Chapter 919 Industry Event
In more than half a year, the editor-in-chief and president of Guowen Publishing House have been replaced one after another. It is no exaggeration to say that this is a great change of dynasty.
However, before Li Xin, the new president of Guowen Society, could make any major moves after taking office, the group took the initiative and issued two documents within one day.
One is the salary increase document that everyone has been discussing for a long time. Starting from the next month when the document is issued, all employees of Guowen Group will receive a 30% salary increase.
As soon as the document was sent out, there was cheers throughout the Guowen Group.
Even when prices were skyrocketing in the late 1980s, wages at the Guowen Press didn't increase that much!
Sure enough, compared with the bonuses and benefits at the end of the year, the general salary adjustment at the beginning of the year is the biggest one. After all, no matter how much the bonuses and benefits are, they are just floating money. If the performance is not good one day, they may have to be cut.
But the employees' income suddenly soared by 30%, which is real income. I have never heard of any unit cutting wages. How shameless that would be!
This is simply great news.
At the same time as the salary increase document was released, another document was also posted on the bulletin board. This was the document in which Guowen Group responded to the national call and participated in the pilot work of corporate pensions.
Since 1997, China has clarified the concept of enterprise annuities in the Social Insurance Law and started to carry out enterprise annuity pilot projects in pilot enterprises.
As a pilot enterprise for the enterprise transformation and restructuring policy, Guowen Group naturally has to be brave in charging forward. It has achieved some results in the past year since its establishment and now must support the above work.
According to the documents, after the enterprise annuity system is implemented in Guowen Society, Guowen Group will pay annuities for employees at a rate of 8% of employees' salary income. At the same time, 8% of employees' income will be deducted from their monthly salary. The two parties will pay a total of 16% of the salary income.
Compared with the wage increase that everyone is celebrating, employees generally do not have any strong reaction to the pension system.
The salary has just been increased, so just deduct some of the annuity. Anyway, you can get the money in the future. This is a disguised pension. The company also gives out part of the money. Overall, it is still a good thing.
Two documents were issued in succession at the beginning of the year, both of which were about adjusting employees' salaries and benefits. These were good news for the employees of Guowen Group and also increased the personal prestige of Lin Weimin, the group's top leader.
However, some people are curious about why there has been no movement on the issue of corporate pensions, even though the salary increase was widely reported before. This is undoubtedly a major blow to the intelligence capabilities of the Guowen Society.
Of course, this matter was related to Lin Weimin. He did not let the people of Guowenshe interfere in the matter of the enterprise annuity. And he did not hide the salary increase of the employees of Guowenshe, and as expected, the news was leaked everywhere.
Facts have proved that confidentiality is not an option at the Guowen Society.
The two happy events at the beginning of the year have given a good start to the development of Guowen Group this year, and the employees are full of enthusiasm.
After the Lantern Festival and approaching March, the latest news came from the other side of the ocean that the US Federal Reserve will once again implement an interest rate hike policy.
This is the fifth interest rate hike by the US Federal Reserve since June 1999. After this rate hike by the US Federal Reserve, the benchmark interest rate of the US dollar has reached 6.25%.
In the previous two years, the Federal Reserve lowered the federal benchmark interest rate due to the Southeast Asian financial crisis and Russia's debt default. In the following two years, the US economy developed rapidly, especially the development of the Internet industry, which could not be described as rapid. The atmosphere of NASDAQ and Silicon Valley had reached a crazy level at the end of 1999.
1999 was the craziest year in the history of the US Internet. Dozens of Internet companies went public. Some companies simply added an e- in front of their company name or a .com at the end, and then published a business plan to get sky-high investments from investors.
In such an atmosphere, many start-ups in the United States have completely stopped considering profitability or subsequent development; they only stick to one principle.
We are an Internet company. To grow rapidly we must raise funds and burn money. The faster we burn money, the more the company will grow, and the more positive feedback we will get from the market. This makes us more popular on the nearly crazy Nasdaq.
