Top of the big era

Luck really came.

Early the next morning, Zhou Buqi got the definite good news from Ning Yaxian. Senior sister Zhen Yu was really pregnant. At least she tested positive with a test strip.

This is awesome.

Especially when he heard the congratulations from Sun Wanran, Ning Lu, Gu Zanli, and Yao Yao, Zhou Buqi felt that his whole body was filled with a sense of accomplishment, and he felt that he had a halo around him compared to having negotiated a large deal of business.

However, Zhou Buqi was not a selfish person. He gathered around the dinner table and said with a smile: "Okay, don't just congratulate me. Let's congratulate Miss Guzanli. Congratulate her on last night's success...successfully I have completed the transformation of my life, grown up and matured into a big girl!"

"Congratulations!"

"Congratulations!"

Congratulations!

Even Yao Yao said with a smile: "Congratulations, that's great!"

Gu Zanli's face was like a big red cloth, but she was not too shy. She stood up and bowed to the two rows of dining tables, "Thank you, thank you..."

Ning Yaxian said to her jokingly: "Don't thank us, who should you thank the most?"

Gu Zanli was already sitting down, but when she heard this, she stood up again, bowed to Zhou Buqi, and said with a faint face: "Thank you, boss, I will continue to work hard."

Zhou Buqi waved his hand and said casually: "Don't be so formal. Let's sit down and eat. How are you doing today? Can you go out?"

Guzanli pursed her lips and said, "It's pretty good. It doesn't affect my feeling."

Zhou Buqi nodded gently, "Then let's go together."

When I went out today, the main thing was to meet Boss Ma.

Since everyone is involved, how can we not share a piece of the pie?

It is almost impossible to acquire Yahoo as a whole. The founders of Yahoo were not willing to sell their entire life's hard work at a bargain price.

In its previous life, Yahoo was acquired by the American telecommunications giant Verizon for US$4.83 billion in 2016, which once caused a sensation in the industry.

The Internet giant that once had a peak market value of more than 200 billion US dollars finally ended up in such a miserable end.

In fact, it's more of layman's hype.

That's not what happened inside.

Verizon only purchased Yahoo's operating business, including portal, search, mailbox, video, etc., but Yahoo also has several other assets.

For example, there is more than US$4.5 billion in cash flow left on the account by cashing out Alibaba shares.

For example, at that time, it held 15% of Alibaba's shares and 35% of Yahoo Japan's shares. These were Yahoo's core assets and were not included in the sale.

Yahoo just sold off its operating businesses, and packaged the remaining businesses into an investment company called "Alibaba", which took over the mantle of a listed company and continued to operate.

In terms of Yahoo's interests alone, it is right not to sell the company at this stage.

Yahoo's own business is indeed in decline, but its stake in Alibaba is its most important asset. As long as Alibaba skyrockets in a few years, it will be an unimaginable huge amount of wealth.

For Yahoo, the best strategy is to keep Alibaba's shares; for acquirers, the best strategy is of course the opposite, which is to find ways to get as much Alibaba's shares as possible.

From this point of view, the best solution is for Boss Ma to bypass the private operations of capital giants such as SoftBank, Blackstone Group, and Bain Capital.

Zhou Buqi wants to go over and conspire with Boss Ma.

Boss Ma has no money, and Ali has no money. Even if they can borrow some money from international banks, it will be very limited. If you want to acquire more Alibaba shares, you still have to find a private equity giant to take over.

It’s all about taking over anyway, so it’s better to let Zhou Buqi take over.

Letting Zhou Buqi take over is also good for Boss Ma, as it saves a lot of unnecessary trouble. And you can plan together with this guy, instead of fighting alone, one person has to challenge Yahoo, SoftBank, Blackstone Group, Bain Capital and other forces.

The two parties still met in the tea room yesterday.

When they met, Boss Ma was slightly startled when he realized that the female assistant beside this boy had been replaced. The assistant Sun Wanran yesterday was as beautiful as a flower, and the Gu Zanli who came today is even more amazing. She has fair and rosy skin, big watery eyes, a tall nose, and a small cherry mouth. At first glance, she looks like a minority from the frontier. nationality.

I couldn't help but scold this bastard boy.

However, Boss Ma had seen this kind of thing a lot, so he didn't say much. He sat down to drink tea and got down to business as soon as he sat down, "I met Yang Zhiyuan last night."

"Oh? How about it?"

"It's very complicated. There are a total of 7 invitations before the Yahoo board of directors. Including the one proposed by Masayoshi Son today, the total number is 8."

"Has your plan been submitted?" Zhou Buqi was a little amused, "How is it? How much is the specific quotation?"

Boss Ma said: "At a premium of 25%, we will acquire the company as a whole at a price of US$20.2 per share, with a total value of more than US$25 billion."

Zhou Buqi shook his head, "It's still too low."

"In fact, it is not low anymore. Yahoo's original stock price was only US$13, but it has been raised to US$15 due to recent speculation. Son's offer is US$20, which is a full 25% premium. It is already the highest offer among all invitation plans. "

This is actually the biggest advantage of Boss Ma and Masayoshi Son when running the Yahoo case.

You can know yourself and the enemy, and you can understand both internal and external aspects.

