Chapter 232 Stock Price Rise and Major Projects

After returning to the capital, Liu Zhou rested for two days and then returned to his busy work.

There was no way. Liu Zhou had been in the United States for nearly three months, and several domestic companies had accumulated a lot of business.

It took Liu Zhou nearly a week to process the backlog of documents from several companies.

At the same time, this also gave Liu Zhou a clear understanding of the current situation of these companies.

Zhoushan Literature is the one that Liu Zhou needs the least to worry about, as several of its websites are developing well now.

Especially the singularity, which is developing very rapidly.

Despite the existence of two competitors, Shanda Literature and Digital Station, which was just established by poaching a group of people from Singularity, it does not affect Singularity's position as the leader in online literature.

Now Qu He, vice president of Zhoushan Literature, is becoming more and more aware of the potential of Singularity and is preparing to increase the development of derivative copyrights around Singularity online literature.

Liu Zhou was of course happy to hear this, as this was also his plan for Zhoushan literature.

Now Liu Zhou didn't need to say anything, Qu He had already realized this, which made Liu Zhou feel that he had made the right choice.

At this time, Liu and Zhou were considering whether to directly hand over the position of president of Zhou Shan Wenxue to him, so that it would be more legitimate for him to manage the entire company.

Liu Zhou doesn't need to worry about Zhoushan Literature, and Sina doesn't need him to worry about it either.

After completely eliminating the threat posed by Duan Yongji and re-planning its development, Sina developed very rapidly.

Not only did it continue to consolidate its dominant position as a news portal, it also got back on the fast track in wireless value-added services and continued to maintain its number one position in the industry.

It now seems that President Wang Yan and Editor-in-Chief Chen Tong are doing a pretty good job.

In addition, in the gaming business, in addition to continuing to operate "Lineage 2", the online game of the same name "Zhu Xian" has also been almost developed.

It should be officially launched in the middle of next year.

Liu Zhou’s main plan for Sina Legu is to develop an online game with the same name as Zhou Shan’s well-known IP of literature.

Of course, if possible, we will also do our best to acquire "League of Legends", the most influential game.

However, this may lead to fierce competition with Penguin, because Penguin has actually been very optimistic about this game for a long time.

They had already invested in Riot Games before the game was even launched for public beta.

In the second decade of the 21st century, there are only two popular online games: League of Legends and PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds.

If we can get even one of these two games, it will be enough to fill Sina Legu's stomach.

Of course, if there is a chance, I will definitely buy both models.

However, these are still far away. Strictly speaking, Sina is still just a newcomer in the gaming field. If it wants to become a giant like NetEase and Penguin, it still has a long way to go.

If we were to say which business of Sina has developed the best, it would definitely be Sina Blog.

With the full support of Liu Zhou, Sina Blog made the industry understand what winner takes all means this year.

Several other blogs have almost no traffic at all. Sohu and NetEase’s blogs have even announced their closure. Sina Blog has become the absolute king in this field.

Sina achieved this achievement a whole year earlier than in history.

Liu Zhou feels that after Sina Blog has thoroughly consolidated its position in everyone's mind next year, Weibo can also be put on the agenda.

After all, Weibo is the direction of future development.

Twitter has already started to appear in the United States, and I believe it will soon spread to China.

At that time, there will definitely be a melee among all parties in the Weibo field.

This time, Liu Zhou is not going to wait for a big battle like in the history of Sina Weibo before gradually establishing his dominant position.

This time, he wants to ensure his absolute advantage as soon as Weibo is launched.

Apart from the above, Sina’s only key business is Sina Video.

Sina Video, backed by the two major groups Sina and Golden Harvest, has developed very rapidly and firmly occupied the first tier of video websites.

Tudou and Youku, which have the first-mover advantage, have already completed two rounds of financing, but are still unable to widen the gap with Sina Video.

This outstanding performance of Sina Video has also made the outside world more optimistic about Sina Group.

Because just last month, Google spent a huge sum of $1.6 billion to acquire YouTube, a video website that had been established for less than two years.

When the news of this acquisition spread to China, the video website immediately became a popular target among investment institutions.

As a leading video website, Sina Video is of course highly regarded by capital.

In the past month, investment institutions have continuously approached Sina Video to ask whether it needs investment.

Sina Video definitely does not need any investment as it is backed by Sina Group, so Tudou and Youku have become the focus of capital investment.

