After a good day of filming the promotional video material, Meng Fanqi got his wish and got his own U.S. bank account and stock account.
Looking at the 3.26 million US dollars in the account, Meng Fanqi was in a daze and felt very unreal.
Previously, although Google had given higher figures in its letter of intent, it was still just a letter of intent.
It takes a very long process to negotiate, sign a contract, produce research results yourself or sign a contract for two or three years, and then transfer the money to your account.
But now the 20 million yuan that he had advanced has actually turned into 3.26 million US dollars based on the exchange rate and is lying in his account.
He can use the money any way he likes without any burden.
"Well...it can't be said that there is no burden at all." Meng Fanqi calmed down. After all, the advance is an advance. If the subsequent income sharing does not reach this amount, there will still be certain risks.
However, this possibility is very slim. Not only is Meng Fanqi, who knows the power of YOLO real-time detection algorithm, full of confidence in it, but even ordinary researchers at Baidu Research Institute can understand its power.
Because of this, at this moment, Meng Fanqi's first investment in his account was Baidu's stock.
Baidu's stock price at this time was approximately US$165. From June 2013 to November 2014, in one and a half years, Baidu's stock price soared from 96 to 246.
At this moment it is in the midst of the spring breeze.
Under this trend, Baidu focuses on promoting the YOLO algorithm and holds technical conferences, which will definitely increase the price by about 20% in a very short period of time.
Meng Fanqi naturally does not intend to hold too many Baidu stocks for a long time, although he knows that the real-time detection algorithm two years in advance will help Baidu a lot.
But in new directions such as autonomous driving, the return on investment is even more exaggerated.
However, since he is very aware of Robin Li's actions in the past two weeks, there is no problem in using Baidu as a short-term target of no more than ten days.
According to Meng Fanqi's estimation, Baidu's stock price has risen from 165 to around 200 after experiencing the promotional video and press conference of this technology, which should not be a big problem.
The market will continue to be optimistic about Baidu in the future, so it will not be difficult for him to quickly sell off these stocks.
For a large company like Baidu, the daily trading volume of stocks is often in the billions. If I put this little money into it, I won't make any splash, and there won't be any abnormalities or arouse too much attention.
But even so, Meng Fanqi still divided his operations into multiple operations when buying stocks, just to be on the safe side.
Generally speaking, such a move is unlikely to attract anyone's attention. But this time it was an exception. The money Meng Fanqi used to purchase shares was originally part of the advance, and it went through an account handled by Baidu's personnel in the United States.
It would be weird if whiteness could not detect this aspect.
Meng Fanqi bought shares worth about five million in batches, and Secretary Liu had already conveyed the situation to Robin Li.
Baidu's experience of going public that year was actually not smooth. In 2005, it suffered a hostile takeover by Google.
At that time, Google was determined to enter the Chinese market. The acquisition of Baidu was a shortcut at the time. Google's acquisition momentum was very strong. President Schmidt personally came to Yanjing to visit Robin Li.
Robin Li was facing tremendous pressure from many shareholders at the time. He believed that Baidu's benefits from its own listing and development were far greater than being directly acquired by Google.
But the road to going public is fraught with thorns, and many shareholders are attracted by the large sums of money promised by Google.
Robin Li spent a lot of energy and time in this regard, and finally blocked the Google acquisition.
In the same year, Robin Li officially submitted a prospectus to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and implemented Baidu's "Niu Ka Plan."
The "Niuka Plan" is an anti-hostile takeover plan. Baidu calls the stocks issued in the public market Class A stocks, with 1 voting right per share, while all original shares are Class B stocks, with 10 voting rights per share.
Once there is an external transfer of Class B shares, the shares will immediately be converted into the same number of Class A shares. Among the Chinese companies listed in the United States, Baidu is the first to adopt this equity setting plan.
This behavior is generally regarded by the outside world as a declaration of Baidu’s desire to develop independently.
Under the constraints of the "Niu Ka Plan", Google had to sell 2.6% of the Baidu shares it already held. At this point, Google's dream of acquiring Baidu was shattered.
After Google failed to acquire Baidu, it clearly established Baidu as its biggest competitor. This also shows that Baidu’s search business had a bright future in China at that time.
With such historical experience, Robin Li is very sensitive and concerned about the transfer of shares in his company.
Looking at the report summarized by Secretary Liu, Li Yanhong smiled helplessly.
"This kid came to me to advance tens of millions, and ended up buying my company's stocks." Li Yanhong knew that Meng Fanqi was just a college student and had no other ideas, so he didn't pay too much attention to it and just thought it was a bit funny.
"This also shows that he is still very optimistic about our company." Secretary Liu answered with a smile.
"I don't think so. If he really wants to hold our stocks for a long time, he can just mention it directly in the agreement." Li Yanhong shook his head. If Meng Fanqi only wanted the shares, he would be extremely happy.
There is no need to spend any money, you can win him by evenly dividing the shares.
"He didn't ask for any shares, and he asked us to help him open a U.S. stock account at Bank of America. I'm afraid he wanted to invest in a start-up." Robin Li is indeed an old fox in the mall, and he can see through Meng Fanqi's ideas at a glance.
"Maybe he never thought before that his technology would have such a good response in autonomous driving. After hearing what I said today, he wanted to play in the U.S. stock market."
Li Yanhong didn't care that Meng Fanqi didn't tell him too much. In his opinion, as long as it wasn't harmful to Baidu, there was no need to ask too much.
"It's okay. If he wants to buy it, let him buy it. It's just that his current behavior is a bit illegal." Li Yanhong told Secretary Liu, "He only has a million dollars in total, and he doesn't have any other ideas. He just wants to take advantage of our publicity. During this period, he can do short-term business and earn a few percent. The technology was originally made by him, so let him make a good profit."
"The account we created this time is also used. You can do it and send him a supplementary clause in the contract, stating that the advance payment will be given in the form of virtual shares."
Li Yanhong thought for a while and felt that there would be basically no problem. The young genius showed a side that he didn't understand, which also made Li Yanhong feel closer to him. "Remind him that in the future, you will still have to find professionals to do this kind of thing."
Even if all the two advances, a total of about six million US dollars, are paid in, it will only be about one to two ten thousandths of Baidu's market value, which is far from worthy of Robin Li's attention.
As long as he is informed, everything is under control.
"Hahaha, this kid is brave enough." Secretary Liu also found it interesting that this student suddenly got such a large amount of money, and he really dared to throw it all in, so he was not afraid of being manipulated by a deliberate boss. Went in.
"Take the time to talk to him in detail." Robin Li put the information aside. He really did not expect this. "If he is still so reckless when he gets to the United States, he might suffer a big loss."
