My Age of Investment

After the United Kingdom and the United States announced their ban on short selling, a large number of countries around the world began to choose to copy the answer.

The German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority urgently announced a ban on short selling of 11 large financial and real estate stocks, including Allianz Group, Deutsche Bank, etc. Investors who have short positions exceeding 0.2% of the total share capital of a stock must report to the company every day. Financial Supervisory Authority reports on the situation.

The Dutch Ministry of Finance announced a ban on naked short selling for the next three months.

Australia has introduced legislation to parliament calling for a permanent ban on naked short selling.

…

For a time, there were calls for a ban on short selling all over the world, as if short selling was the culprit causing the economic deterioration, and as long as short selling was banned, all financial crisis problems would be solved.

Hong Kong Island is special. Naked short selling was banned as early as ten years ago during the Asian financial crisis, and the ban has not been lifted since then.

Therefore, in the face of the intensifying financial crisis, Hong Kong Island, as one of the few regions that did not revise short-selling regulations, attracted world attention as soon as its Chief Executive Officer of the Securities and Futures Commission, Wei Yili, gave a speech.

“Short selling plays an extremely important role in the price discovery process, driving the development of market neutral activities such as hedging, which is critical in mature markets.

What we as regulators want to prevent is abusive short selling..."

Xia Jingxing held the phone and listened to Ye Shuhui repeating Wei Yili's original words on the other end of the phone.

After listening, he replied with a smile: "Hong Kong Island is quite stable. We did not choose to blindly follow the trend and ban short selling. This is a good thing for us."

Ye Shuhui said: "Xia Sheng, although short selling is not prohibited on Hong Kong Island, what is allowed is secured short selling, which requires the seller to have borrowed the stock or to have obtained confirmation that the lender has real stock when selling.

In addition, the list of companies that can be shorted in Hong Kong stocks is limited, and they are all large-cap stocks with high trading volume.

When we were shorting, we had borrowed a large number of shares held by institutions, so there were not many shares left available to lend out to the market.

Whether the Hong Kong Securities Regulatory Commission prohibits short selling or not, it actually has little meaning. "

"It would be better not to ban it. In the past two days, there have been a large number of naked short-selling orders liquidated in the U.S. stock market, which caused quite a stir. In addition, affected by the economic stabilization plan jointly proposed by the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve, the market rose by 11.6%."

Xia Jingxing didn't say anything further. If they hadn't closed the deal immediately, they would have given back part of their short-selling profits in the past two days.

As of today, September 20, Envision Capital has closed all short positions in the underlying stocks in the United States.

The outside world is very concerned about whether the US$700 billion bailout bill currently being discussed in the House of Representatives can be passed. In the short term, it will not have any impact on their investment.

Of course, in the long run, it will still have a certain impact on investment in stock index futures.

The United States has banned short selling this time. It bans short selling of individual stocks, especially naked short selling. It does not ban short selling of indices.

Therefore, Jiang Ping’s team is still staring at the trading of stock index futures, with a total position of 20 billion US dollars, and not one cent has yet been closed or delivered.

The Liu Hai team has successively closed out 14 billion U.S. dollars in short positions in underlying stocks and sold some put options, but it still holds several billion U.S. dollars in put options, some of which will not expire until early next year.

In the European market, Li Yaozu's team still holds short positions totaling US$20 billion in the UK, Germany, France and other countries, most of which have not been closed. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are taking the blame.

Ye Shuhui's laughter came from the other end of the phone, "That's right. Hong Kong Island does not prohibit normal short selling, which is of great benefit to our retreat.

At present, we and Tiger Asia Fund are closing and withdrawing their positions in an orderly manner. We are closing positions and paying back the borrowed stocks, and retail investors are selling them short. The liquidity in the market can be greatly alleviated, and the stock price will not be directly driven away. . "

Xia Jingxing nodded lightly, "Just follow the plan. Don't be so anxious to quit. The Li family is already frightened and they don't dare to come in and cause damage at this time."

"Not only the Li family, but also the other three major real estate families, as well as real estate companies such as SOHO, did not dare to act rashly in the face of the plummeting stock market."

Xia Jingxing smiled and stared at the main course every day, almost forgetting the complementary food.

He has replenished ammunition for the Hong Kong Island team twice. Ye Shuhui and the team have a total of 10 billion US dollars and more than 40 billion Hong Kong dollars in funds.

The US$10 billion of main funds added later were used to short the Li family, and the other more than 40 billion Hong Kong dollars were used to take care of other real estate families.

In short, everything is clearly arranged, the funds are dispersed enough, and the layout is global.

Excluding the mainland, Envision Capital has invested approximately US$70 billion and HK$40 billion in initial principal for short selling globally, and it also has US$4 to 5 billion in reserve funds.

This amount of money does not belong to Xia Jingxing alone. It includes investment from LPs, as well as many leveraged loans and equity pledged loans.

At present, except for the teams of Liu Hai and Ye Shuhui, which are closing the net on a large scale, other teams are still waiting for a better time to withdraw.

So far, this global hunting operation can only be said to be half, or even a small half.

With such a large amount of capital involved, it took more than half a year to cast the net, and naturally it requires some patience to close the net.

More haste less speed.

If you close the net carelessly, you will catch a lot less fish.

Naturally, Xia Jingxing would not be too anxious. After giving Ye Shuhui another explanation on the phone, he ended the call.

A few minutes after he hung up the phone, Liu Xiaoduo knocked on the door and walked in.

