Huayu: Director started with art films

Chapter 337 348 [Hong Kong Island's crazy property market, an opportunity to acquire ATV]

"Yeah, I'll be fine grandma."

Yu Feihong burst into tears, recalling many childhood memories of playing in her grandmother's yard.

Grandma's dry hands wiped away the tears from Yu Feihong's eyes, and a faint smile appeared on her wrinkled old face: "Don't cry, my dear girl."

"Grandma is old and can't do it anymore."

"Grandma is not old. After you recover, I will accompany you to visit West Lake and Yanjing. Also, my movie will be finished, so you have to come and watch it live."

"Okay, okay, I'll listen to you, my dear."

"..."

Li Yishu stood at the side, looking at the grandparents and grandchildren. Even though he was mentally old enough to have seen life and death, he couldn't help but sigh in his heart.

Grandma comforted Yu Feihong for a few words, then turned to look at Li Yishu and said, "Yishu, you are a good child. Take good care of Feihong in the future."

"Don't worry, grandma, I will take good care of Feihong." Li Yishu nodded.

"That's fine, that's fine."

Grandma smiled happily, while Yu Feihong sobbed softly.

After chatting for a while, the old man was not feeling well, so the two did not stay in the ward for long.

After coming out, Yu Feihong's eyes were already swollen from crying. She choked up and said, "Grandma, she has been very good to me since I was a child. Whenever she had something to eat, she would think of saving it for me..."

At this time, Li Yishu didn't know what to say to comfort people, because he knew that no matter how much he said, it would be of no use.

Only when one has personally experienced grief and separation can one understand that the consolation and comfort of others are but like wind in the hall, going in one ear and out the other.

For the next two days, Yu Feihong stayed in the ward with his mother to take care of his grandmother.

During this period, Li Yishu called Zhao Fei and confirmed that the crew had finished filming, so he let them go back on their own. He then went to the Hangzhou Telephone Bureau and called Qingxia who was far away in Taiwan, informing her that he might be able to arrive a few days later during this year's Spring Festival.

1 month 28 number.

The old man passed away two days before New Year’s Eve.

He passed away peacefully, with his children and grandchildren by his side.

Considering that the Chinese New Year is approaching, it is not auspicious to hold a funeral during the New Year. Although family members may not say anything, others may have some opinions.

So Yu Feihong's uncle did not hold a big funeral. He just notified relatives and friends, and they met for a meal the next day to discuss arranging grandma's funeral after the Lantern Festival on the 15th day of the first lunar month.

Originally, Li Yishu wanted to stay and help, but Yu Feihong's parents considered that the funeral for their old mother would be arranged after the Lantern Festival, so they asked him to go back first and it would not be too late to help later.

Li Yishu did not insist on this. After the night of New Year's Eve, he said goodbye to Yu Feihong at noon the next day, and went directly from Hangzhou Airport to Guangdong, and then took a plane from Guangdong to Taiwan.

It was already the second day of the Chinese New Year when he arrived in Taiwan.

Mother Zhao Xue was naturally unhappy that her son did not go home for the New Year. If it were in previous years, it would be fine, but this year his grandparents and grandparents-in-law all came to Taiwan to see their eldest grandson, and he was still busy on the crew during the New Year. They must be unhappy.

But fortunately, Qingxia is also an actress, and she knows that the crew doesn't care whether it is Chinese New Year or not when filming, so she took the initiative to speak well of Li Yishu, which made her mother Zhao Xue not so angry.

On the second night of the Chinese New Year, the Li and Lin families finally got together for a family dinner. Zhao Xue pulled Li Yishu over and said, "I'll go back with your dad on the fifth day."

"Why are you in such a hurry to go back?" Li Yishu asked in surprise, "Can you stay a few more days?"

"I can't live here anymore. I've been on leave for more than half a year. Although no one in the factory said anything, it still has a bad impact."

Zhao Xue hesitated for a few seconds and whispered, "Before your father came, Qinqin called home and said she would come to play at home on the fifth day of the Lunar New Year. I told her to come on the eighth day. We are going to the countryside to celebrate the festival these days."

"Since it's the eighth day, why don't you leave on the seventh day?"

"Are the relatives at home not leaving?"

Zhao Xue glared at her son angrily: "It's all your fault, you little bastard son. I don't know why I gave birth to such a playboy like you."

Li Yishu smiled awkwardly. In his previous life, his mother begged him to get married and have children early. Now that he had children early, she said the same thing again.

"Don't think you can just keep silent. I tell you that Qingxia is a good kid, and Tuantuan is also cute and smart. She talked to me privately and doesn't care about status. You should be nice to her in the future."

"Don't worry, mom. I'm not that kind of person."

"It better be this way."