Analysts, investors, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and banks were all caught up in the frenzy, and everyone felt they were making a lot of money.
So in this environment, the Federal Reserve began to raise interest rates in the middle of last year to deflate the bubble.
Although several consecutive interest rate hikes have brought some short-term fluctuations to the market, the Nasdaq index has continued to rise, which has further fueled the frenzy in the market and made everyone more convinced that the foundation of the Nasdaq's bull market is solid and solid, and is not afraid of any impact of interest rate hikes.
Take Sohu as an example. Since the stock lock-up period of Sohu expired in November, many shareholders have been cashing out for profits. Most of the shareholders have recovered their costs and cashed out a certain amount of profits before stopping.
Only Guowen Group was the craziest. Within three months, it continuously reduced its holdings of Sohu shares by more than 10%.
If the shares sold by other shareholders are included, the Sohu shares circulating in the secondary market now exceed 30% of the company's total share capital.
According to common sense, Sohu's stock price should have plummeted long ago, after all, there are so many shares circulating in the market.
But the reality is that after a brief decline, Sohu's stock price continued to soar along with the broader market.
During the period after New Year's Day, the stock price rose instead of falling, and by the end of February it had reached a high price of around 142 million US dollars.
This figure has increased nearly three times compared to Sohu's issue price, but among all the companies listed in 1999, it can only be considered an average performance.
At the end of the month, Zhang Chaoyang asked Lin Weimin to go out for coffee.
Zhang Chaoyang has been in high spirits recently. The company's stock price has been rising, and the market value has exceeded 9 billion US dollars, and is about to break through 10 billion US dollars. Sohu has now become a giant in China's Internet industry. Recently, many newspapers have called him the "Godfather of China's Internet Entrepreneurship", which makes Zhang Chaoyang feel elated.
"Teacher Lin, does the group plan to sell off its Sohu shares?"
This was the first question Zhang Chaoyang asked when they met, but his tone was not as worried and anxious as it was at the end of last year. This was certainly the confidence that Sohu's recent stock price gave him.
“I won’t sell out my shares, mainly because Sohu’s stock price is performing so well right now.”
Zhang Chaoyang asked again: "Does the group have any confidence in Sohu's future development?"
Don't you have any idea? A company with annual revenue of several million dollars, a company that has not yet made a profit, is worth tens of billions of dollars. Do you dare to believe it?
Of course, you can't say that, it requires some skills.
"It's not that I'm not optimistic about Sohu's development, but the current momentum of Nasdaq is a bit too crazy. Don't tell me you didn't cash out."
Hearing this, Zhang Chaoyang couldn't help but laugh triumphantly, "I couldn't help it and got 100 million out."
The "one hundred million" he mentioned was of course not RMB, but rice.
"The current market is indeed a bit frothy, but I think the underlying driving force is still supported by the development potential of technology stocks, so it's not a big problem."
Lin Weimin admires Zhang Chaoyang's blind confidence. Of course, if he didn't know the general trend, he probably wouldn't be much better than Zhang Chaoyang.
"We still need to be vigilant and not be too careless. Also, don't pay too much attention to things like stock prices. Stock prices are just icing on the cake. The most important thing is that Sohu can continue to develop upward," said Lin Weimin.
Zhang Chaoyang nodded, "You are right."
He then asked, "I heard that the higher-ups are planning to transfer the management of the Internet recently?"
Lin Weimin joked: "You are quite well-informed."
"I still have to ask you about this! Is this true?"
Lin Weimin said patiently, "We do have this idea. The higher-ups are aware that the Internet actually has strong media attributes. Most of the officials in the Ministry of Information Industry come from the traditional communications field and are not sensitive enough to the Internet and public opinion propaganda. The management of the Internet should be transferred to the State Council Office."