After approaching, she handed over a document, "Mr. Xia, there is an email from the New York State Attorney General's Office. Attorney General Mr. Andrew Cuomo would like to make an appointment with you."

Xia Jingxing took the printed email, glanced at it a few times, and murmured, "What does he want from me?"

Xia Jingxing suddenly had a very bad feeling in his heart.

If combined with Cuomo's televised speeches in the past two days, it is clear that the other party's goal is to find him.

In short, it is absolutely impossible to treat yourself to coffee.

After calming down, Xia Jingxing carefully read the contents of the email.

It didn't say anything in detail. It just said that it was ordered to investigate financial companies of all sizes on Wall Street and hoped that Vision Capital would cooperate.

After thinking for a moment, Xia Jingxing replied: "You go out first, I will call you later."

After Liu Xiaoduo left, Xia Jingxing called Blankfein and told him about the fact that the New York State Attorney General's Office had approached him.

After listening, Blankfein on the other end of the phone was silent for a few seconds before slowly saying: "Dylan, if I'm not wrong, this guy should be targeting you!"

Xia Jingxing was not intimidated and smiled faintly: "Then what?"

"Then he will try every means to find your non-compliance issues, and gain political resources and public favor by knocking you down or severely injuring you, which will serve as capital for his future promotion!"

Blankfein's voice was cold, "Do you know how the former governor of New York climbed up? I'm referring to the "Mr. Clean" and "anti-corruption fighter" who were rumored to have paid $4,300 to call girls a few months ago. ”, Mr. Eliot Spitzer, “Governor of Wall Street.”

Xia Jingxing remembered that a few months ago, U.S. judicial officials determined through phone tapping that New York State Governor Spitzer was involved in the scandal of dealing with call girls.

The madam was the woman with the pseudonym Billie who handed Xia Jingxing a business card at the party organized by Paulson last time.

The company he runs is called "The Emperor's Club", and Spitzer is numbered as client No. 9. There were rumors that Ao Guanhai was client No. 10. I don't know whether it is true or whether his campaign opponents deliberately smeared this political dark horse.

Xia Jingxing guessed that it might be the latter. After all, Ao Guanhai's current financial capacity was not enough to afford it. Of course, it was not ruled out that someone would invite him.

"I heard that mommy has a client list that involves the entire top Wall Street and countless politicians. Goldman Sachs won't be involved, right? You need to make plans early!"

Blankfein laughed dryly and said, "Dylan, you are quite concerned about this matter! However, believe me, man, that list is completely fictitious. Even if it does exist and is spread, it will be suppressed very quickly. Go down, don’t worry!”

Xia Jingxing was stunned. I kindly reminded you to make plans in advance. Can you please tell me to rest assured?

Xia Jingxing felt that he had been misunderstood, but he was too lazy to talk about these things with Blankfein.

"Before Spitzer became governor, he was New York State Attorney General, which is the position that Cuomo currently holds.

During his tenure, this guy was famous in American politics for his efforts to rectify the financial order and crack down on the illegal behavior of business giants.

Former New York Stock Exchange Chairman Richard Grasso, former American International Group AIG CEO Greenberg, and insurance giant Marsh \u0026 McLennan have all been sued by him.

However, he does not really want to kill Wall Street companies, but he likes to use legal threats and actions to force these companies to settle out of court.

Even so, if he dared to take action on several Wall Street giants and succeeded, it would be enough for the Attorney General to gain huge political reputation.

If my predictions are correct, that Cuomo guy wants to run for governor next term.

Now that the financial crisis has presented him with a good opportunity, if he doesn't perform well, who will support him in future elections? "

After listening to Blankfein's analysis, Xia Jingxing nodded secretly.

This was indeed what Cuomo did in his previous life, copying the promotion route of his old superiors.

But they are not the only ones who like to do this. The Attorney General of New York State also likes to do this. After all, Wall Street is a good target.

There is no need to hit ten rings, just a few random shots are enough to make the crowd applaud.

The "upright" public persona that dared to swing a knife at Wall Street was instantly established.

Xia Jingxing asked, "Then why is he targeting me? Just because I'm a foreigner and can be easier to control?"

Blankfein smiled and said, “We cannot rule out the reason for this, and it may also be that Vision Capital’s performance in the past two years has been somewhat eye-catching.

In the past two years, major financial giants have been losing a lot of blood, while several hedge funds have made a lot of money. "

Xia Jingxing frowned slightly. He felt that he was already low-key enough. Except for his short exposure to subprime mortgage derivatives last year, this year's second wave of short-selling operations couldn't be any more low-key.

Even when Lehman Brothers was brought down, a younger brother, Greenlight Capital, was launched to take the lead.

Could it be that some news was leaked?

As if he could guess what Xia Jingxing was thinking, Blankfein immediately said: "Darren, your cooperation with us has a very high level of confidentiality. Goldman Sachs has always been well-known for protecting customer privacy, and we don't want to lose it." You’re a big customer.”

Xia Jingxing did not particularly doubt Blankfein. Even if the other party wanted to sell Vision Capital, it would not be possible to sell it so cheaply.

"Darren, why don't you ask Mack? Their personnel has been in quite a turmoil this year."

At any time and anywhere, Blankfein never forgot to give his old rival some eye drops.

Xia Jingxing smiled, "Okay, I understand, then I'll go meet the future governor!"

"Daerun, don't hang up the phone in a hurry. I'll give you some advice. If you're like this..."