Watching him rise from the ground, watching his big dreams go through the air.
He was the first Asian business leader to go abroad, and he was also the head of the trillion-dollar business empire, such a godfather of business, but he was suddenly arrested.
"The first two or three years of buying, buying, buying, buying, famous people, can be said to be indispensable." Later, the debt was forced, and the sale and sale were exhausted. ”
From omnipotent heroism to the fiasco of powerlessness, but a few years later, as he himself said, "When you think you can do anything, you can do anything, the disaster is buried." ”
And he is Chen Feng, the founder of HNA.
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In 1987, when Deng Xiaoping met with Yugoslav guests, he pointed to the southern end of the map and said emotionally, "We are building a bigger special zone, which is the Hainan Island Special Economic Zone." ”
For the customs and customs of Hainan, he said, "Hainan Island and Taiwan are about the same size, there are many resources, there are iron ore, oil, rubber and other tropical and subtropical crops."
He went on to say, "It is remarkable that Hainan Island has developed well."
This is the origin of Hainan's establishment of a province and a special economic zone.
In 1988, the First Session of the Seventh National People's Congress officially approved the establishment of Hainan Province, delineating Hainan Island as a Hainan Special Economic Zone.
Overnight, Hainan became the "ideal country" of gold diggers across the country, and 100,000 young people crossed the Qiongzhou Strait to stage one legend after another.
When I first came, I was poor and white, and after a few years, I was worth tens of millions.
Nowadays, many business tycoons, such as Wang Shi, Feng Lun, Pan Shiyi, Zeng Wei, Yi Xiaodi, etc., have started in Hainan, and the most colorful of them is Chen Feng and his HNA department.
To be precise, HNA was once a "two-person HNA".
Chen Feng, who is eight years older than Wang Jian, worked in an office of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, and later, the two hit it off and went south to start a business and found HNA.
Inside HNA, Chen Feng called him "Comrade Wang Jian" and he called Chen Feng "General Manager Chen".
Like Ali's "P", HNA management cadres are ranked by numbers with the "M" (Manager's abbreviation) suffix.
Wang Jian was in the M15, and there was only one person in this level, and above him, there was only Chen Feng's M16.
Under one man, above ten thousand.
Chen Feng once said, "We are golden partners, with the same ideas and different personalities. ”
In the spotlight is Chen Feng, and the capital operation is Wang Jian.
For quite some time, the two were gold medal combinations.
In just over 20 years, HNA has rapidly swelled into a behemoth with assets of more than one trillion yuan, just one step away from the peak of China's private enterprise camp.
Unfortunately, in front of it is Huawei.
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At the beginning of hainan's establishment as a province, hundreds of industries were waiting to be revitalized and hundreds of industries were waiting to be lifted, but a shallow Qiongzhou Strait became a "flow and hinterland" problem restricting the development of the special economic zone.
Due to traffic problems, you can only take a boat to come and go, and when the train arrives in the Qiongzhou Strait, you have to honestly break into several sections and take a ferry to cross the sea.
Building bridges?
Hainan is not unthinkable, the geographical conditions are too complicated, the technical difficulty is too high, and there are a large number of warships and fishing boats in and out.
But speaking of which, it is still difficult for a woman to cook without rice.
No money.
Although Guangdong, which was across the sea at that time, was in full swing in reform and opening up, Hainan's economic level was still the same for decades, and it could not catch up with a developed city in Guangdong.
Since you can't meet the sea and build a bridge, then fly over.
Through the development of the aviation industry, Hainan's tourism, trade and service industries will take a qualitative leap, so that a game of chess will be alive and Hainan's economy will also take off.
Therefore, the leaders of Hainan found Chen Feng, 36 years old, "Give you 10 million yuan, and let us run an airline in Hainan." ”
This led to a passage that Chen Feng repeatedly said later: The little money he got, let alone an airline, could not even buy an airplane wing.
Seriously, at that time, ten million was not a small amount, roughly equivalent to 1 billion today.
At that time, Hainan's annual fiscal revenue was only 300 million, and even the salaries of civil servants were very difficult, and the leaders were still very bold in taking out 10 million to run aviation.
However, for this file, Wang Jian was full of disdain, and repeatedly stressed that it was forbidden to mention ghost stories of ten million people.
Before the establishment of HNA, Chen Feng not only had extensive government contacts, but also had a bright resume.
He once studied storytelling in Beijing Tianqiao, and later became a soldier, teaching himself English in the army, who could have imagined that in the future he would be able to rely on his crappy English to say that he had moved the financial predator Soros.
