Hollywood Hunter

After staying in the UK for a week and going to Finland and Italy, Simon returned to New York on July 11.

AOL will be officially listed on the Nasdaq market on July 12.

In the previous two weeks of the Ipo roadshow, AOL has aroused a very strong response from investor groups across North America. The cumulative number of shares subscribed for has exceeded 210 million shares, which is 9.5 times the number of new shares issued by AOL.

At the same time, in order to cooperate with the ipo on July 12, AOL released the company's financial report for the second quarter of 1991 on July 10.

As of June 31, AOL had 3.63 million official users in the most prosperous metropolitan areas on the east and west coasts of the United States. Compared with the previous quarter, the number of users increased by 45%. In the three months from April 1 to June 31, AOL’s operating income reached US$270 million, a 137% increase compared to the first quarter.

Although the quarterly loss reached 160 million US dollars, no one can ignore the explosive growth of AOL.

At six o'clock in the morning, Simon woke up on time in his manor house in the northern suburbs of Greenwich.

The woman in her arms quickly opened her eyes because of Simon's actions, and she was confused for a short while, with a little shame on her face.

Simon couldn't help but squeezed Sofia's ruddy face when he first woke up, and said, "Would you like to go to Manhattan with me?"

Sophia didn't avoid the man's hand, just pressed it gently, and said, "I'm going back to my home later."

Yesterday, I flew over from Italy with Simon. Because I was greedy, I didn't have the first time to see my son and daughter. This is why the woman was embarrassed just now.

Simon just smiled and said, "In this case, you can sleep a little longer."

Sophia put her head on the pillow and watched the man get dressed, and then got up, revealing a seductive spring when the sheets slipped off. Seeing Simon looking over, he couldn't help raising his hand to cover it, and pretending to put it down in his expectant gaze, slowly looking for his own clothes to put on.

Simon walked downstairs after washing, the housekeeper Alice and C girl Claire have led the other girls to prepare breakfast.

The two women will attend the ipo bell ringing ceremony with Simon today, and they are officially on the stage.

The outside world has always had many speculations about Simon's increasingly low-key private life, including the beautiful girls around him. When the two women walked to the front of the stage this time, they were destined to attract some discussion, but this was also an experience they had to bear. It is better to let the public begin to adapt to something early than to expose it at the last minute.

After having breakfast and saying goodbye to Sophia, Simon and his party set off for Manhattan.

Having gone through the bell-ringing ceremony of Blockbuster's listing, this time it is also very familiar.

However, compared to just showing his face last time, more procedures will be arranged this time, including media interviews that Simon will personally accept before the bell ringing ceremony.

AOL’s ipo has obviously attracted more media attention.

Simon's car just appeared outside the headquarters of the Nasdaq Exchange in Midtown Manhattan, and a large group of reporters just came up, and several TV stations' live interview cars were parked around.

The bodyguards got out of the car first. A group of four surrounded Simon and the two women who got out of bed with him. There were four other bodyguards outside to prop up the crowd and forcibly opened a way for Simon to enter the exchange.

The surrounding reporters rushed to ask various questions, but when they didn't get a response, they quickly adjusted their strategy and pressed the shutter at Simon frantically, especially the two women who appeared with him today. Some people have even begun to guess the identities of the two women, even getting involved in the idea of ​​marriage change.

But of course you can only think about it this way.

If you write your ideas in the newspaper without any tangible evidence, you can probably only wait for Westeros to go bankrupt.

The super tycoon just broke a few stupefied youths some time ago. Although Janet was basically doing things, the outside world took it for granted that they belonged to Simon.

Entering the exchange hall with difficulty, James Rebold, Steve Case, Jeff Bezos, Carol Butts, John Chambers, Raymond participated in this bell ringing ceremony ·Smith and other high-level officials greeted him.

Today’s ipo, Steve Case, as the chairman and CEO of AOL, is only the protagonist in name. Everyone knows that a certain young man is the focus of everyone’s attention.

With the continuous outbreak of the Internet industry, more and more people have seen Simon's mastery of this emerging high-tech field in just a few years.

Microsoft, Intel, Oracle, Cisco, AOL, Igreat, and even Bell Atlantic, which has officially changed its name to Verizon Telecom, are all the same.

Among them, Cisco, AOL, and Eaglet have formed the entire Internet industry chain of Internet equipment providers, Internet service providers and Internet content providers. The three jointly created a universal World Wide Web standard in just two years. Before they have achieved an overwhelming penetration rate, other companies of the same type have no time to follow up and participate in the competition.

Many people expect that whether it is Cisco, AOL, or Eaglet, they will become a giant after the beginning of an era.

Therefore, the listing of AOL among the three companies far exceeds the attention that Simon has received from Blockbuster’s listing at the beginning of last year.

This is not the time for greetings, it's already eight o'clock, and everyone simply greets them and starts to work on their own affairs.

Simon was also led by the staff into the interview area of ​​the exchange. This interview will be broadcast live on major TV networks such as abc, nbc, cbs and the morning news program of local TV stations in New York.

The interview time was only ten minutes, and each reporter was only allowed to ask one question.

As Simon Westero's rare open interview opportunity, everyone cheered up.

There were two sofas in the interview area. Simon sat down on one of them, next to a vice president of the Nasdaq exchange who personally served as the host.

After a simple preparation, the vice president took the lead in ‘fake public for private benefit’: “Simon, this opportunity is really rare, so how about giving me a chance to ask questions first?”

Simon smiled and nodded and said, "Of course, but you have already asked, so, next one."

Everyone at the scene was stunned, then laughed together.

This is of course just a joke.

