Who are you calling "little fresh meat"? I'm the king.

Chapter 944 Returning to the Capital (33)

At the Peninsula Hotel, Shen Yan checked the market value of Maoyan Entertainment and then took stock of the stocks he held…

That's over HK$200 billion!

I can't help but sigh, "Making money in the stock market is still the easiest..."

Ji Xiang remarked, "It definitely won't keep rising indefinitely; it'll probably plummet in a month or two..."

"I know!"

"After several normal fluctuations, Maoyan's stock price will become more realistic!"

"...I understand. When Ali Pictures first went public, its market value peaked at over HK$800 billion, and now it's over HK$250 billion..."

Alibaba Pictures, backed by Alibaba Group, is building a complete film and television industry chain. Alibaba Digital Media & Entertainment Group includes Youku, UC Browser, Alibaba Pictures, Damai.cn, Alibaba Music, and Alibaba Literature. Alibaba Pictures is the only listed company in the Digital Media & Entertainment Group.

Shen Yan continued, "I just suddenly remembered Mai Jia and Shi Tian..."

"What's wrong?"

"In the later years of Cinema City, Karl Maka and Dean Shek became extremely obsessed with stocks, often betting millions, which deeply entangled them, causing them to completely lose interest in movies..."

Ji Xiang rolled his eyes: "I know about this. They started by speculating on real estate, then on stocks, thinking they could make more money in other industries... Then they got caught in the stock market crash and lost everything... In contrast, Huang Baiming's mind has always been on movies. He doesn't study stocks, doesn't speculate on real estate, and has no interest in anything else... He founded Oriental Films..."

Shen Yan followed up on his words: "Huang Baiming almost went bankrupt later when he made movies!"

In 98, Wong Pak-ming's Oriental Films produced the Lunar New Year film "Nine Stars Bring Good Fortune," starring Leslie Cheung, with Wu Chien-lien, Wong Pak-ming, Kenny Bee, Gigi Lai, Lee Wai-man, Cheung Tat-ming, and Chow Man-kin in supporting roles. It ultimately grossed HK$1003 million…

Blood loss!
The 99 Lunar New Year film was Andy Lau's "Love Dream Ship," with a supporting cast including Hikaru Ishida, Qu Ying, and Huang Lei. It turned out to be the worst film of Andy Lau's career…

In terms of production style, Oriental Films actually continues the personality of Cinema City, which is to make whatever is popular and let the market determine the investment direction. Its most prominent feature is its adherence to the Lunar New Year film season every year.

When Category III films were popular, Oriental Films produced films such as "Dancing with Ducks" and "When Peach Ripens";
When martial arts films were popular, he filmed "The Bride with White Hair" and "Wong Fei-hung vs. Wong Fei-hung".
When the "Young and Dangerous" series was popular, they also filmed "The Thirteen Protectors of Tsz Wan Shan" and "Young and Dangerous: Sunset Glow".
When art films were popular, he directed films such as "The Phantom Lover" and "Half a Lifetime Romance," as well as horror films like "Wolf Kiss Nightmare" and "Haunted House," among others.

After that, Huang Baiming suspended his film and television investments. After watching "SPL: Sha Po Lang," he signed Donnie Yen and created the "Ip Man" series, which made him money...

They've started working on the "All's Well, Ends Well" series again—"All's Well, Ends Well 2009," "All's Well, Ends Well 2010," "The Ultimate Happy Event," "Eight Stars Embracing Happiness," "Six Blessings for Happiness," "All's Well, Ends Well 2020"...

However, he was recently investigated—suspected of insider trading!
Ji Xiang suddenly remembered something: "Spark Animation was sold to Maoyan for 800 million?"

"Animated films have such long production cycles... I originally planned to take it slow, but Maoyan wanted to expand into the animation industry, and I thought animation + derivatives should be a good thing, so I just sold it to them..."