Referring to Chen Feng, the former colleague of the Civil Aviation Administration of China commented on him as follows:
"There is nothing that Chen Feng can't do."
In fact, when Chen Feng took 10 million to tell stories around, he found that he could not tell them at all.
The company is in a remote small building, there is no plane, and what aviation enterprises are blown, just like when Lei Jun saw Ma Yun, investors felt that Chen Feng was "running a train with his mouth full of mouths".
Entrepreneurship is difficult, everything is difficult at the beginning.
In 1991, the turnaround finally appeared, and the transformation of the joint-stock system in Hainan began to be piloted.
Chen Feng, who has a unique vision, keenly seized the policy opportunities, persuaded the Hainan government to approve the share reform, and then prepared the first standardized joint-stock airline in China, Hainan Airlines Co., Ltd., by raising 250 million yuan from various financial institutions.
"It looks pretty funny today." Whenever Chen Feng recalls this past, he can't help but laugh, "In the eyes of today's people, (at that time) you took a piece of paper, sold stocks in the society and on the street, and the public actually invested 250 million." ”
From 10 million to 250 million, Chen Feng's storytelling has been more confident since then:
"A plane ticket from Hainan to Beijing is 1,000 yuan, which can hold 150 people, and the round trip is 300,000 yuan, flying to Guangzhou and then flying to Beijing in one day, you can make a net profit of 450,000 yuan, there is no better deal than this!"
The bank was also moved, and the two sides hit it off.
Chen Feng took 250 million yuan as a credit guarantee, borrowed 600 million yuan, bought 2 Boeing 737s, and then used 2 Boeing 737s as a guarantee to order 2 aircraft, and the cycle went back and forth, thus forming an inverted pyramid development path of "loan-liability-expansion-re-loan-expansion".
Through a series of divine operations, Chen Feng made HNA a private airline, "10 million yuan was returned to the government, and this 'top wearing flower plume' was returned, and from then on it fell into the grass."
At that time, many people fell into the grass and became today's business leaders.
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In 1993, HNA's first plane finally took to the skies, flying from Haikou to Beijing.
On that day, Wang Jian served as a check-in attendant and service guide to send passengers on board, and Chen Feng incarnated as a "flight attendant" to serve tea and water to passengers.
Such a unique aviation service is refreshing, but also opened a big era of Hainan Airlines.
At that time, Mao Zhijun, vice governor of Hainan Province, provided cabin services to passengers as a flight attendant. For more than two decades, HNA and Hainan shared the same destiny.
That year, the profit champion of domestic airlines was not China's three major airlines, but the local airline that started out on a small island in the middle of the country, HNA.
"We are finally not a leather bag company, but a regular airline with its own aircraft!" Chen Feng frequently raised a glass at the celebration banquet of that year, and his eyes were full of tears.
Due to the overheating of the property market, the high-rise tightening of the monetary root, the Hainan real estate bubble burst, and the Hainan Development Bank collapsed.
Looking at HNA's high debt, domestic financial institutions are reluctant to lend to HNA, which makes Chen Feng, who wants to show his fists, become a kite with broken lines.
The East is not bright and the West is bright.
Chen Feng set his sights on overseas and began to embark on the road of finding money around the world, which also created a precedent for Chinese companies to raise funds overseas.
Later, the story of Chen Feng's "ten in and ten out of Wall Street" was circulated on the rivers and lakes.
It is said that Soros is attracted by this "story" - China is a market that no one can miss, an opportunity for the world!
If it were not for the fact that the state could only allow 25% of foreign capital to settle in, Soros would have invested more than $25 million, accounting for 25% of the shares, and it is not known whether it is wholly owned.
Since then, Hainan Airlines has also become the first Sino-foreign joint venture airline, and Soros and the quantum fund behind it have become a strategic investment partner of HNA.
Chen Feng was dubbed the "Chinese entrepreneur who conquered Soros" and was also known as the "master of capital operation". But he himself denied the claim:
"The master of capital operation is to constantly use the opportunities of the capital market to achieve wealth and value growth, and I have made full use of every opportunity in the development of the capital market to support the development of my industry." So I am not a master of capital market operation, I am a master of industrial development to make full use of capital market opportunities. ”
Of course, the story is not so legendary, and a Chinese who speaks in a broken voice and dreams of "building China's first-class airline" is obviously not enough to impress the financial predator.
The reason why Soros is willing to pay for it is that he looks at China's huge market.
