Chapter 650
Public Opinion
Chapter 650 Public Opinion
Yu Xing arrived in Hong Kong to conduct the final half-month of roadshow work, and then waited another week for the official listing of Carbon Silicon Group on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange's GEM board.
During his trip to Hong Kong, he brought along Zhao Shuo, who had recently joined Guoshanfeng, Yao Yanghui of the carbon silicon supply chain management company, and Qi Miaohan of Red Falcon Capital, among others. On the one hand, he wanted to listen to the work on the mainland in a timely manner through them, and on the other hand, he wanted to consider building the framework for Guoshanfeng's future operations.
Zhao Shuo came from the domestic consulting firm Hejun, Yao Yanghui was a supply chain management talent promoted by Yu Xing, and Qi Miaohan was nominally the team leader of Red Falcon Capital, exclusively for Yu Xing.
In fact, it was only after Guo Shanfeng was exposed that Qi Miaohan realized that the NetQin research she had been doing all those years ago was actually serving the short-selling king, and that the boss, Liu Wanying, was clearly inseparable from Guo Shanfeng.
When asked by General Manager Yu if she would be willing to transfer to Guoshanfeng to do some work, she agreed almost without hesitation.
While Red Falcon Capital is doing well under Mr. Liu's leadership, there is even greater potential with Guoshanfeng, which has a considerable global influence. Of course, there are also risks involved, and there may not be much follow-up operation after the exposure.
On February 24, Yu Xing and Goldman Sachs concluded another round of debriefing on the roadshow, and had a basic expectation of the performance of the Silicon Carbon Group's listing.
Judging from the roadshows before and after the Lunar New Year, the results were rather average. Retail investors' subscriptions were just over 1%, and the international placement institutions also placed mostly small orders without large-scale bidding. Naturally, this did not trigger a clawback. Although it was not a collapse, it was still a rather lukewarm reception.
The factors contributing to this performance are varied. First, the time since the launch of vehicles by Silicon Carbon Group has been relatively short. Second, this year's policy clearly stipulates the reduction of subsidies. Third, there is a bullish and bearish game in the international market regarding Tesla, which has also affected Silicon Carbon, which is also a new energy company. As for the subsequent impact of Yu Xingda's status as a short seller and the price reduction of liquidity in the Hong Kong GEM board, these are also factors that different investors are considering.
Under these circumstances, the final offering price of silicon carbon will basically be close to the lower limit of the valuation, set at approximately HK$75.56, with an overall valuation of HK$680 billion, equivalent to US$81 billion.
This is still far from the $90 billion that Yu Xing had already considered, but it is more than double the $40 billion valuation of Silicon Carbon Group in its last round of financing.
In addition to discussing the effectiveness of the roadshow, Goldman Sachs also issued a serious warning about the actions of international short sellers in the media.
Silicon Carbon Group doesn't need to worry about being shorted in the short term, because for a stock to be shorted in Hong Kong, it needs to be included in the Hong Kong Stock Exchange's "List of Designated Securities for Short Selling," which requires meeting strict conditions such as having been listed for more than 60 trading days, having a market capitalization of more than HK$20 billion, and having more than 25% public shareholding.
Based on the situation of Silicon Carbon Group, it will probably not be officially shorted until the fourth quarter. However, this did not stop international short sellers from creating public opinion before it was even listed.
Goldman Sachs, considering the current situation, believes that the future of silicon carbon is still quite risky, and specifically reminded Yu Xing to pay attention to the proportion of stock pledges if he has funding needs.
A recent hot topic is the margin call on LeEco's Jia Yueting's pledged shares.
Goldman Sachs' people are rather tactful, and I believe the big short sellers naturally understand this unfavorable situation.
Yu Xing then informed Cui Zhiyu and others about the situation of "pricing at the lower limit and subscription not being hot" through an online meeting, so that they could have a psychological expectation, but the feedback received was still quite positive on the surface.
“Mr. Yu, it’s already good enough that we can go public at all.” Cui Zhiyu said meaningfully, “Whether it falls below the issue price or is shorted, in the end it still depends on our fundamentals.”
This is quite true. When more cars are sold, profits increase, the story can be sustained, the stock price will naturally rise, and the short sellers will naturally retreat.
