Wang Jianlin's strong man broke his wrist again, and Wang Sicong staged "the last stubbornness"?
Produced by Radar Finance and Economics, edited by Li Yihui, Deep Sea
At an urgent juncture, Wang Jianlin once again sold off his core assets.
On December 6, Wanda Film announced that Wang Jianlin, the actual controller of the company, intends to transfer 51% of the shares of Beijing Wanda Investment Co., Ltd., the controlling shareholder of the company, to Shanghai Ruyi Investment Management Co., Ltd.
According to the announcement, if the above matters are finally implemented, it will lead to a change of control of the company. This means that after the transfer is completed, Wang Jianlin will lose a controlling stake in Wanda Films.
"Film is an industry without a ceiling. Wang Jianlin was very optimistic about the film and television industry and made a large investment. As early as 2002, Wanda stepped into the theater field for the first time, and in 2013, the Oriental Film Metropolis started, and Wanda began to advance to the upstream of the film. and then to the acquisition of 100% of the shares of AMC in the United States, from domestic to overseas, from cinemas to manufacturing, Wang Jianlin hopes to occupy 20% of the global film market by 2020.
Looking back now, Wang Jianlin's "small goal" has long been drifting away like smoke. In 2017, in order to solve the liquidity crisis, Wanda sold more than 40 billion yuan of assets to Sunac, and Qingdao's cultural tourism project Oriental Movie Metropolis was impressively listed. Since the beginning of this year, in response to the debt repayment pressure of Wanda Commercial Management, Wang Jianlin has sold the equity of Wanda Film several times.
The same familiar fire sale, only this time, Wanda's embarrassing situation has not yet eased. According to the latest news, Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management still has no IPO timetable, and Wanda Group plans to sell its Wanda Plaza in first- and second-tier cities in exchange for liquidity.
Faced with the "difficult bone" of Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management's listing, Wang Jianlin had to break his wrist again.
It is worth noting that recently, Wang Sicong, as the chairman of Beijing Huanju Commercial Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Beijing Huanju"), met with the leaders of the Tai'an Municipal Party Committee and signed a contract with the Tai'an Municipal Government on the 3.7 billion cultural tourism project. During the meeting, Wang Sicong was dressed casually and his hair was messy, which was particularly abrupt compared with the secretary of the Tai'an Municipal Party Committee who was sitting opposite him in a formal suit.
"Fight tiger brothers, go into battle father and son soldiers. Some market participants believe that when Wanda is facing financial pressure, Wang Sicong came forward to sign a cultural tourism project, which objectively supports Wang Jianlin. Although Wanda refutes the rumors and has no successor plan, Wang Sicong's cultural tourism project has received a lot of support from Wanda, and Wang Sicong should be more involved in related projects in the future. And wearing casual clothes to attend the signing ceremony can be regarded as Wang Sicong's last stubbornness.
"Cut Love" Wanda Movie
Ruyi Pictures, which previously cashed out Wanda Films for Wang Jianlin's "emergency", reappeared.
According to Wanda Film's announcement on December 6, the company's indirect controlling shareholder, Beijing Wanda Cultural Industry Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Wanda Culture"), its wholly-owned subsidiary, Beijing Hengrun Enterprise Management and Development Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Beijing Hengrun"), and the actual controller of the company, Wang Jianlin, intend to transfer 51% of the shares of Beijing Wanda Investment Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Wanda Investment"), the controlling shareholder of the company, to Shanghai Ruyi Investment Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Shanghai Ruyi").
According to the third quarterly report, the top four shareholders of Wanda Film are Wanda Investment, Shenxian Rongzhi Xingye Management Consulting Center (Limited Partnership) (hereinafter referred to as "Shenxian Rongzhi"), Lu Lili and Hangzhou Zhenxi Investment Management Co., Ltd. (a subsidiary of Alibaba), with shareholding ratios of 20%, 10.21%, 8.26% and 6.19% respectively.
Among them, Shenxian Rongzhi is also a subsidiary of Wanda, which is actually controlled by Wanda Culture and constitutes a concerted actor with Wanda Investment.
Tianyancha shows that at present, Shanghai Ruyi Film and Television Production Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Ruyi Film and Television") holds 49% of Wanda Investment's shares, and the remaining 51% is jointly held by Wanda Culture, Beijing Hengrun and Wang Jianlin.
It is worth mentioning that the above-mentioned Ruyi Film and Television holds 49% of the shares of Wanda Investment, which was obtained at a consideration of 2.262 billion yuan by entering into a share transfer agreement with Wanda Culture on July 23 this year.
The Ruyi Film and Television and Shanghai Ruyi are both 99% owned by Ke Liming. According to media reports, Ke Liming, who was born in the 80s, worked in the financial industry, and later started his own business in the film and television industry, taking over the Ruyi Film Industry founded by his brother.