After that, Chen Feng engaged in financial leasing, operating leasing, HNA A shares, B shares, H shares listed one after another, banks also opened the door of convenience, borrowing money is easier, the addiction to borrowing money is getting bigger and bigger, and the desire has pushed HNA into the fast lane.
For borrowing money for development, he once said:
If there are more lice, it will not itch, and if you borrow more, you will be able to sleep.
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Around the turn of the millennium, China's aviation industry continued to shake.
In 1997, the financial storm swept through Southeast Asia, the cost of dollar debt that HNA had just acquired surged, and the price of aviation materials also climbed, facing a test of life and death.
In 2000, the Civil Aviation Administration of China proposed the idea of merger and reorganization centered on three state-owned airlines, Air China, China Southern Airlines and China Eastern Airlines.
In other words, there seem to be only two outcomes for HNA: either "eaten" or killed.
At the critical juncture of life and death, Chen Feng decided to gamble even bigger - to develop HNA into a national airline, competing with the three major airlines of Air China, China Eastern Airlines and China Southern Airlines.
HNA successively acquired Changan Airlines, Shanxi Airlines, Xinhua Airlines and Xiangpeng Airlines, reorganized Meilan Airport Company, and established Western Airlines and HNA Xinjiang Branch, becoming the fourth largest airline in China in one fell swoop and avoiding the fate of being "eaten".
After experiencing this incident, Chen Feng began to understand the importance of capital mergers and acquisitions for the survival and development of HNA, which can not only spend money to save his life, but also make big and fat.
Borrow and borrow, buy and buy, and thus begin.
Who expected that when just full of energy was ready to stride forward, the SARS epidemic came unexpectedly. HNA, which has been profitable for 10 consecutive years, tasted a huge loss for the first time and directly lost its family.
In 2003, the huge loss was 1.269 billion yuan, down 1332% year-on-year.
This is also the autumn of the dying of the dying.
However, Chen Feng not only did not shrink the front, but led HNA to carry out diversified transformation - "one main and two wings" strategy:
While expanding the main business of air transport, we will vigorously develop the hotel, tourism and financial businesses related to the main business.
This move seems to be to defend against risks, but in fact, HNA's stall is bigger.
Just when Chen Feng decided to make further progress, the financial crisis broke out, coupled with the soaring oil prices, the aviation industry suffered a heavy blow, HNA lost 1.4 billion, and some people bet that HNA would go wrong.
However, such a crisis is not a matter for Chen Feng.
For more than 20 years, HNA has died nine times, and rumors, speculations, and doubts have never left him.
Every few years, some people will bet that "HNA will not fall", but Chen Feng is like a questioning shredder, HNA not only did not die, but entered the world's top 500 and became a god-like existence.
Some people even said that HNA ruled all kinds of disobedience, and Chen Feng was the chief designer of the dictatorship, so that when the news of bankruptcy reorganization came out, some people asked whether the official website was hacked, and whether the screenshot was PS?
The reason why HNA has not fallen in danger many times is, of course, inseparable from the "mother" who loves her son.
At the time of SARS, the Hainan government quietly paid 1.5 billion plugs to HNA, which solved the urgent need.
When the financial crisis broke out, the Hainan government injected another 1.5 billion yuan to stabilize the military's morale again.
HNA was so lucky, not only with the support of the government to tide over the crisis many times, but also with the support of the government to develop and grow, until the time when the return to the sky was powerless, it was willing to let go.
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After 2008, taking advantage of the European and American financial tsunami and China's 4 trillion yuan of liquidity easing, Chen Feng went on a global rage to buy and acquire mergers and acquisitions, and began the largest adventure in China's business history:
Chen Feng attacked on multiple lines, and his business also extended from aviation to supermarkets, hotels, tourism, logistics, real estate and finance, with tentacles all over the world, and quickly launched the name of "international giant crocodile".
In just two years, HNA Group's companies have expanded from less than 200 in 2009 to nearly 600 in early 2011, with achievements including:
Australia's AllCO Group Aviation Leasing Business, Turkish Aircraft Maintenance Company MY TECHNIC, Norwegian Listed Company GTB, Spain's NH Hotels Hotel Chain Group, Turkish ACT Cargo Airlines, GE SEACO Container Leasing Company...
If you eat too much, you either die of support or choke to death.
HNA had to shut down more than 200 companies in 2012 due to multiple financial crises due to overseas mergers and acquisitions, but under the liquidity feast, these were not a problem.
Then let the bigger "buy, buy, buy" cover up the sound of the broken capital chain.
Where does the money come from?
