Chapter 491: Prelude to the Subprime Mortgage Crisis

Chapter 491: Prelude to the Subprime Mortgage Crisis

Chapter 491: Prelude to the Subprime Mortgage Crisis

A super-rich man has fallen from grace.

It's just like killing monsters in an online game, and many valuable items will drop.

An ordinary-looking antique chest of drawers is valued at over a million US dollars. No wonder people often say that a lean camel is bigger than a horse. Some rich kids whose families have fallen on hard times may find an old item under their beds and may live a life of luxury.

For example, in Europe, some impoverished nobles' warehouses store numerous spoils looted from China hundreds of years ago.

They may have never taken these trophies seriously and just put them on display at home. However, as time passed, these things suddenly became valuable. A bronze animal head or a large Yuan blue and white porcelain jar may be worth 10 or 20 million euros.

In their eyes, they are blessed by their ancestors and feel that the glory of their family is still shining, and they have suddenly turned around and risen again.

But the Chinese people who spend money to buy these things are really being taken advantage of, which is tantamount to paying a sky-high ransom to the kidnappers.

In addition to the assets that Fan Wumian cares most about, there are many other good things in this special auction.

For example, a luxury house in Manhattan, New York, USA, is located on the top floor of a building, with a usable area of ​​approximately 680 square meters, overlooking the entire Central Park.

For example, the 25-carat orange-pink diamond of the cousin of the last Russian emperor Nicholas II is valued at $220 million. It also includes a large number of jewelry, furniture, artworks, luxury cars and watches, castles and manors, etc.

Compared with these wealthy people who spend money like water and know how to enjoy life.

Fan Wumian felt that his life was almost the same as that of some "ascetic monks".

Not to mention the whiskey worth hundreds of thousands of dollars a bottle, even if he bought a few potted plants with a total value of millions of Hong Kong dollars as decoration, he would feel like he had fallen and was starting to waste his money.

Considering that items like Fabergé eggs and shares of online shopping company Amazon are likely to be targeted by many buyers from all over the world, it is not certain that they can be successfully purchased at a suitable price.

Fan Wumian also selected a few additional auction items worth selling, such as an exquisite small manor in Liechtenstein. Although he was not sure where the country was exactly, he felt that the castle in the manor was very exquisite and beautiful. The key point was that the estimated value was only 100 million euros.

There is also a private island located in the Seychelles Islands. However, after Fan Wumian checked and found that it was in the Indian Ocean east of Africa, he immediately lost interest.

It only takes five or six hours to take a private plane from Hong Kong to the Maldives for a vacation, but it takes twice as long to go to the Seychelles. In addition, the island was just purchased in 2003 and there is no infrastructure on the island. He finds it troublesome and does not want to spend time building it from scratch.

If you really want to buy a private island as a future vacation paradise, it is not too late to consider it after the financial crisis breaks out in two years. It is best to directly choose an island that has been developed and has complete facilities to avoid spending several years on development and construction.

After flipping through several auction albums, Fan Wumian's eyes were almost dizzy.

After taking a short break at noon, he asked someone to count the funds on the account and found that he still had a total cash reserve of 3.38 million Hong Kong dollars.

Coupled with the upcoming box office dividends and other peripheral income, there is a little pressure, but it is barely within an acceptable range.

The bulk of the expenses are mainly from Bandit King Media and Myth Film Studio. The number of projects being prepared and filmed is more than last year, which takes up too much funds.

In addition, he has to pay loan interest to the bank, as well as companies such as Tudou, Feili, and Valentino, which require him to invest funds to slowly incubate and expand.

Fortunately, after finding a qualified third-party company to operate the large piece of land on the seashore of Shenzhen, they came to the conclusion that "it needs to settle naturally for a few years before it can be developed." We have already agreed with the authorities to postpone the development cycle as promised before, so it will not occupy a large amount of funds for the time being.

I have always been thinking about how to make quick money.

After looking around, it seems that the only opportunity that we can seize next is the subprime mortgage crisis that is about to sweep the world.

Fashion Week and concerts are all over, and apart from business matters, the next schedule will not be until September 9th.