Mother Zhao Xue glanced at her son, shook her head, turned and left.

During the days she lived in Taiwan, Zhao Xue occasionally went out shopping or watched TV, and often saw some gossip about her son Li Yishu, saying that he was Miss Hong Kong and a movie queen, and they talked about it very seriously.

At first she was afraid that Qingxia would be unhappy when she saw this, but when she saw that she didn't seem to care much, she was relieved.

Now Zhao Xue finally understood that she could no longer control her eldest son Li Yishu.

Becoming famous at a young age and being highly praised, parents must be proud of them, but their love life is really unbearable.

What can I do if I can't bear to watch it? After all, he is my own son.

"Jingle Bell……"

Just when Li Yishu was about to go back into the house, his cell phone rang. When he picked it up, he saw that it was Yang Shoucheng calling.

After the call was connected, Yang Shoucheng's laughter came from the other end: "Mr. Li, Happy New Year, and may you make a fortune!"

"Let's celebrate together, may everyone get rich!"

Li Yishu said with a smile: "Boss Yang, you are here on New Year's Day, you are not here just to wish me a happy new year and good fortune, right?"

"Haha! Mr. Li, I really want to congratulate you on your fortune!"

Yang Shoucheng laughed heartily and said, "I met with Lin Baixin again yesterday, and he finally relented."

"He agreed?" Li Yishu's eyes lit up. Since last year, he had asked Yang Shoucheng to discuss the acquisition of ATV shares with Lin Baixin.

"Not yet, but almost there. He wants to meet you in person to discuss ATV!"

"Okay! I'll go there early tomorrow morning. Please help me make an appointment with Mr. Lin."

"No problem, Mr. Li. I'll contact Mr. Lin right away."

When Yang Shoucheng first proposed to invest in ATV, Lin Baixin initially refused.

He bought Asia Television in order to get better publicity for his Lai Sun Group, so he didn't care whether to bring in new shareholders. However, in the past few months, Asia Television's losses have increased. A few days ago, Asia Television's annual accounts were reviewed and it was found that Asia Television lost as much as 3700 million Hong Kong dollars last year.

This number is astonishing!
The reason for such huge losses is not only that the TV dramas produced by ATV have poor ratings and the advertising fees cannot be recovered, but also mainly due to personnel expenses.

Although TVB is famous for its cost-consciousness, many artists and employees are still willing to work for TVB simply because of the job stability.

ATV has changed several boards of directors. Many TV actors are not willing to come to ATV because of the situation of wage arrears in the early years.

So after Lam Pak-yan took over, he spent a lot of money to poach a lot of talents and actors from TVB. To poach people, he must have offered them better benefits than before, otherwise who would change jobs?

This also leads to ATV's personnel expenses being much higher than TVB's. In addition, TVB also has Shaw Studios and Shaw Warehouse, so many props and costumes manufactured in the past can continue to be used.

Including some daily wear and tear, equipment upgrades, and so on, ATV has not been able to keep up with TVB's pace, resulting in slow steps, huge daily expenses, and a loss of at least NT$100,000 a day.

If it was just one or two years it would be fine, but it has been six years since Lin Baixin acquired Qiu Degen’s shares in Asia Television in 1988 and became the new chairman of Asia Television, and he has lost nearly million yuan.

If they continue like this, they will probably lose even more. When Lin Baixin looked at the year-end report, he was so angry that he almost vomited blood. He was extremely disappointed with his son Lin Jianyue's management ability.

In addition, Yang Shoucheng called him from time to time to discuss the shares. Finally, yesterday afternoon, Lin Baixin met with Yang Shoucheng and expressed his willingness to sell ATV shares, but the prerequisite was to meet with Li Yishu to understand the changes that would be brought about after he took over ATV.

Early the next morning.

Li Yishu flew to Hong Kong early.

At around 11 o'clock in the morning, after he came out of Kai Tak Airport, he got into Yang Shoucheng's car.

Yang Shoucheng said: "Mr. Li, I have made an appointment with Mr. Lin to meet at the Peninsula Hotel at noon."

"Yes." Li Yishu nodded and asked, "Mr. Yang wants to see me. What does that mean?"

"I guess he wants to see if you, Mr. Li, have any ideas to revive ATV."

Yang Shoucheng said with a smile: "Yesterday, Mr. Lin agreed to meet with you to discuss it, so I asked someone to find out about the situation of Asia Television. Last year, Asia Television lost more than 3700 million Hong Kong dollars. Counting the losses in recent years, Asia Television has lost at least to million Hong Kong dollars in the past few years."

"Since there is no hope of making any profit in the future, I think Mr. Lin would like to meet with you, Mr. Li, to understand your future plans for the TV station and, if possible, sell the majority of his shares."