The vice president who introduced himself by the name Richard did not take it seriously, insisting on holding the microphone and saying, "This should be your second time on the Nasdaq exchange. Last time it was Blockbuster, this time it was AOL, what I want to ask is, um, of course it’s not which company will have such a nutritious problem next time. Although I really want to know, what I want to ask is, what is the current status of the US stock market and the next few years. How do you look at the trend of China, and if possible, give you some investment advice?"

This is obviously a big problem.

However, with Simon's current status, he is also fully qualified to comment on the economic trends of the entire country.

Although it deviated from the theme of today’s AOL ipo, Simon thought for a while and said: “As we all know, the federal stock market experienced a strong rebound for several months in the first half of the year. Because of the weak economic conditions, many people think this I don’t think so. In recent years, or if counting from 1987, the federal government has experienced two consecutive catastrophes: the bursting of the stock market bubble and the collapse of the bond market. These two collapses have also affected the federal economy. The bubble component of the US is squeezed out, so I think this year will be the beginning of another bull market in the federal stock market."

The people around listened to Simon's analysis and couldn't help but nodded slightly. Seeing that Simon had finished speaking, it seemed that he did not intend to continue. Richard asked: "So, what about investment advice?"

Simon had no choice but to say: "In a market that is at the bottom of the valley and is ready to rebound, it is very easy for any investment to benefit. The key is patience. Of course, if you are more specific, I recommend that you invest in technology stocks in the next few years. . For example, AOL, which is listed today."

Richard got his own answer and stopped asking questions. He quickly handed the question opportunity to a reporter who was eager to try.

The reporter from the "New York Times" took the microphone and quickly said: "Simon, AOL's issuance price is $21, which is equivalent to a corporate valuation of $3.15 billion. However, AOL's revenue in the previous quarter Only 270 million U.S. dollars, the annual revenue may only be 1 billion U.S. dollars. The industry's estimated 2.1 billion stock price is equivalent to a price-earnings ratio of about 35 times. Is this pricing too high? How do you think AOL supports such a valuation? value?"

Simon had already considered this issue before, so he proficiently said: "For a company that just started IPO, the stock price should represent a kind of future. This is especially true for AOL. The high growth of this company is well known, so , I don’t think AOL’s share price is high, in fact, I think it’s a bit low."

Simon's answer is somewhat panacea.

In fact, anyone who has carefully analyzed AOL can probably see that this company not only represents a kind of high growth, but also this strong monopoly.

Because the technology patents of the World Wide Web are in the hands of the Westeros system, not only AOL itself, which has exclusive agreements in the operating areas of the three major operators. Moreover, whether it is the upstream Internet equipment provider Cisco or the downstream Internet content provider Igreat, there are too many ways to protect AOL's advantages in the industry.

Over the past six months, the two operators, Bell Pacific on the West Coast and Nynex on the East Coast, have not completely smashed their faces with AOL. The contract is one of them, and the other is the lack of corresponding upstream and downstream support.

If these two companies tear up the original exclusive agreement in order to enter the isp field, then it is obviously impossible for them to get the support of Cisco and Eaglet, let alone the authorization of the corresponding technology in the world wide web field.

If tearing up the agreement only requires compensation in accordance with the agreement, then it is not impossible to forcibly infringe the use of the World Wide Web technology in the absence of technical authorization, even if the Westeros system is sued for bankruptcy. It is impossible for companies with a little bit of business ethics to do so.

However, it is impossible for Simon to say clearly about these relatively sensitive advantages.

When it comes out, it is to give others a handle.

Warren Buffett has a very well-known "toll bridge" theory, to the effect that a certain company has a strong monopoly advantage in a certain area, and this company has absolute pricing power.

Originally, this theory was put forward to give Berkshire a reference for finding investment goals, but because Buffett said this in the public media, this theory became his target of being criticized in some corporate lawsuits. It is believed that Berkshire has the intention to manipulate the market arbitrarily.

In fact, is there any company in this world that doesn't want to be the ‘only one’, and doesn’t want to have a monopoly advantage?

It's just that too many things can often be done, but don't say it.

Therefore, Simon’s answers to some questions may be regarded as unnutritious, and even laughed by some self-proclaimed shrewd people, but even some entrepreneurs who like to teach successful experiences in the media, as long as their heads are not completely broken , And probably will not really "put his heart in his heart" to the public.

Of course, even if it was deliberately hiding, Simon actually revealed enough in the next ten minutes of interview time.

Over the years, the market has become somewhat blind to Simon, who has created a series of wealth miracles in just a few years. AOL is also one of the well-deserved core companies in the Westeros system. The bell ceremony ended and the inquiry before the official opening started, AOL's stock price continued to soar.

So, until 10:30, after more than an hour of continuous inquiry, AOL finally opened trading at a price of 33.75 US dollars.

US$32.75, compared to the issue price of US$21, the increase has reached 56%.

However, this is just the beginning.

In the following trading sessions, AOL's stock price continued to rise, and the increase reached the point that some investors who had subscribed for the stock in the early stage could not help but start selling.

In the end, as of the close of 3:30 pm, AOL's stock price was finally set at a high of $43.25.

On the first day of the market opening, AOL's stock price rose by 106% overall, and the market value was 7.46 billion US dollars at the close of the day.

After ipo, Westeros' shareholding in AOL dropped to 65.4%.

As a result, many people suddenly discovered that Simon Westero's asset statistics last year was almost an unknown AOL company. Only a short year later, it brought the young man $4.9 billion in book wealth. Moreover, just this 4.9 billion US dollars of wealth has surpassed the entire wealth of most of the richest people in the United States and even the global rich list.

However, it cannot be denied that AOL is only part of the thriving Westeros system.