Borrow new to pay back old!
The outside world has always regarded HNA as a god-like existence, thinking that it can defeat invincible hands all over the world, but it is not known that HNA's undercurrent is surging and a protracted infighting has quietly sprouted.
Although the golden duo has been acting in "harmony between kings and subjects" for several years, their real power has gradually transitioned to Wang Fitness, and he is known as HNA's "Caesar without shadow".
In the era of Wang Jian, HNA expanded far more ferociously than in Chen Feng's time.
In 2015, HNA completed five blockbuster deals in Europe:
Acquisition of a wholly stake in Irish aircraft leasing company Avolon for US$2.6 billion, Swiss airport company Swiss Port for CHF 2.73 billion, reuters headquarters building and French tourism group, and contracts for engines and related services worth more than 15 billion yuan in the UK.
Suddenly, HNA became a hot company in the European financial community.
In order to curry favor with this big financier, the British Ministry of Commerce held a tea party for him, and the host was the newly appointed Minister of Commerce, Javid.
At the beginning of 2016, in order to celebrate HNA's first ranking among the world's top 500 companies, Chen Feng and Wang Jian also held a special celebration, during which they improvised a double reed on stage.
Chen Feng is definitely an old shadow emperor, and when he comes up, he teases and says: Some people say that I am not at peace with Wang Zong?
The staff in the audience naturally knew it, and everyone smiled symbolically to match their performance.
Sure enough, the two men didn't pretend for long.
In September of this year, the "Sunshine Declaration" incident broke out, and the "golden partner" who had been working together for a long time completely tore his face.
Each executive must express his allegiance to Wang Jian in the form of a declaration. In addition, in the oral notice that was not passed on, Chen Feng, who was still the chairman of the board of directors at this time, must adopt the policy of "not implementing, ignoring and not explaining".
The soul figure Chen Feng was forced to go offline and gradually faded out of the management of HNA.
The gods fight, and the mortals suffer.
A large number of Chen executives have been squeezed out, or even simply purged, but in the overseas "king of mergers and acquisitions" all the way to the top, all this has not been noticed by the public.
Among the top 10 overseas M&A transactions in 2016, HNA occupied 3 seats, and HNA's cumulative overseas investment reached US$45 billion.
In the words of Chen Feng, there are 22 large industries in the market, and HNA accounts for 12, which can be said that "except for the companies that make condoms, there are no others." ”
But that's nothing!
The most powerful thing is the small goal set by Wang Jian at the end of the year, which is much more heroic than Wang Shoufu:
In 2025, it will enter the top ten of the world's top 500 companies, with total assets of more than 30 trillion yuan.
Yes, you read that right, a local airline, a mouth is a small target of 30 trillion, that year, China's GDP was only 74 trillion.
In "Let the Bullets Fly", Master Tang was right:
"The wine should be drunk one by one, the road should be taken step by step, the steps are too big, and the eggs will be pulled."
Oh, yes!
Out of the mix, sooner or later it is necessary to pay back.
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During the two sessions in 2017, the People's Daily published an article entitled "How to See How "HNA" Sails", and for a while, HNA became a benchmark enterprise for "serving the country with industry".
However, the good times were not long, and after the risk mapping, the liquidity crisis of HNA immediately broke out.
According to media reports, in 2017, HNA's liabilities have climbed to 736.502 billion yuan, an increase of 22.04% year-on-year, while interest expenses have reached 31.847 billion yuan, an increase of 61.46% year-on-year, becoming "the most indebted company in Asia".
At that time, most of HNA's domestic and foreign assets were at the high point at that time. If the hero breaks his wrist, HNA will not go bankrupt and reorganize.
But Wang Jian did not believe in evil and did not realize that the era of borrowing the new to return the old was over, and Wang Jianlin's broken arm survival would become the new normal.
Of course, many housing companies have not reacted to it until now, not to mention That Wang Jian at that time, even if there was no rice under the pot, he still did not terminate the acquisition of 7.5 billion yuan of Dangdang.
At the end of the same year, HNA sent a letter to the CBRC, suggesting that systemic risks might occur.
At this time, the most anxious person is not the bank, but the leader of Haikou.
This led to the fact that later the eight major banks gathered in Haikou to support HNA, claiming to implement the spirit of "Hainan Airlines is good, Hainan is good; Hainan is good, Hainan is better".
Even so, it is difficult to completely restore the confidence of the market.
However, Chen Feng is still full of confidence in the future of HNA:
We are closer to our dreams than ever before.
