America: My Time

Chapter 25 The Watch of Wall Street (Part 1)

Chapter Twenty-Five: The Gaze of Wall Street (Part One)

We need to find a direction for this kid to spend money, and a big one at that. Otherwise, as time goes on, he'll be even less short of money; the profits from the game world will provide him with ample financial reserves. At this moment, Wall Street tycoons are eager for John to raise funds, so they can accelerate the game world's IPO and speed up the launch of Dream World software.

Studying John, his every move, and everything about him became a top priority on Wall Street. They were eager to cut a piece of the pie from Game World and Dream World software and secure a stable profit before the software went public!

A fledgling company attracted the attention, even the attention, of Wall Street giants in just a few days. The owner of this company was only an eighteen-year-old boy. Before this, the boy had a company with extraordinary potential. The impact of all this on Wall Street was unimaginable.

At this moment, the Bayard family was overjoyed. Although they were all certain that John would succeed, they hadn't expected success to come so quickly and so fiercely. A comic book company hidden in Japan had already shocked them, then came Dream World Software, and now Game World, with its astonishing potential, causing a stir on Wall Street.

It wasn't that no one in the family had designs on the game world and the Dream World software; however, their suggestions were met with severe retaliation. Family rules were inviolable; no matter how great the potential profits, such actions were not permitted. These individuals received warnings and might even be gradually marginalized within the family, as they had crossed the family's bottom line. If the family's bottom line was breached, its cohesion would crumble, and the family's collapse would not be far off!

When Wall Street tycoons began to carefully study John's investments, they were quickly astonished by what they learned. He was simply a genius madman with unbelievable foresight. Every investment yielded huge returns. The music company, though small, was very profitable, even though it was John's own work. His publishing house's novels swept across North America and even began to enter Europe, earning him a fortune in dollars. As for his Japanese comic book company, it was even more terrifying. It directly swept the Japanese comic book market, becoming the top player and standing at the pinnacle of the Japanese comic book market. At the same time, it was also sweeping the Asian market and had even begun to expand into Europe and America. As for Dream World software, it needs no introduction. Standing at the top of the personal computer industry, it held powerful patents and looked down on all competitors. Now, this madman's investment in the game world was also making great strides forward.

What shocked Wall Street tycoons most wasn't John's foresight, but rather his terrifying decisiveness. Clearly, from the beginning, he had no intention of manufacturing the game consoles himself, nor even of setting up a sales network. He had laid out his plans from the outset, anticipating all possible scenarios. He had seen through those American manufacturing companies; his ability to make such a decisive judgment from the outset was astonishing.

From Wall Street's perspective, considering the gaming world, it seems like this isn't worthwhile. If they manufactured the game consoles themselves, they would have substantial fixed assets, making it easy to go public and raise funds, which would give investors strong confidence and create huge potential in the stock market. However, without the physical entity, the stock value would be significantly reduced.

If we consider things from John's perspective, we would arrive at a different conclusion! Building a production line requires a huge amount of capital, time, and, more importantly, financing. After financing, how much equity would he still have left? Less than 51%, and he could lose control of the company at any time. How could John accept such an outcome?

I'm not an idiot. If there's no way to solve the problem of game console production, then so be it, I'll just have to accept it. But I can solve the problem by licensing, so why should I give away the profits I've already made to others?

Nowadays, even an idiot knows that the game world is a valuable asset, and it's extremely difficult to acquire it. Unless John can quickly find a new investment direction that will consume funds, it will be difficult for them to take action against the game world and the Dream World software.

"Boss, perhaps we can start with the entertainment industry. This crazy kid recently registered another company, Legendary Pictures. His previous companies didn't require much capital to operate, but the film industry is different. Judging from his plans, it's clear he wants to establish an entertainment conglomerate. First there was music and publishing, then a comic book company, and now there's the film industry, plus his game world—it's a small entertainment conglomerate. If we let him continue to expand, leveraging the profits from the game world, a new entertainment conglomerate will emerge in no time. Perhaps we can start from this direction and find him a good entertainment media company."