In less than a year, Sina Video became extremely popular, and Liu Zhou was widely recognized within Sina.

Because Sina Video is the application that Liu Zhouyi strongly advocated for development.

In fact, not only within Sina, but also outside the company, doubts about Liu Zhou's leadership of Sina have generally disappeared, and some have even begun to praise him.

Because according to the financial report released by Sina for the first three quarters, revenue has exceeded 200 million US dollars and profit has reached 60 million US dollars.

Sina's revenue in the first three quarters is three times that of the whole of last year, and its profit may be lower, but it is more than twice that of last year.

Sina's market performance is good, and Sina Video is also highly regarded by the capital market. The most direct reflection of this is the stock price.

As of now, Sina’s stock price has risen to US$72, with a total market value of nearly US$36 billion.

This is more than double the market value when Liu Zhou acquired Sina.

In other words, the funds that Liu Zhou invested in acquiring Sina shares have more than doubled in value in less than a year, making him a huge profit.

In fact, during this period, not only Sina's market value has been rising, but almost all technology stocks have been rising sharply.

The world is now entering a bull market, which is also the last craze before the financial crisis.

The share prices of NetEase and Sohu have also nearly doubled, but NetEase has the highest market value among the three portals, reaching US$33 billion, while Sohu has the lowest, currently only US$ billion.

Of course, among domestic Internet companies, Penguin has seen the biggest increase in stock price.

The share price has increased sevenfold from HK$35 last year to HK$ now.

The market value has also increased from about US$800 million at the beginning of its listing to nearly US$6 billion now.

Moreover, according to historical development, Penguin's stock price will continue to soar in the next year, and its market value will exceed 10 billion US dollars before the financial crisis breaks out.

This period was also a time of change for the domestic Internet. The three major portals officially retreated to the second line, and the three Internet companies BAT with a market value of over 10 billion US dollars became the industry representatives.

Compared to the hot Internet industry, the entertainment industry is a little calmer.

The excitement created by The Banquet in the past two months has now died down. This costume blockbuster, which was highly anticipated by Huayi and Feng Kuzi, only grossed 1.2 million yuan in the mainland.

Combined with overseas copyright income, the movie "Night Banquet" only made Huayi a small profit, which was far from their expectations.

This incident had a significant impact on Feng Kuzi. The complaints about him online also made him very angry.

In the absence of "Assembly", in order to wash away the negative impact of "The Banquet", Feng Kuzi announced that his next film would return to Feng-style comedy.

Even the title of the film has been announced, it's called "If You Are the One", and the script is currently being perfected.

As for "Assembly", the film has already started shooting in Northeast China.

After being reminded by Liu Zhou, Zhang Zhao found the explosion and fireworks special effects team at the Bayi Film Studio.

Afterwards, director Feng Xiaoning took the assembled crew to the Northeast for filming.

Golden Harvest invested 50 million yuan in the movie "Assembly". Qin Hao played the male lead, playing Guzidi, and Liu Ye played the supporting role, playing Zhao Erdou.

Liu Ye's agency is signed to Hairun, so he has no shortage of TV drama resources, but the movie resources that come to him are generally art films.

Since her debut, Liu Ye has only appeared in a commercial film, playing a small supporting role in Chen Shishi's "The Promise", and her costume was later criticized by the audience.

In fact, during this period, it was difficult for young actors in mainland China to get involved in commercial films, and they were mostly stuck in TV dramas or art films.

Historically, the role of Zhao Erdou attracted competition from two popular mainland actors, Huang Xiaoming and Deng Chao.

Among the four young actors in mainland China, Qin Hao and Huang Xiaoming, who are backed by Golden Harvest, have no shortage of film resources.

Qin Hao has now come to his senses. He is no longer obsessed with dramas and art films, but has started to get involved in commercial films.

He became popular again for playing Zhuge Liang in "Red Cliff". This time, Golden Harvest launched the project "Assembly" and he was confirmed as the male lead.

Of course, Jiahe did not favor one over the other. In the selection of the male lead Guzidi, it gave Qin Hao and Huang Xiaoming the same opportunity.

But Huang Xiaoming looks younger, and with makeup on he doesn't look like a middle-aged soldier like Qin Hao, which seems a bit weird.

Finally, Qin Hao's acting skills were superior, and Feng Xiaoning finally chose Qin Hao to play Guzidi.

As for the second male lead, Zhao Erdou, who is also promoted by Golden Harvest, Huang Xiaoming, it is impossible for him to play a supporting role to Qin Hao.