In the cold winter of film and television in recent years, the "Confucian system" has expanded against the trend, and the lighthouse data shows that in recent years, Confucianism Film and Television has produced a total of 43 works, with a total box office of 17.677 billion yuan and a total box office of 7.434 billion yuan.
According to the latest announcement of Wanda Film, the three shareholders of Wanda plan to transfer the remaining 51% of Wanda Investment's shares to Shanghai Ruyi. The announcement also said that if the above matters are finally implemented, it will lead to a change of control of the company.
This means that if the transfer is completed, Ke Liming will have de facto control over Wanda Investment. After losing Wanda's investment, Wang Jianlin will only hold 10.21% of Wanda Film's shares through Shenxian Rongzhi.
Since the beginning of this year, Wanda Film's equity has changed several times. On July 17, Wanda Investment and Shenxian Rongzhi signed a share transfer agreement to transfer 8.14% of Wanda Film's shares to Shenxian Rongzhi for a consideration of 2.336 billion yuan, and the transferee will use the shares to undertake the performance commitment compensation obligation of Wanda Film's acquisition of Wanda Film and Television in 2019.
Lu Lili, the third largest shareholder of Wanda Films, entered earlier.
On July 11, Wanda Investment signed a share transfer agreement with Lu Lili to transfer 180 million shares of Wanda Film held by it to the other party at a transfer price of 12.07 yuan per share, totaling about 2.17 billion yuan. Lu Lili is well-known to the outside world, and she is the actual wife of the actual controller of Oriental Wealth.
In addition to the equity transaction, Wang Jianlin also reduced his holdings of Wanda Film through the secondary market this year.
In March this year, Wanda Culture reduced its holdings of about 43.565 million shares of Wanda Film through block trading, with a total reduction of about 580 million yuan. The reason for the reduction is to repay part of the stock pledge loan and reduce the pledge risk.
Since May, Wanda Investment has reduced its holdings of about 21.71 million shares of Wanda Film through centralized bidding transactions, cashing out about 272 million yuan, and reducing its holdings of about 34.88 million shares of Wanda Film through block trading, with a cumulative cashing out of about 400 million yuan. At that time, the reason given by the company to reduce the shareholding was the shareholders' own capital needs.
Some market participants pointed out that in the entire Wanda system, Wanda Films can be regarded as one of the high-quality targets, especially at the moment when the film market is accelerating its recovery, and the profitability of Wanda Films is gradually recovering. But in order to raise funds, Wang Jianlin could only endure the pain of parting his love.
Continue to sell assets for realization
The plan to sell a controlling stake in Wanda Films shows that Wang Jianlin is resolute in selling assets, but this is not all the projects Wanda has sold this year.
Radar Finance found that since the beginning of this year, Wanda has continued to "slim down" through personnel optimization to asset disposal. In May this year, Wanda was revealed to "be a large-scale layoff, involving more than 30%". According to Jiemian News, the individual departments involved are mainly business management and real estate groups, including operations, costs, design and other positions.
Soon Wanda issued a statement, saying that the news of Wanda's large-scale layoffs on the Internet was untrue. However, the company also revealed to the media that it is indeed optimizing, involving the compression of individual departments, but there are no large-scale layoffs, and some departments are still increasing.
At the same time as the personnel adjustment, Bloomberg announced on May 24 this year that Wanda Group is considering evaluating the sale of 20 shopping malls in Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and other places, seeking a valuation of about 700 million yuan to 800 million yuan for each project, depending on the location and business.
However, on May 25, Wanda Group issued a statement again saying that the "16 billion sales of 20 Wanda Plazas" on the Internet was untrue.
However, Wanda's sale of assets to quickly recoup funds is not groundless. According to the viewpoint new media, Dalian Wanda Commercial Management Group has established four enterprise management companies this year, one of which is Zhuhai Wensheng Enterprise Management Co., Ltd.
Soon after its establishment, Zhuhai Wensheng successively acquired the project companies of Qinghai Xining Wanda Plaza, Guangdong Jiangmen Taishan Wanda Plaza and Shanghai Songjiang Wanda Plaza, and after the completion of the three projects, they were spun off under the name of Dajia Insurance at the end of May.
Tianyancha shows that on May 31, the shareholders of Zhuhai Wensheng were changed from Dalian Wanda Commercial Management to Shanghai Family Business Management Consulting Partnership (Limited Partnership) and Suzhou Lianjia No. 1 Equity Investment Partnership (Limited Partnership).
After penetrating the equity, it is shown that Shanghai Jiashang is 100% owned by Dajia Life Insurance, and the shareholders of Lianjia No. 1 include Dajia Investment Holdings.
In addition to the above-mentioned commercial assets, Wanda has also put on the shelves the third-party payment license of its fast money company and Infront Sports Media.