On February 25, Li Song arrived in Hong Kong from Shanghai, intending to meet with Mike, the trader who manipulated silver prices at the investment bank, along with General Manager Yu, to further persuade him to reform.
When he visited Hong Kong, he inevitably mentioned Pinduoduo, with which he was actively promoting cooperation.
The newly formed "anti-Alibaba alliance" is willing to work together, but there are still some disagreements about Pinduoduo's valuation. Pinduoduo has now gone through two rounds of financing. Its valuation in the A round was $6667 million, and its valuation in the B round was $2 million after introducing funds from Tencent. Bi Sheng wants to raise $15 billion in this round.
Pinduoduo has great potential for development; however, it also faces challenges such as not having enough time to prove itself and needing further validation. "I think Bi Sheng's ambitions are a bit too high," Li Song said, sharing his thoughts. "Everyone hopes it will pose a threat to Alibaba, not that it has already done so."
After listening silently for a while, Zhao Shuo suddenly spoke up: "If it has already posed a threat, then it would be far more expensive than this. I don't think this valuation is too outrageous."
Li Song disagreed: "In the end, it's just a low-price Taobao. It can only disrupt things, not compete head-on. Alibaba's revenue this year is going to reach 1500 billion, and its GMV is going to break 3 trillion. What does that mean?"
“Alibaba is arrogant. It’s now aiming to break 3 GMV, but didn’t it also develop from the foundation of low-price Taobao?” Zhao Shuo said. “Moreover, don’t be fooled by Alibaba’s current spending spree. Its performance in WeChat and Leyin outside its original system is not that strong. It’s just using money to intimidate people. Pinduoduo has made so many moves to compete with other companies. It may not be afraid when it really starts burning money.”
Li Song didn't want to argue with Zhao Shuo, who had successfully joined Shanfeng, so he looked at the composed President Yu and asked, "President Yu, what do you think of this valuation?"
“That’s how you ask for a price, just negotiate. Anything over $10 billion is fine.” Yu Xing shook his head. “The mobile internet is developing very quickly, and Pinduoduo will only prove that again.”
Li Song sensed the unwavering optimism beneath President Yu's calm demeanor.
He then thought about it again and felt somewhat envious of Bi Sheng. Back then, he had only made acquaintance with President Yu on a TV program, but now he had reached such a position. With the support of the alliance, Pinduoduo's valuation in this round was clearly not the end.
However, before Pinduoduo's valuation could be finalized, news about Baidu suddenly spread from the Baixiaosheng Forum. Someone compiled information about the public sale of Baidu's medical forum, and the post quickly spread to Zhihu and Weibo.
Putian, false medical advertisements, excessive commercialization of online forums...
Baixiaosheng Forum is already a well-known source of first-hand information in the industry. Recently, it has further fueled the hype surrounding short selling, and related posts have quickly gone viral. Popular topics on various social media platforms have also followed this trend.
Baidu's public response was to conduct a serious internal investigation, and the chain reaction was that Pinduoduo's secret negotiations were immediately suspended.
When faced with Pony Ma's persuasion, Li Yanhong only asked one question: "What does he mean?"
Pony Ma called Yu Xing, hoping that the controversy surrounding the cooperation with Pinduoduo would not escalate further, and that the Baixiaosheng Forum would appropriately reduce its public attention.
Yu Xing's response was just one sentence: "I don't interfere with the forum, it's good enough that they didn't short him."
Faced with this unexpected situation, Pony felt that the makeshift alliance he had just built was likely to collapse in an instant.
After much deliberation and considering the current situation at Baidu, he decided to persuade Li Yanhong, offering a practical reason: "Pinduoduo isn't his; it's meant to compete with Alibaba. Look at Yu Xing—he's a big short seller; it's perfectly normal for him to do something like this."
Li Yanhong was still furious and gave Yu Xing a thorough dressing-down on the phone, criticizing his treacherous behavior during their cooperation.
After finishing the phone call that was supposed to mend the alliance, Pony Ma put down his phone and sighed to his colleagues, "Two-faced as he may be, he really didn't misname himself Ke Zhen'e of Jiaxing. With Baidu in this state, why didn't Yu Xing think of going to cry to it?"
He felt that Tencent back then was actually quite good compared to Baidu today.
I've been so busy at the end of the year... I got home too late today.
(End of this chapter)