Later, Golden Harvest held an open audition for this role, and unexpectedly, Liu Ye actually came.

Most people in the circle know the relationship between Liu Ye, Liu Zhou, Qin Hao and others.

The people inside Golden Harvest knew this very well, so after Feng Xiaoning's audition and confirmation that Liu Ye was okay, Zhang Zhao directly gave him the role of Zhao Erdou and cancelled subsequent auditions.

So now, Qin Hao and Liu Ye, a pair of old classmates and good friends, are currently crawling in the snow in their hometown in Northeast China.

Among the major projects Golden Harvest is currently investing in, "Blade of the Immortal 2" has been completed and is in post-production, while "Assembly" is currently being filmed.

Zhang Yimou's new film "Curse of the Golden Flower" has just completed its preliminary preparations and is ready to start shooting.

This movie, just like in history, still features three superstars: Gong Li, Chow Yun-fat and Jay Chou.

The total investment announced was US$3.6 million, equivalent to nearly RMB million.

The actual investment is not that much, but it is also 300 million, which is not a lot of water. However, these 300 million include the subsequent publicity and promotion funds for the film.

"Curse of the Golden Flower" had only two investors. Golden Harvest invested 100 million yuan, accounting for one-third of the share, and New Picture invested 200 million yuan, accounting for the remaining two-thirds of the share.

New Picture is responsible for the distribution in the mainland, while Golden Harvest is responsible for the overseas distribution.

The cooperation between the two companies was relatively sudden to the outside world, at least to the major film companies.

For this reason, several heads of major companies, including Han Shanping, called to inquire. Their meaning was obvious: they wanted to see if they could get a piece of the pie.

This project was led by Zhang Weiping, and Golden Harvest also referred these requests to New Picture.

Zhang Weiping was more tough this time and rejected all requests to participate in "Curse of the Golden Flower".

Of course, the outside world is unaware of these situations, but the project "Curse of the Golden Flower" is still attracting much attention.

Not to mention that the director is Zhang Yimou, the cast alone is enough to make everyone look forward to it.

What's more, there are many gossips about Zhang Yimou and Gong Li that everyone enjoys talking about.

The preparation and project establishment of "Curse of the Golden Flower" is probably the hottest topic in the circle after "The Banquet".

In addition to these major projects, Golden Harvest's cinema chain company is also progressing rapidly.

The luxury cinemas in the four first-tier cities should be completed after the Chinese New Year and officially put into use before next year’s summer vacation.

As for the original cinema of the Liuyang Cinema Chain that it acquired, Golden Harvest has already signed a new lease contract with the cinema’s property and is currently undergoing modernization.

It should be completed in the first half of next year.

Therefore, by next summer, Golden Harvest Cinemas will be able to officially open for full operation.

Liu Zhou was very happy to see that these three companies were developing rapidly and in an orderly manner.

Now I finally don’t have to worry about everything.

Apart from these three companies, the only one that Liu Zhou is concerned about is the Zhoushan Asset Management Company which was established not long ago.

Some time ago, Zhong Lifang helped him negotiate the purchase of the large villa in Yanjia Garden in Shanghai for 2.2 million yuan.

Liu Zhou acquired this mansion two years ahead of schedule and spent 60 million less than Chen Tianqiao.

Yan Family Garden has not been maintained for a long time, and a professional team has been invited to carry out its maintenance and repair.

In addition to purchasing Yan's Garden, Liu Zhou also finalized the design for the building he planned to build.

Liu Zhou did not make any special designs, it is just square with a glass curtain wall on the outside.

At the same time, we have also contacted a construction company with a Chinese name in its name, and construction will officially start after the Chinese New Year. It is estimated that it will take two years to be put into use.

After learning about the situation of many of its subsidiaries, Liu Zhou breathed a sigh of relief.

Although the company doesn't require him to worry too much, Liu Zhou still can't relax.

Because the second part of "Red Cliff" is scheduled to be released on December 15th, which is only one month away.

Liu Zhou will once again devote himself to the promotion of the film.

The publicity this time was even more sensational than the first one, because Liu, Zhou and others had high hopes for this movie.

Everyone is also looking forward to "Red Cliff" breaking the eight-year box office record held by "Titanic" in the mainland.

This mountain has been weighing down the mainland film industry for too long, and all Chinese filmmakers want to remove it completely.

(End of this chapter)