Xinghuo Animation's three major projects are: *White Snake*, *Nezha*, and *Chang'an Three Thousand Miles*...

Currently, "White Snake" has been completed and is scheduled for release this summer; "Ne Zha" is still in post-production; and "The Longest Day in Chang'an" is still in production…

"I mean, Spark Animation is worth 800 million?"

"How is it not worth it? Eight hundred million to acquire 40% of the shares... I think that's too much. 'White Snake' is a series, and the trilogy will gross at least 20 billion at the box office!"

"...But Xinghuo Animation hasn't released any works yet?" Ji Xiang immediately retorted upon hearing this, then suddenly remembered something: "Damn, 8 million for only 40% of the shares?"

“Yes,” Shen Yan said matter-of-factly, “Once the derivatives market opens up, do you know how huge an industry that will be?”

The merchandise for "Ne Zha 2" generated hundreds of billions of RMB in official sales, bringing significant benefits to all aspects of the development, production, and sales of related merchandise!
Ultimately, achieving derivative sales of over 100 billion yuan is entirely possible.

Of course, the licensing fee isn't that much...

But it's definitely worth billions!

"The China Securities Regulatory Commission may not agree..."

"Why not? I'm just putting the animation business into Maoyan..." "Fine..."

Ji Xiang nodded, then asked, "You're not accepting any of those interview requests from financial media?"

"...I work in film, I don't know anything about finance!" Shen Yan shook his head: "I'm not going to embarrass myself!"

……

Shen Yan truly didn't understand finance, nor did he understand the specifics of how the stock market operated...

For Maoyan, the most important thing about going public is that he no longer needs financial support!
After all, Alibaba's Taopiaopiao is eyeing the market and has always wanted to challenge Maoyan's position...

Alibaba is really rich...

In February of this year, Alibaba, together with Wentou Holdings, signed a strategic investment agreement with Wanda Group to acquire 12.77% of Wanda Film's shares from Wanda Group for RMB 46.76 billion at a price of RMB 51.96 per share.

An attempt is being made to create a closed loop in the cultural and entertainment ecosystem that combines online ticketing with offline cinemas.

Both parties plan to engage in in-depth collaboration in areas such as film investment, distribution, and merchandise…

46.76 billion!
Really rich.

Yes, making movies isn't about who has money and who's awesome, but not having money is definitely embarrassing!

After Maoyan went public, it had ample cash flow, which allowed it to do many more things.

For example, we should focus on developing offline content!
Similar to concerts, plays, musicals, dramas, and sporting events.

The offline conversion path is "centrally arranged": concerts, movies, and plays are scheduled uniformly by the platform, and users passively choose...

The platform bridges the gap between content, traffic, and ticketing, a logic similar to "ad placement distribution."

Its biggest competitor is barley!

However, Maoyan is also expanding into the operation of entertainment venues and the integration of commerce, culture, and tourism...

How to do it?
Throw money at it to grab market share!
Damai has inherent advantages—it originally started as a comprehensive live entertainment ticketing and marketing company, covering concerts, plays, musicals, sporting events, and more. It has a large number of established partners and is also registered with government agencies…

With the help of the Alibaba ecosystem…

Without spending a lot of money, it's hard to beat them...

……

Back in Beijing, Shen Yan gave an exclusive interview to *People* magazine…

There was simply no way to refuse!

"People" is published by People's Publishing House, and its editor-in-chief is Zhang Han.

Shen Yan really liked this person; he used to be a reporter.

His representative work is "The Money Kingdom of the Hidden 'Master' Wang Lin" - he previously worked as the operations editor of Toutiao for a period of time, but later returned to the publishing industry and became the editor-in-chief of People magazine.

When Zhang Han came to interview him in person, Shen Yan was naturally happy to do so!
"Yes, Parasite has been confirmed as the opening film of this year's Cannes Film Festival..."

We first talked about the Cannes Film Festival…

(End of this chapter)