Chapter 644: Good News

[Chapter 644: Good News]

Five years prior, Warner Bros' Batman had cost $35 million to produce and generated not less than $1 billion in box office and merchandise profits.

After confirming his suspicions, Ron Perelman immediately thought that if Firefly Group had its sights set on Marvel, their target would undoubtedly be the film rights to superheroes on par with DC's Batman, Superman, and others.

A call placed to Marvel's New York headquarters yielded results in under an hour. Ron Perelman found himself staring at faxes of several copyright transfer agreements, fully confirming his earlier hunch.

While Firefly Group only directly held the relatively insignificant rights to Blade, which was under their New Line cinema, starting from the latter half of last year, Flower Films, which spun off from Firefly Group, had acquired the rights to Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, and the Hulk from a few smaller film companies that possessed Marvel's superhero film rights. Additionally, Flower Films was currently competing with other companies for the rights to X-Men. This deal should have been finalized in the first half of the year, but because of Flower Films' involvement, Marvel had been holding out for a better price.

After firmly demanding that Marvel's CEO Avi Arad immediately halt all licensing of Marvel superhero characters as a major shareholder, Ron Perelman began to consider his next steps.

Firefly Group's statement that morning had not mentioned Disney's animation department, but as a creditor of Marvel, it issued threats, indicating that Firefly Group had not abandoned its intentions regarding Disney's animation division. Given Marvel's current state, Ron Perelman suddenly felt he possessed two significant bargaining chips. These chips could not only grant him a seat on the Firefly Group board but might also lead him to becoming a shareholder in the group!

However, the most immediate task was to find a way to avoid the fate of bankruptcy protection that Marvel was facing. If the New York district court approved the bankruptcy protection request led by Firefly Group creditors, Marvel could face an outright takeover by its creditors, putting it entirely out of his control.

As a savvy capital player, Ron Perelman quickly thought of a range of methods to prevent Marvel from entering bankruptcy protection. Yet he also realized that given how long Firefly Group had been planning this, his window of time was likely limited to less than two weeks.

Moreover, the majority of methods to prevent Marvel's bankruptcy protection ultimately boiled down to one thing: money. But to facilitate his plan to join the Firefly Group board, Ron Perelman had utilized all available liquidity from MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings to invest in Firefly Group's bonds, pulling some of the funds from subsidiaries like Revlon. He simply could not muster enough capital for Marvel's financial maneuvers in the short term.

Now, his initial strategy had turned into a self-imposed trap. The only way out of this predicament was to find sufficient external support.

Ron Perelman sifted through a directory of executives from the seven major Hollywood studios, weighing his options. He eliminated closely connected companies like Columbia, Fox, and MGM from contention and called his assistant over, saying, "Get me appointments with Universal's CEO Michael Eisner, Time Warner's CEO Terry Semel, and Paramount's CEO Sherry Lansing, as soon as possible."

...

At Santa Monica Airport, Eric stood next to his vehicle, waving goodbye to a Gulfstream private jet as it took off down the runway and soared into the sky.

Onboard the jet were Warren Buffett, Tom Murphy, and David West, along with Jeffrey Katzenberg and Firefly's Chief Legal Officer Edward Lewis. They were all heading to New York, seeking to leverage their networks and influence to persuade the New York district court to approve Marvel's bankruptcy protection application in the shortest possible time.

After revealing their plans regarding Marvel in a retaliatory manner, Eric believed that Ron Perelman, with his sharp wit, would surely gauge Firefly's intentions toward Marvel. However, the leverage held by Firefly exceeded Ron Perelman's estimations.

In addition to Marvel's CEO Avi Arad having already been co-opted by Firefly, the process of acquiring Marvel bonds had allowed Firefly to gather substantial evidence of Ron Perelman's illegal capital operations involving Marvel.

Firefly even had detailed information on how much Ron Perelman had diverted from Marvel financing through MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings. Marvel's current total of long-term bonds stood at $553 million, yet only $73 million had been allocated to its recent development. The remaining $470 million had flowed into MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings' accounts.

Should they gain control of Marvel and obtain more detailed evidence, the cost Ron Perelman would have to pay to extricate himself from this crisis would far exceed the benefits he had derived from the $470 million.

Watching the Gulfstream jet disappear into the distance, Eric turned to his assistant Kelly Haynes and asked, "What do you think Ron Perelman's next move will be?"

"Of course, he will seek to preserve Marvel," Kelly replied as she joined Eric in the car. "The most straightforward way would be for the major shareholder to inject funds to boost Marvel's stock price. However, since Ron Perelman must have depleted his liquidity to buy Firefly's bonds, he also lacks the time to raise several hundred million dollars on short notice. Since that approach won't work, I believe he will find a way to create a significant piece of good news to prevent Marvel from entering bankruptcy protection."

"Good news, huh?" Eric said, reclining against the leather seat. "Would Firefly wanting Marvel count as good news?"

"Of course, but most people wouldn't see it that way. The media spin surrounding the recent incidents with Firefly has become a tangled mess, and unraveling everything before this settles isn't going to be easy."

Eric relaxed and squinted, saying, "The more chaotic it gets, the more advantageous it is for us. I believe the upcoming news will add to the turbulence."

"When do you plan to confront the animation department?"

With a confident smile, Eric replied, "Wait a bit longer. Since Ron Perelman needs good news, Disney animation represents a crucial 'good news' piece he will undoubtedly be able to use."

*****

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