After getting a definite answer, Zhang Chaoyang looked worried: "I have a new mother-in-law, and I have to go to the mountain gate to pay homage."
"Sohu is now the face of the Chinese Internet. What do you have to worry about?"
"It's nothing. You know, I don't like dealing with the government."
"At this stage, this kind of work is unavoidable. Just cooperate actively. You will definitely benefit from it in the future."
Zhang Chaoyang smiled and said, "Then we need more help from the group. You must not sell all your stocks."
Now that Guowen Group no longer holds Sohu's shares, it will have nothing to do with Sohu in the future, and it will no longer be able to ask Lin Weimin for help like it does now.
"Don't worry, we won't sell off our shares. The amount of shares we hold depends on the stock price, but our support for Sohu remains the same as always."
After hearing Lin Weimin's assurance, Zhang Chaoyang felt a little more at ease.
At this time, Lin Weimin said, "I have an idea. I wonder if Sohu is interested in participating?"
"What do you think?"
"I want to hold an Internet conference to build a platform for domestic Internet companies to communicate and cooperate, and promote the better development of China's Internet industry."
After hearing this, Zhang Chaoyang's eyes lit up, he stood up excitedly, clapped his hands and said, "This is a good idea!"
He paced back and forth excitedly, muttering to himself: "The Internet Conference brings together many domestic Internet industries. This is a rare opportunity. If it is done well, it will be a grand event for the Internet industry."
As he was talking, he suddenly raised his head and said, "Teacher Lin, are you planning to use the name of the Guowen Group?"
Lin Weimin said with a smile: "Sohu is now an Internet giant. We can't do without you. Of course we have to find you to co-host it."
Zhang Chaoyang waved his hand, "Please don't make fun of me. If the group wants to hold such an event, we at Sohu will definitely go all out to support it. However, aren't we two companies alone a little too weak?"
"The State Council's X-Office and the Ministry of Rites will also participate. I also plan to invite the founders of several Internet companies in Silicon Valley to come."
Zhang Chaoyang was not at all surprised that the State Council X Office and the Ministry of Rites would participate in the Internet Conference. Since Mr. Lin was involved, the standards would definitely not be low.
But when he heard the second half of the sentence, his eyes flashed with excitement that he couldn't suppress, "Who are you going to invite?"
"Bill Gates, Jerry Yang, Jeff Bezos, and Jim Clark."
After reading these names, Lin Weimin muttered again: "Jim Clark and Bill Gates are sworn enemies. They can create some topics and gimmicks for the conference."
Zhang Chaoyang didn't bother to think of any gimmicks. His eyes lit up more and more as he listened. These four names corresponded to Silicon Valley giants Microsoft, Yahoo, Amazon, and Netscape. Each name mentioned by Lin Weimin was the founder of a Silicon Valley giant or a first-tier technology company. For practitioners in the Chinese Internet industry, they were all unattainable figures.
He couldn't help but tremble with excitement at the thought of these people appearing at the Internet conference.
"Teacher Lin, please tell us how you need our Sohu to cooperate. We will definitely cooperate with the group to make this conference a great success and let it go down in the history of China's Internet development." Zhang Chaoyang said excitedly.
Lin Weimin smiled calmly, "Don't get excited yet. This is just an idea at the moment. I plan to hold this Internet conference on May Day..."
Lin Weimin then discussed with Zhang Chaoyang some specific ideas for the Internet conference. After talking for more than an hour, Zhang Chaoyang was completely attracted by the Internet conference and was eager to get everything done right away.
"That's probably how it's going to be for now. I'll ask the group to come up with a plan later, and you guys can also think about it and see if you have any good ideas. We can learn from each other's strengths and make up for each other's weaknesses." Lin Weimin said.
Zhang Chaoyang nodded solemnly. A sense of mission to participate in the tide of history surged in his heart, and at the same time he had a hunch.
The Internet Conference will surely become a major industry event for China's Internet industry in the future.
(End of this chapter)
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