Hearing this, Li Yishu nodded without comment. If he was sitting in Lin Baixin's seat, he would probably do the same, right?
Television stations are still very profitable these days. Hong Kong doesn't have that many television channels yet. Even though Murdoch's News Corporation acquired 64% of Li Huanggua's satellite TV station, Hong Kong people are more accustomed to watching TVB and ATV.

Li Huanggua's satellite TV station does not have the ability to produce its own TV dramas. It is more like a middleman, specializing in acquiring some film resources and overseas programs, and also producing some variety shows and news programs.

In terms of strength, it is definitely not as good as TVB and ATV.

But even so, ATV still suffered losses for many years. You can imagine how humiliated Lin Baixin was.

After half an hour.

Peninsula Hotel.

When Li Yishu and Yang Shoucheng arrived at the restaurant, Lin Baixin had already arrived, and his son Peter Lam had also arrived.

Lin Baixin smiled and said, "Mr. Li, we meet again."

"Yes, Mr. Lin, nice to meet you again. Happy New Year." Li Yishu clasped his hands together and congratulated him with a smile.

“Haha, let’s have fun together.”

Lin Baixin smiled and asked the two to sit down, then asked the waiter to start serving the dishes.

The few of them chatted while eating, but they did not talk directly about the acquisition of ATV shares. Instead, they discussed the recent property market in Hong Kong.

Since 1991, the Hong Kong property market has been rising again, and it has been rising for four years now. Compared with the same property market four years ago, the increase has reached four times!
Starting from New Year's Day this year, in just one month, the real estate market has increased by nearly 20%, which is an extremely exaggerated figure.

This also means that houses in good locations can easily cost 70,000 to 80,000 yuan or even more than 10,000 yuan per square meter.

It has far exceeded the normal house price.

The reason for this was that British capital was selling off its assets in Hong Kong Island on a large scale. The British Jardine Matheson, Landmark, Swire and Kadoorie families all sold off their core assets on a large scale, forming a downward gap.

Under such circumstances, the real estate market should have experienced a major earthquake, but many Chinese investors felt that this was an opportunity and took over part of the market. The wealthy took part, and the general public took part, but the majority of the market was taken over by the mainland.

In January this year, Jardine Matheson sold two buildings in Central for more than HK$60 billion, and the two buildings were taken over by red capital.

This situation was more common last year. In order to avoid huge fluctuations in the Hong Kong property market, red capital took over a number of industrial and commercial buildings that were sold off at high prices by British capital.

As 97 approaches, the market starts to get frenzied.

What is the slogan of Hong Kong real estate speculators now? -- The mainland will definitely take over!
That’s right, in their opinion, the mainland will definitely take over.

No matter how high the housing prices are, the mainland will definitely accept it for the smooth return of Hong Kong.

All we can say is that British capital has really seen the importance of the return, and ordinary people are greedy and all think that the mainland will back up the property market.

In fact, the bottom was indeed covered, but the Asian financial crisis in 1997 triggered by Soros directly collapsed the Hong Kong property market.

Li Yishu didn't know about these things. After listening to what Lin Baixin and Yang Shoucheng said, she felt deeply saddened.

In his previous life, he only knew that British capital did a lot of things on the eve of the return, but he didn't expect that even the skyrocketing property market was related to British capital.

But it is normal to think about it. Knowing clearly about the return in 97, British capital would definitely take the opportunity to raise the price and sell off the real estate in their hands, and then buy them back at a lower price in the future.

In the end, Hong Kong residents and mainland residents suffered heavy losses. The property market was all bought at high prices. Later, they faced the 97 financial crisis and the 98 Hong Kong financial defense war...

It seems that the road to Hong Kong’s return is really not peaceful.

After chatting with Yang Shoucheng for a long time, Lin Baixin looked at Li Yishu and asked, "Mr. Li, what do you think of the property market?"

Li Yishu shook her head: "Mr. Lin's question is really useless. I know nothing about the property market."

"It's okay. I just want to see how Mr. Li, who doesn't know much about the property market, views the skyrocketing property market in Hong Kong in recent years."

"I can only say that where there is a market there is demand."

Li Yishu smiled and said nothing.

Seeing that he didn't want to talk more, Lin Baixin didn't say anything else and got straight to the point: "Mr. Li, I asked Mr. Yang to invite you here this time because I wanted to ask you if you have any way to revive ATV after you take over?"

“It’s a huge comeback, but I still have some confidence that we can turn a loss into a profit.”

Before Li Yishu came, she had already prepared a draft in her mind, and said with a smile: "I plan to reform ATV in three directions. The first is variety shows, the second is TV dramas, and the third is people's livelihood news."

(End of this chapter)