According to market sources, Wanda Group plans to sell the third-party payment license of its fast money company for about 1 billion yuan, and potential buyers include companies such as ByteDance. In this regard, Douyin responded to the media that it is only a preliminary contact.
According to the Financial Associated Press, in June, Wanda Real Estate transferred 85.72% of the shares held by Wuhan Huada Jiuhao Innovation Investment Partnership, which was taken over by China Huarong Asset Management Co., Ltd.
Wuhan Huada Jiuhao was established in March this year, with Wanda Real Estate holding 99.6% of the shares and Huarong Capital Management Co., Ltd. holding 0.369% of the shares. After the completion of the transfer, Wuhan Huada Jiuhao is 86.04% owned by China Huarong Asset Management, 13.91% by Wanda Real Estate, and 0.05% by Huarong Capital Management.
Wuhan Huada Jiuhao holds an equity interest in Wuhan Wanda East Lake Real Estate, whose main projects include Hanjie Wanda Plaza and Wuhan Wanda Show in Wuhan's Central Cultural District. However, the remaining 30% stake in Wuhan Hanjie Wanda Plaza was sold to SKP in March this year.
At the end of September, Dalian Wanda Commercial Management transferred 100% of the equity of Shanghai Wanda Plaza Real Estate Co., Ltd., and the receiver also insured.
Tianyancha shows that on September 26, Dalian Wanda Commercial Management withdrew from Shanghai Wanda Plaza Real Estate Co., Ltd., and the new shareholders are Shanghai Jiasheng Management Consulting Partnership (Limited Partnership) and Wuhu Puyu Equity Investment Partnership (Limited Partnership). After the equity penetration, Shanghai Jiasheng is still behind everyone's life insurance.
Almost at the same time, Wanda transferred its Guangxi Beihai Hepu Wanda Plaza, which opened in early 2022, to Hepu Wanghe Real Estate, a local real estate company in Beihai.
According to the industrial and commercial change records, on September 28, "Hepu Wanda Plaza Commercial Management Co., Ltd." was renamed "Hepu Shuoguoxuan Commercial Management Co., Ltd.", and the major shareholder was also changed from "Wanda Commercial Management Group Co., Ltd." to "Hepu Wanghe Real Estate Co., Ltd."
At present, Wanda is still planning to sell more assets. On December 6, according to the surging news, Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management revealed in the process of communicating with investors that Wanda Group plans to sell its Wanda Plaza in first- and second-tier cities in exchange for liquidity, and is currently negotiating with insurance institutions.
There are still listing challenges to be solved
Wanda's thirst for funds is, on the one hand, Wanda's own debt pressure.
At the end of November, Dalian Wanda Commercial Management announced that a $600 million bond due in January 2024 was voted by investors to adjust the repayment plan.
The reason for the extension is that the current real estate industry continues to be sluggish, the interest rate in the overseas capital market is rising, the company is facing certain difficulties in refinancing, and there is a certain uncertainty in the approval of the listing of its subsidiary Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management before the end of the year.
In addition, as of the end of June 2023, the scale of Dalian Wanda Commercial Management's monetary funds was 16.02 billion yuan, and the scale of short-term borrowings and non-current liabilities due within one year was 74.55 billion yuan, which is far behind the monetary funds. The balance of cash and cash equivalents at the end of the period was 14.692 billion yuan, covering only half of the interest-bearing liabilities of 29.257 billion yuan due within one year.
On the other hand, the listing of Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management is progressing slowly, and Wang Jianlin has to prepare for the worst-case scenario.
In its submission to the CSRC in March, Dalian Wanda Commercial Management indicated that if Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management could not be successfully listed by the end of 2023, the issuer would need to pay about 30 billion yuan in equity buybacks to pre-listing investors.
This potentially huge buyback stems from a previously signed VAM agreement.
In its July report, S&P noted that if Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management fails to go public by the end of 2023 and negotiations with pre-IPO investors do not yield satisfactory results for all parties, Wanda Commercial Management Group and Dalian Wanda Group may need to buy back all pre-IPO shares by the first quarter of 2024 and compensate investors for investment returns totaling more than CNY40 billion.
However, there is information that as the VAM deadline approaches, Wanda's communication with investors has not yet yielded results. An investor from Zhuhai Wanda Commercial Management said that it did not agree with Wanda's plan to postpone the repayment of war investment funds.
In this situation, Wanda hopes to bring in new investors to alleviate the situation, and has begun to contact potential investors. However, the above-mentioned investor believes that "it should be a little difficult now".
There are more than 20 days left before the end of the year, judging from the sale of Wanda Film shares, Wang Jianlin is still actively preparing and making final efforts.
What role will Wang Sicong play in Wanda in the future?