This dream is probably to let go of a satellite in the first two years, and to achieve a small goal in 2025 - assets of 30 trillion yuan, advancing to the top ten of the world's top 500.
With the accidental death of Wang Jian, in the second half of 2018, Chen Feng re-emerged from the mountain.
Boss Chen, who has become the "core" again, can't hide his resentment at meetings:
You're hugging me now, the ass is good, where was it before?
Soon, HNA ushered in another round of "rectification".
More than 200 of Wang Jian's youth army were purged, and the company in crisis ushered in turmoil. The old team fell apart, and the new officials ignored the old accounts. Many problems have not improved, but have become more intractable.
HNA was once a two-person HNA, and later became a one-man HNA. Going around, HNA is no longer a one-man HNA.
Chen Feng repeatedly said that don't overestimate yourself, HNA is the life of selling tickets. However, there are internal judgment errors, internal friction among executives, and the external environment has also taken a sharp turn, and the situation of Hainan Airlines has not improved.
Chen Feng also changed the rhythm of HNA Group from "buying, buying and buying" to "selling and selling", in his own words: when buying and buying, it was indispensable, and later selling and selling and selling out of the ocean.
Who the heavens have spared.
What you are driven by, what is your destiny.
In November 2018, Chen Feng presided over a meeting on democratic life to make a collective reflection and comprehensive review of HNA's problems. This was seen as HNA's Zunyi meeting, at which he said:
We've died two times.
When asked what the end game of HNA will be," Chen Feng replied that he was a "shop boy two" who worked hard to satisfy the people's beautiful life.
"Others say today was our fault, but I think it's something we should bear," he said. ”
At the same time, he admitted that he would not leave the family, because "I am not in the dust, and the bank owes so much money and has not paid it back." ”
In 2019, the market liquidity further tightened, and HNA's business was more difficult, but Chen Feng gritted his teeth and persevered for a year, and continued to boost his morale and the group:
Victory lies ahead.
This year is also the 26th anniversary of the establishment of HNA.
Chen Feng, like the inaugural voyage of Hainan Airlines 26 years ago, led the management team to do a "short flight" on the flight from Haikou to Beijing on the same day, personally serving meals and pouring water for passengers.
He also sincerely reviewed his past problems:
"When you think you can do anything, you can do anything, and the disaster is buried." "Man just has too much desire, and we want to cut off some of man's desires."
When talking about sending a sentence to private entrepreneurs, he emphasized four simple words:
Be yourself.
In his 2020 New Year's speech, he also said with confidence that HNA in 2019 "worked hard, overcame difficulties, withstood tests, successfully completed the task, and is about to usher in the dawn, and defined 2020 as "the decisive year for HNA to resolve liquidity risks, he also claimed:
In the past year, HNA has cooperated with relevant units to find out the bottom of the family.
But God didn't give him another chance.
The new crown epidemic has put HNA in a desperate situation, and Chen Feng's good luck has doubled back.
In 2020, HNA's operating income was 29.401 billion yuan, down 59.38% year-on-year; net loss was 64.003 billion yuan, down 12431% year-on-year, setting a record for the loss of A-share listed companies
Chen Feng was included in the "height limit" list due to HNA debt problems, and he could not even sit on his own plane.
After Chen Feng was unable to return, the working group moved into HNA and reorganized the board of directors.
Soon, the working group discovered that this was a company on the brink of collapse:
HNA was already insolvent and saw no hope at all.
After months of communication, quarrels, and struggles, first Chen Feng was defeated in the new leadership team of HNA, and then the notice of bankruptcy reorganization was released.
On the day of release, Founder, Yurun, Huaxia Happiness and Oceanwide also released restructuring news or progress, and Lai was shot.
Just a few bucks.
From 10 million yuan to more than one trillion yuan in total assets and an annual income of more than 600 billion yuan, HNA took only 24 years, while from the peak to the bottom, HNA only took 2 years.
Success is also capital, and failure is also capital.
For HNA now, bankruptcy reorganization is not so terrible, on the contrary, it may be the best way to solve the problem.
For Chen Feng, what awaits him will not only be the loss of equity in HNA Group, but also the possibility of facing jail time.
As China's last capital predator, Chen Feng's era has long come to an end, and HNA after bankruptcy and reorganization may truly enter a new era.
Chen Feng's floating and sinking is lamentable.
However, I have to admit that as an explorer in the field of civil aviation, Chen Feng's business philosophy and strategic planning have many places worth learning. The courage to go global, the international service, and the high level of flight attendants... These are all valuable assets left by HNA.