The bids made by other organizations for Yahoo should be Yahoo's business secret, and such bidding is often not made public. Once the secret is leaked, won't there be a reference standard for the bidder?

But it doesn’t work for Son.

Because Masayoshi Son himself is a director of Yahoo.

Therefore, the acquisition consortium composed of SoftBank, Alibaba, Blackstone Group and Bain Capital has far greater advantages than other consortiums and is the most promising force to succeed.

This is also where Son’s confidence lies.

Zhou Buqi disagreed, "The US$25 billion offer has almost halved from Microsoft's offer three years ago. This is such a huge blow that it is difficult for normal people to accept it."

"Times have changed." Boss Ma lamented, "For Yahoo now, this is already a sky-high price."

This is the "thrilling" part of running a company.

Watching him build a tall building, watching his building collapse. Even ten years ago, Yahoo was still the largest Internet company in the world; in the blink of an eye, everything has gone by.

If you have a bad mentality, it will be difficult to accept this status quo.

Yang Zhiyuan's mentality has obviously been affected.

Without foresight, according to the current situation in the capital market and Yahoo's own development potential, selling Yahoo is actually the most risk-averse and correct choice.

But the real world is so wonderful.

Misfortunes are where blessings depend, and blessings are where misfortunes lie.

Yang Zhiyuan's mentality was unbalanced and he was unwilling to sell Yahoo life or death, but he made the most correct choice by mistake and saved part of Alibaba's shares. These Alibaba shares will create huge wealth for Yahoo's shareholders in the future, no less than Yahoo's peak market capitalization of US$200 billion.

Zhou Buqi said: "Microsoft's quotation three years ago was a huge stone that weighed on many people's minds. What is Microsoft's attitude now? No quotation?"

"The quotation was made, but Microsoft's strategy has changed." Boss Ma shook his head, "The main reason why Microsoft's quotation was so high three years ago was that Microsoft was focusing on search and launched Bing to compete with Google. Use the traffic from Yahoo’s portal. Bing has been launched for several years now, the market novelty is gone, and Yahoo’s strategic significance no longer exists.”

Zhou Buqi nodded and said: "Another point is that Yahoo is moving too slowly in the transformation towards mobile Internet."

Boss Ma said: "Microsoft has joined forces with Horowitz Fund and Silver Lake Capital to acquire 20% of Yahoo's shares, but the price is very low, only $16.6 per share."

Zhou Buqi smiled and said, "I really want to make you sick while you are sick."

Boss Ma said matter-of-factly: "The capital market is ruthless, and Microsoft doesn't want to give away money for free. They want to influence the board of directors and have a say in the appointment of the next CEO."

"I go!"

Zhou Buqi felt that Microsoft was playing a bit harshly this time, and it was no different from slapping Yang Zhiyuan in the face.

20% of shares or something... In fact, whether it is 20%, 50% or 80%, the number actually does not matter.

What matters is power.

Once you have the power, even if you only hold 20% of the shares, you can still control 80% of the capital gains through the power of wealth distribution.

If Microsoft had the say in appointing a CEO, it would be equivalent to taking control of Yahoo.

Power only serves the source of power. The CEO appointed by Microsoft to operate from it, no matter who the CEO is, must serve Microsoft. By then, even if Microsoft only holds 20% of Yahoo's shares, it will be treated as a subsidiary of Microsoft at the business level.

This shows how dangerous Yahoo's current situation is.

Boss Ma smiled and said: "For Yahoo, if you want to get money, you have to delegate power, or sell it as a whole to solve the burden once and for all. However, when it comes to the choice of delegation, if you only give up power to Alibaba, you can Solving the problem is certainly better than giving up the power of Yahoo headquarters."

"That's what I said..."

A bolder and more ambitious idea came to Zhou Buqi's mind.

Boss Ma said to himself: "Capital is ruthless, but people are sentimental. As long as we show some kindness and affection to Yang Zhiyuan, it will be a timely help."

"Wait..." Zhou Buqi interrupted him, "Does Yang Zhiyuan still have control over Yahoo's board of directors?"

Boss Ma said: "After all, he is the founder and has great influence. And most of Yahoo's management is his people. Whether Yahoo is sold or run by itself, it must get Yang Zhiyuan's support."

"Isn't it enough?" Zhou Buqi felt that this reason was not convincing, "Now it's all a conflict of interests between the needle and Maimang."

Boss Ma smiled and said, "Yes, Yang Zhiyuan's methods are not bad either. He can handle shareholders."

"How?"

"I had a conversation with him last night, and he said that as long as he promises to distribute $4 billion in dividends to shareholders, he can basically win the support of shareholders."

"I go!"

Zhou Buqi was stunned.

Is there still such an operation?

As expected, they are American capitalists, and their capital methods are really slippery!

Generally speaking, Internet companies will not pay dividends. Not only will they not pay dividends, they will also find ways to continue to borrow and raise funds to obtain funds to expand their business.

Many traditional companies pay dividends every year because their business growth has stalled. Without new development directions, there is no point in putting money in the company account, so dividends are distributed.

Yang Zhiyuan's operation was so fierce that he even resorted to profit sharing.

Buy off shareholders through dividends.

Zhou Buqi narrowed his eyes and said meaningfully: "You can use such shameless means. It seems that Yang Zhiyuan has been forced to a dead end..."