Chapter 268: Financial Summary
Chapter 268: Financial Summary
Almost all the heads of the major companies in the conference room had climbed up step by step from the very bottom of Hollywood, so they were extremely familiar with every kind of deceitful trick in the industry. After several hours of discussion, a series of strategies targeting Firefly and Eric were established. The six CEOs even divided up the benefits each company would receive after Eric softened his stance.
After Thanksgiving, Eric entered the final busy stretch of the year. According to plan, as long as he finished this last month of work, he would be able to rest for quite a long time starting in late December. Drew had even already begun calculating whether the two of them should go on vacation during Christmas.
Eric spent the entire morning at Fox participating in auditions for the leads of The X-Files. Since The X-Files was receiving far more attention than it had in his previous life, the casting of the male and female leads, who would carry the entire series, was also being handled very carefully.
Because of the success of Friends, the competition for the male and female lead roles in The X-Files, which Eric was leading, had become extremely intense. Several well-known Hollywood actors whose careers had not gone smoothly over the past couple of years had all participated in the auditions. Although the auditions had already entered the second round, they had not even finished going through all the male lead candidates after an entire morning. Moreover, not a single auditioner satisfied Eric.
Eric had also never considered the two actors from the original version.
In the original version, David Duchovny, the male lead, always had a faint, lingering smile at the corners of his mouth no matter what emotional state he was in, giving Eric a very strong sense of being pulled out of the scene. Therefore, Eric had never intended to hand the role to him from the start. The producer in his previous life had mainly chosen David Duchovny as the male lead because his salary was very low.
As for the female lead, Gillian Anderson, she conformed even less to Eric’s expectations, not to mention that she had not even debuted yet.
The female lead of The X-Files, Dana Scully, was supposed to be a highly intelligent woman who had graduated from the University of Maryland, held degrees in physics and law, and worked as an instructor at the FBI. However, the petite Gillian Anderson did not display the temperament a highly intelligent woman should have in the series. Instead, she seemed more like Fox Mulder’s little secretary.
In Eric’s conception, the actress playing Dana Scully should be tall, sharp, capable, and preferably carry a slightly cold, glamorous aura. This character should be able to form an evenly matched opposing dynamic with the male lead in the series, not become the male lead’s appendage.
After lunch in Century City, Eric could only leave the afternoon auditions to the two producers because he had to return to Firefly headquarters to attend the first annual meeting after Firefly and New Line’s merger.
“I’m really sorry, Carolyn. I happened to run into traffic on the way,” Eric said apologetically as he hurriedly pushed open the door to his office. Sitting inside was a brown-haired woman in her forties named Carolyn Elliott. She ran a small but fairly reputable accounting firm in the industry, and both Firefly’s finances and Eric’s personal finances had always been outsourced to Carolyn Elliott’s firm.
Seeing Eric’s hurried appearance, Carolyn, who had indeed felt somewhat displeased after waiting for quite a while, could only smile lightly. “It’s fine, Eric. I haven’t been here long either.”
Eric did not walk toward his desk. Instead, he sat down on the sofa opposite Carolyn and asked, “Carolyn, have you finished organizing my personal financial records?”
Carolyn took the prepared documents from her bag and placed them on her lap. She looked up and asked, “Eric, now?”
Eric checked his watch. There were still more than twenty minutes before the 2:30 p.m. meeting. He thought that should be enough time to hear his own financial summary, so he nodded.
Carolyn opened the file and began reporting. “Eric, your main income this year came from several films. Among them, Home Alone brought in 120 million dollars in revenue share. Fox’s buyout of the overseas distribution rights brought in 24 million. In addition, the second-half videotape and television broadcast revenue share from Home Alone totaled 32 million. At present, Home Alone has generated a total income of 176 million dollars.”
Although she had already reviewed these figures many times, and had personally organized the data herself, Carolyn Elliott still felt as though she had wasted her entire life when she read them again in front of this young man who was not even twenty.
After a brief moment of emotion and distraction, Carolyn Elliott quickly shifted her attention back to the documents and continued reading.
“Because Firefly and New Line will only complete their financial merger next year, all box office revenue shares from the films released by Firefly this year still belong to you personally. The global box office revenue share from Pretty Woman is 102 million. At present, videotape and television broadcast revenue shares have only brought in 19 million, for a total of 121 million dollars. In addition, the total global box office revenue share from Sleuth is 88 million. There is no videotape share yet. The advertising placement share from Friends is 29 million. These two sums have not yet arrived. According to the contracts, Columbia and Fox Television will complete payment before December 31.”
