Back To 1995

"A source revealed that Iger, the president of American Telecom, was dissatisfied with ICQ's chaotic management and continuous losses, which dragged down the performance of American Telecom. In the second half of this year, ICQ suffered a huge loss of more than 4.4 billion US dollars, and the short-term debt scale has soared to 18.9 billion US dollars. !

Although ICQ’s goodwill impairment is not as much as AOL Time Warner’s US$54 billion, it still exceeds an astonishing US$40 billion. President Iger revealed that ICQ’s board of directors has violated many agreements when it acquired America Telecom , including the most important debt and funding issues! "

  The financial channel of San Jose TV station reported the news of American Telecom and ICQ headquarters as if it had obtained "insider information".

  To sum it up in one sentence, America Telecom now feels that ICQ is not worthy of it...

It can’t be said that American Telecom is not authentic. I don’t see that AOL is the same as Time Warner. AOL’s continuous losses make Time Warner hate AOL people. They think AOL is a serious drag on Time Warner and demand that AOL Time Warner changed back to the original Time Warner name, removed the traces of AOL, sold AOL or directly split it!

There is a famous saying in the e-sports industry that food is the original sin. In a team of five, if there is one position and the level of playing is not enough, it will drag down the entire team. The tricks targeted, and finally caused the entire game to collapse.

  The same is true for companies that have become giants through mergers. When a certain business continues to lose money, it will drag other businesses down!

   Now, the Internet is that "weakness". Neither American Telecom nor Time Warner want this "burden".

  The statement of Iger and America Telecom caused the stock price of ICQ to collapse again. Now it is America Telecom that supports half of ICQ's empire!

America Telecom's broadband business and mobile business have not changed with the decline of the telecommunications industry. Net, you have to continue to pay!

In addition to these two businesses, America Telecom's "electronic retail business" has also ushered in an explosive period. America Telecom's flagship stores in major cities in America are now also starting to collect "member money". Carter mobile phones, Leica cameras, Panda TVs, and other electronic products, the revenue of America Telecom's electronic retail flagship store may reach an astonishing level this year!

Now American Telecom is the most profitable industry under ICQ, and it is also the last afterglow of the empire. It is precisely because of the revenue of American Telecom that ICQ's performance is not so ugly. , There are still many Wall Street institutions and foundations that are unwilling to sell ICQ stocks, because, no matter how you look at it, ICQ cannot become a junk stock.

  But Iger's attitude made these leeks who had the last hope and faith in ICQ also despair.

Almost as soon as the news came out, the stock price of ICQ plummeted again that day, and successfully fell below the market value of US$100 billion. Since then, Nasdaq has no giant company with a market value of more than US$100 billion. Officially wiped out!

   Immelt heard the news from ICQ and America Telecom after just finishing a General Electric meeting. Immelt is currently busy raising dollars for General Electric.

General Electric is also badly hurt this time, and its market value has been cut in half. Although it still occupies the pit of the world's highest market value giant together with Microsoft, its current market value is only less than 230 billion US dollars. On the one hand, the fellow sufferer, Microsoft, is similar, and Microsoft is worse than General Electric.

General Electric was hit by the crash of the Internet. How comfortable it was at the beginning, it feels uncomfortable now. Microsoft was purely affected by the antitrust ruling, and its stock price plummeted all the way. Who is in more trouble.

Immelt is desperately trying to raise cash. The sudden collapse of Internet and technology stocks has turned the entire American stock market into a ghost market. General Electric, which has never had to worry about funding issues, has become stretched for a while. After all, many debts are about to come due, and General Electric needs to repay them...

The market is depressed, the leeks have been squeezed dry, and the new leeks have not yet grown. General Electric cannot issue bonds or issue additional stocks to cut the leeks. American banks and institutions are not willing to lend money to General Electric at this time. , because what General Electric needs is not a small sum of money. In the short term, at least this year, it needs to repay debts of more than tens of billions of dollars!

These debts were originally not a big problem for General Electric. With General Electric's reputation and revenue, if you increase stocks or bonds casually, you will be able to borrow a sum of money. After all, General Electric is very profitable. of.

   But now the market has changed. General Electric relies on debt to support its debts. It is ineffective. Those debts, as well as GE's most profitable financial department, require a lot of cash flow!

The most profitable department of General Electric has long been no longer engines, medical care, aviation, machinery, electrical appliances, etc., but a financial department for lending. In the early days, it provided loans for ordinary people in America to buy refrigerators and dishwashers. Until now It has become a financial sector for many businesses ranging from insurance to aircraft leasing, to real estate mortgages, vehicle mortgages, and home loans.

As the oldest profession in the world, lending is definitely profitable, especially General Electric is more expensive, because it is not the Bank of America, and does not need to abide by the rules of the bank, so the loans that ordinary banks in America can lend, General Electric can Letting go, the Bank of America dare not lend, but General Electric dares to lend!

  Combined with the management of a group of financial executives and tax experts, the US dollars earned by GE's financial department can also be offset by taxes, which is simply a win.

But this business also requires a huge cash flow. Now that GE’s account is empty and it has to pay off huge debts, Immelt is raising money all over the world, so that GE won’t blow up. Ray, then Immelt is probably going to be crucified on the pillar of shame of professional managers!

  Immelt is now negotiating with several American banks for loans, and is also preparing to ask the federal finance department to provide General Electric with a loan guarantee of no less than $50 billion.

Other companies have no money, and they are basically waiting to die. However, companies such as General Electric and Goldman Sachs are in trouble. The first thing they think of is to ask the federal financial department to quickly pay for life-saving money. They have enough contacts and connections , Let the federal finance take care of it, this is their confidence!

But it will take time. After all, it is not a small amount of money. It will take at least a few months or even a half-year transition period, especially now that it is still in the general election period. Immelt needs to let General Electric survive this period. It is also the weakest period for General Electric in recent decades!

  Hearing that another moth appeared on ICQ, Immelt frowned. He really felt helpless now. It is not so easy to be the head of an empire, especially two empires.

   "Eiger, Bruno Song!"

Immelt said the two names softly. He naturally didn't want to give up ICQ. Immelt knew that the current ICQ is only in a weak period, and the Internet has entered a low period, but the future definitely belongs to the era of the Internet. One thing, Immelt knows better than anyone.

It can be seen clearly that it does not mean that Immelt will be able to hold back the decline of ICQ. The confidence of leeks in the Internet has collapsed, and Wall Street institutions dare not end easily. Watch it fall bit by bit!

With a long sigh, Immelt can only lament the bad luck. As long as he is given another year and a half, even if the Internet collapses, he can control the entire ICQ and prevent ICQ from falling apart. But now, Ren Yimei No matter how unwilling he was, he also felt a little helpless at this time. He couldn’t support ICQ and General Electric at the same time.

  On the golf course at the Manor on the North Shore of Long Island, New York, Song Yang was swinging a club with an invited person.

   "President Welch, thank you for being here!"

  Song Yang swung a shot and said to Welch beside him.