, or all of them.
The officials of these central banks are fully aware of the huge harm caused by international hot money, especially hot money led by hedge funds. The tragic scenes as far away as the whole of Europe and as recent as South America two years ago are still vivid in their minds. However, they did not expect that the crisis would come to Southeast Asia so soon.
“Can you tell me about the Bank of Thailand’s position in forward foreign exchange contracts?”
The person asking the questions this time was Ren Yi-zhao, Director of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, who represented Hong Kong in the conference call.
“Ahem…”
Although he had prepared himself for this question, Malaja Nuan still looked a little embarrassed when asked. Fortunately, it was a conference call and other people could not see his expression. After a while of embarrassment, he said, "The position is basically the same as the US dollars we sold, which is 5 billion US dollars."
In order to cope with selling orders in the spot market, Thai banks must buy Thai baht with US dollars in the spot market. For hedging purposes, they have to buy US dollar contracts in the forward market, thus forming a counterparty with international speculators.
The party that shorted the Thai baht sold the Thai baht in the spot market and shorted the Thai baht contract in the forward contract, exerting double pressure on Thailand. The location of this forward contract transaction is not fixed, some are in London, some are in New York, and some are in Lijiapo.
According to news from the Lijiaopo Exchange, the total daily trading value in the forward foreign exchange market of Asian currencies has reached 6 billion US dollars during this period, and the trading volume of Thai baht has grown the fastest, which means that the main force of the current international hot money attack is Thailand.
Without waiting for others to ask again, Malajianuan said, "The most important task at present is to closely monitor market trends, especially the forward exchange market. If there is a huge sell-off, we must pay attention to the spot exchange market at the first time. At that time, we hope that all countries can provide assistance."
Malajianuan's tone sounded a bit pleading, and his attitude was very humble, but the current situation in Thailand forced him to ask for help, so he had to humble himself.
There was a groan behind each line. After a long while, Hu Cidao was the first to say, "Please rest assured that Lijiapo will definitely support the Thai baht. Our government has prepared 10 billion US dollars and is ready to enter the market at any time."
The reason why Lijiaopo is so strong against Thailand is that, firstly, the Thai economy is inextricably linked to Lijiaopo, and secondly, most of the short-selling contracts for Thai baht are conducted in Lijiaopo's market. For moral reasons, Lijiaopo has to be active.
Of course, Lijiaopo also has its own considerations. Although Thailand has been actively building a regional financial center in recent years, it still cannot be compared with the old financial centers such as Lijiaopo and Xiangkeng. Lijiaopo wants to actively intervene in the market this time to let the world know that Lijiaopo, a small place, is not something that can be manipulated at will.
Malaja Nuan heaved a sigh of relief when he heard the promise from Lijiaopo. Although he had long guessed that Lijiaopo would fully support Thailand, it was only when he heard the promise from Hu Cidao, who represented the official, that he finally let go of the worry in his heart.
"We also need to pay attention to the dynamics of the forward market. I am afraid we cannot provide too much support to Thailand. It is estimated that there is only a quota of US$1 billion."
With the first statement, others also expressed their views. This time it was Gabby Singson, the governor of the Central Bank of the Philippines. Like Thailand, the Philippines was also attacked fiercely by international hot money in the forward market. Although the situation was not as serious as that of Thailand, it was also extremely urgent.
After the Philippines, Malaysia and other countries expressed their views, Ren Yi said: "We still need to negotiate on our side, but we will enter the market when necessary."
Although Mala Jianuan was not very satisfied with Xiangkeng's statement, he was also aware that Xiangkeng was at a crossroads of major historical changes and it was difficult to provide much support.
At the end of the meeting, Hu Cidao added: "In addition to our support, the Thai government should also do something to limit the liquidity of investment funds and restrict the flow of international hot money."
"We will soon introduce regulations to restrict local banks from lending to foreign investors, and at the same time significantly increase the level of offshore lending rates, so that the borrowing costs of international hot money will increase significantly."
Hearing that Thailand was fully prepared, several influential figures in the Southeast Asian financial world breathed a sigh of relief. They believed that with the national strength of several countries, they would be able to cope with this currency crisis.
After the meeting, the heads of central banks or monetary authorities of various countries were digesting the contents of the meeting. Some of them were digesting Marajanuan's words "restricting local banks from lending funds to foreign investors".
As long as Thailand issues an administrative order, all banks in Thailand must obey it. But what about Hong Kong? As a place known as a free port, the HKMA is unlikely to issue such an order. If international hot money hits the Hong Kong dollar, what else can Hong Kong do except raise the lending rate?
Ren Yi Zhao fell into deep thought!