“Besides these major box office revenues, Firefly’s advertising department generated a total of 18 million dollars through product placement in the four films Pretty Woman, Sleuth, Home Alone 2, and Sleepless in Seattle. In addition, among the other two companies you own, Pixar Animation Studios generated zero profit, while the revenue share from UTA was 9.3 million dollars.”
At this point, Carolyn Elliott paused and looked at Eric seriously. “Eric, compared with films, I don’t think UTA, as a talent agency, can create much profit for you. So my personal advice is that you should transfer your shares in this agency as soon as possible. Otherwise, it may bring you trouble.”
Eric nodded.
Over the past six months, he had gradually discovered this problem as well. Although he owned ninety percent of UTA’s shares, that did not mean ninety percent of the commissions drawn from UTA’s artists belonged to him. The company could only receive a very small portion of the ten percent artist commission, while most of it still went to those artists’ direct agents.
Therefore, although Kapoor only owned ten percent of UTA, if one calculated only the agency’s income, Kapoor, who held agency contracts for several A-list stars such as Al Pacino and Julia Roberts, earned no less profit than Eric. After all, agents did not only draw commissions from film salaries. They also took a share from actors’ income through endorsements and other channels.
In addition, in order to avoid suspicion, Eric could no longer interfere in any of UTA’s affairs. As a result, this portion of shares was dispensable to him and could be transferred at any time.
“I’ll consider it, Carolyn. Please continue.”
Carolyn Elliott continued reading. “To summarize, your received income this year is 441 million dollars. Among this, two payments totaling 117 million dollars have not yet arrived. Next is the expenditure situation. Firefly participated in the production of seven films this year. Sleuth had zero expenditure. The other six films, including various personnel profit shares, cost a total of 84 million. The acquisition of Pixar Animation Studios and subsequent investment totaled 30 million. The acquisition of New Line cost 60 million. The acquisition of Fox Television shares cost 80 million. In addition, the construction costs for the manor in Malibu totaled 27 million. Your personal credit card account includes several large expenditures totaling 7.14 million. And…”
Carolyn Elliott gave Eric a strange look. “And Miss Barrymore’s credit card expenses were 21.56 million. Total expenditure amounts to 309 million dollars. Eric, before Columbia and Fox pay the other two sums, you only have 15 million dollars in disposable funds left. And even after those two payments arrive, you cannot use the money casually, because even after applying some reasonable tax avoidance measures, the taxes you need to pay this year still amount to 140 million dollars.”
The reason Eric had specifically asked Carolyn to help organize his financial situation was to prepare for the investment company that was about to be established. After several days of consideration, Chris Hansen had already agreed.
According to the information Chris gathered, Cisco’s share price at listing would likely be 18 dollars, with a total market value of only 224 million. Eric knew this was definitely the only chance to acquire Cisco shares at such a low price. Once Cisco went public and its stock price soared, even if he wanted to buy, those investment institutions probably would not be willing to sell their shares. Therefore, Eric naturally wanted to acquire as much stock as possible this time.
But now, he discovered that his remaining funds were not even enough to pay taxes.
“Carolyn, can I apply for deferred tax payment?” Eric asked tentatively.
He happened to know there was such a method, which could extend the tax payment deadline by half a year. If payment could be delayed until the second half of next year, then the revenue shares from these films released at the end of the year would definitely have arrived, and his financial situation would be much more relaxed.
Carolyn shook her head. “Eric, both Firefly’s and your personal financial situations are very simple. There’s no way to obtain a deferral from the IRS through financial measures. If you had planned to apply for a deferral from the beginning, you should have notified me at least half a year ago. It’s too late now.”
Eric gave a bitter smile. “Looks like I’ll have to take out another loan. Right, Carolyn, what do you think of Firefly?”
Carolyn asked in confusion, “In what aspect?”
“You should know that after merging with New Line, we can no longer keep outsourcing our finances to your firm after this year.”
Carolyn Elliott’s heart sank. Firefly was her biggest client. If she lost this client, her firm’s income would drop by at least half.
However, Carolyn suddenly realized that Eric’s words just now seemed to carry another meaning. “Eric, are you saying you want…”
“Yes.” Eric smiled and nodded. “I want to invite you to join Firefly as Chief Financial Officer. Of course, if you do this, you’ll have to close your own firm. But I believe you can definitely realize that Firefly is worth it.”