Five days later, he will go to the premiere ceremony of the movie "Wulin Waijiao: The Treasure of Hengshan" to promote this spin-off movie. The location is scheduled to be in Yanjing.

There is no other way. There are many colleagues in Yanjing and media reporters gather there. Arranging the premiere event there will help with publicity.

At that time, Fan Wumian only needs to go through the motions and give a few compliments to the reporters, and he won't have to worry about anything else.
I went out in the afternoon and came to the golf course owned by Li Chaoren to learn how to play golf.

There was no novice halo. Every time he swung the club, the golf ball would always fly in a trajectory that was beyond his expectations, landing dozens of meters away from the target.

During this period, many people came to get close to Fan Wumian, including directors of listed companies and well-known wealthy children from Hong Kong who were often in the media's attention. He seldom came into contact with the local circle, and many people wanted to take the opportunity to get to know him.

The news seemed to spread quickly, because more than an hour after Fan Wumian arrived at the golf course, a group of well-dressed socialites came over.

Different from other fake socialites.

This private golf course, which has been purchased by Li Chaoren, has an annual membership fee of up to one million Hong Kong dollars. Generally, members need to be introduced or make an appointment before they can queue up to apply to join.

Being able to run to the stadium and chat with Fan Wumian means that someone in your family has become a member here, or that you know some powerful friends. It is difficult for ordinary people to cross the threshold and get in touch with this circle.

After being interrupted several times in succession, and because his ball skills were so poor, Fan Wumian left early and took a bus home.

I played the online game "Dungeon & Fighter" for a while, and then searched the keyword "subprime mortgage" to find some clues worth using.

Still just some old news.

In January this year, Ameriquest Mortgage, the largest subprime mortgage company in the United States, invested US$1 million to investigate irregular lending practices in the real estate lending industry, causing some investors to begin to doubt whether there are certain risks in the subprime mortgage market.

Some speculators have publicly criticized the subprime mortgage market, criticizing banks for lending funds to high-risk customers who cannot afford mortgages in order to make a profit and earn more mortgage interest.

However, these news did not attract the attention of the outside world, and the latest news still proves that the market is booming.

Other "gold diggers" were just trying their luck, but only Fan Wumian knew clearly where the gold mine was. If he searched in the right direction, everything else would be easy.

Among many English reports, he saw a news article in the Wall Street Journal last week that mentioned a hedge fund company founder named John Paulson who managed $10 billion in client funds.

In July this year, John Paulson raised $1.47 million to set up a fund dedicated to shorting subprime mortgage bonds.

More than two months passed in a blink of an eye. The US real estate market was still booming, and various good news continued to come out, causing his fund to suffer huge losses. Some investors chose to redeem their funds and leave.

The reason is that this fund not only charges an 8% management fee, but is also locked until the end of 2008.

The editor of the Wall Street Journal mocked John Paulson in the news for being so stressed that he jogged five miles in Central Park every day.

Sitting in front of the computer, Fan Wumian read every line and word with extreme care.

He was a little confused at first, because although he knew where the gold mine was, he didn't know how to dig it out. He just wanted to short companies such as Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers.

However, after learning about John Paulson's fund, Fan Wumian had a new idea, and he began to consider directly taking advantage of it.

And he didn't just spend money to buy the ticket and get on the bus, but instead negotiated with the driver to buy the bus, directly invested in the hedge fund company, became a partner, and earned huge management fees from investors.

The reason is simple.

Fan Wumian realized that in the short term, he had little capital available, but he could borrow money from investors to make money indirectly.

In this way, once the fund managed by John Paulson rises sharply, the 8% management fee per year alone can be received continuously until the fund is opened for redemption at the end of 2008, and there will be an opportunity to make huge profits during this period.

When asked exactly how many there were, Fan Wumian wasn't quite sure.

Anyway, judging from the comments under the article, John Paulson is currently just a "nobody" on Wall Street, which is full of big sharks.

Due to the huge losses of this new fund, other funds have lost a large number of customers and are now suffering heavy losses.

With the idea of ​​trying his luck first, Fan Wumian wrote down his information and prepared to find someone to contact John Paulson to get some information first.
(End of this chapter)