"That's indeed a good insight, but ordinary entertainment companies simply can't put pressure on his finances. The game world's layout is complete, and there will be a continuous flow of cash. Only Hollywood giants or those few public television stations can deplete his cash and force him to raise funds!" "Boss, the film industry has been in a slump these past few years. Perhaps we can start from this direction. Disney, Universal, and MGM are all good options!"

"No, MGM won't do. At most, it'll only be around a billion dollars. It won't put any pressure on this little guy. Once the game is released, you should know what it will be like. You'll see how amazing its profits will be at the end of the year. What do you think such a company is worth? There's Apple as an example of software companies, so there's no need to say more! Disney won't do either. It loses money every year and there's no hope of turning things around. Nobody would take it on unless they were a fool. Nobody wants to take on a film studio that keeps losing money, especially one that makes children's films! Universal is an option, but we need to spend some time investigating and understanding it. We can't put all our hopes on Universal. We need to have other preparations. Time waits for no one. The whole of Wall Street is getting restless. It's not just Morgan Stanley that's taking action."

"Actually, I'm a little worried. John has also acquired a toy company. If his toys are successful, the cash flow he controls will be enormous. We need to be prepared and can't afford any mistakes!"

Whether a toy company is profitable or not is unknown to Wall Street bigwigs. A profitable toy company is in no way inferior to the game world. It turns out that Wall Street knows that John has registered several toy companies and has even acquired a Taiwanese toy company, which makes the Morgan big boss very uneasy!
"Boss, we can take advantage of Warner Bros. The explosion in the gaming world will have a huge impact on Warner Bros. In the previous incident, Warner Bros. exerted considerable influence behind the scenes. Perhaps we can use this to suppress the gaming world and achieve our goals!"

"No, we can't show ourselves. We can't leave any leverage for others. This kid is not to be trifled with. Once he finds out we're plotting against him, do you think Morgan will still have a chance to participate in this huge pie of the gaming world? We can't be the bad guys. That's the bottom line, an inviolable bottom line!"

The situation was similar to that of Morgan Stanley, which was present in all the major banks on Wall Street. They were all eager to find an investment direction for John that would consume a lot of money, and they all noticed John's entertainment plans. Warner Bros. suddenly became a target of Wall Street.

It wouldn't be difficult for Wall Street to obtain John's investment information; it's just a matter of time. Most people already know how much money John has and understand his character. He's a petty guy, so it's best not to offend him if possible.

Morgan doesn't need to do anything; they just need to wait. Knowing Warner as they do, they know this won't end here; a counterattack is inevitable, because they have no other option. As for other areas, they need to speed things up. They can't wait for other investment banks to finish before making their move—that would be too late!

Just as Wall Street thought, Warner Bros. couldn't do nothing and just watch the gaming world sweep the North American gaming market. They had to take action, disrupt the development of the gaming world, and prevent the emergence of new entertainment groups that would threaten Warner Bros.' position.

Warner also tried to unite with other entertainment giants to suppress John, but no one responded. The other entertainment giants had no direct conflict of interest with John, and they wouldn't work for Warner for nothing.

Warner Bros. also considered using theater chains to prevent them from purchasing Game World's arcade machines, opting for Atari instead. Unfortunately, no one responded. The theater chains that attended Game World's launch event were well aware of Game World's strength and understood the impact its games would have on Atari's laughable offerings. Those that didn't participate waited for Game World's console to launch, unwilling to rashly accept Warner Bros.' proposal and risk losing money.
Suppressing a weekly comic book magazine? That's even less likely to work. Phoenix Comics isn't based in the US; its creation and production are all in Japan. Warner Bros. would be powerless to suppress it, and even if they intervened now to block Phoenix Comics' distribution in the US, it wouldn't be very effective, let alone have any impact. John never intended for Phoenix Comics to distribute itself; he wanted to hand it over to a distributor!
After searching high and low, they finally realized that the only ones they could take action against were the record companies. They could only try to poach their employees. Warner was the giant in the record industry, and it was the easiest way to succeed!

(End of this chapter)