Leonardo DiCaprio (Leonardo DiCaprio), is the kind of typical juvenile famous actor, he appeared on the stage at the age of 5, starred in American dramas at the age of 16, was nominated for an Oscar at the age of 19, and gotten to Berlin at 21 Actor. As one of the most handsome men on the planet, his appearance when he was young can only be described by the word "against the sky".
Romeo and Juliet
in 1995, he was picked by James Cameron, starred in the classic movie "Titanic". When the movie was released in 1997, people all over the world knew his blond, blue-eyed, handsome and sunny face. This was the first peak of Leonardo's career as an actor, and it was also a burden he couldn't get rid of in the future.
Titanic, 20th Century Fox, 1997
The "Titanic" of the year not only caused a sensation in the world, it is also an empty street in China. The film was released in China in April 1998, creating 360 million box office, accounting for one-third of the total box office that year.
Leonardo didn't like the fame brought by "Titanic", and even because he didn't get the best actor nomination, he didn't even attend the Oscar awards in angrily. In the following years, he tried to use his acting skills to prove that the capital outside of 's own appearance is not equal to zero.
For example, in 2004, he collaborated with the famous director Martin Scorsese in the movie "The Aviator", in which he played the famous aeronaut and entrepreneur Howard Hughes (Howard Hughes), showing the domineering and quirks of the characters The performance is very good and the performance is remarkable.
The Aviator, 2004
In 2008, he starred in Warner's film "Blood Diamond". In order to play a good role as a criminal who is engaged in diamond smuggling in Africa, he spent half a year to develop a South African accent. His professionalism is admirable.
Blood Diamond, Warner, 2007
In 2010, he starred in the movie "Shutter Island", playing a severely schizophrenic patient. In the movie, he has long since faded away from the youthfulness and immaturity of the year, and has become calm and atmospheric, and gradually mastered the relaxed and restrained performance methods.
Shutter Island, in 2010,
relied on the accumulation of these works, he finally won the coveted Oscar for Best Actor Award with the "Wild Hunter" released in 2015. In the movie, he used a masochistic performance to show an image that is completely opposite to the sunshine boy of the year, which is both distressing and amazing.
The Revenant, 20th Century Fox,
won the Oscar winner in 2015, sweeping away the haze of his years of hard work but always missed, and also made many ridicules and pictures on the Internet history. For example, in March 2014, his classic expression when he failed for the fourth time in the Olympics:
86th Oscar Awards, 2014
. What's interesting is that the opponent he lost to this year was our last post. The protagonist in the film review: Matthew McConaughey . He had a lot of interaction with Xiao Li. For example, the first starring role in "Titanic" was McConaughey, but because of Cameron's insistence, he changed to Leonardo. And defeating Xiao Li can be regarded as making up for his regret back then.
Xiao Li congratulated McConaughey. At the coincidence of
in 2014, in the movie "The Wolf of Wall Street" nominated by Leonardo, Matthew McConaughey also starred, playing Leonardo’s immediate boss In a confrontation between the two, McConaughey fully demonstrated his rich acting skills, with seductive characters and touching lines.
And Leonardo played the stockbroker Jordan Belfort (Jordan Belfort) in the movie, crazy, passionate, exaggerated, is the kind of role that Xiao Li is better at. However, this kind of drama that did not break through, could not impress the Oscar's rigid and demanding judges, and finally lost to the "Dallas Buyers Club""McConnor, the star of acting.
Leonardo, who is a little bit "struggling" in the movie,
, the "Wolf of Wall Street", which is full of pornography, gambling and drugs, is the financial film we want to interpret today. It is directed by the famous director Martin Scorsese, based on a real American financial fraud company-Stratton Oakmont, Leonardo played the company's founder Jordan Belfort (Jordan Belfort) in the film.
In this three-hour movie, Director Scorsese focused more on the exaggerated, glamorous, licentious, and pathological details of the life of the Stratton Oakmont group in order to enhance the viewing experience. The design routine is not discussed in depth.
is the second film in the Nuggets film series "Financial Fraud Special". This article will focus on character stories, scam design, and sales techniques outside the film. According to the practice of the official account, the article will be divided into four parts:
1. False and true: an atypical Wall Street
2. Routine design: how a real scam works
3. The core meaning: how to sell hope to customers
4. Domestic case: local finance The ups and downs of the wolf
enter the text below.
1. False and true: An atypical Wall Street
First of all, the crazy Stratton Oakmont company in the movie does not operate in a skyscraper on Wall Street, nor is it a typical Wall Street company. In fact, they It's just a group of financial crooks who have their base camp on Long Island, New York.
Stratton Oakmont Office, New York, 1994 Jordan Belfort, the founder of
, was born in a middle-class family in Queens, New York City, and has shown extraordinary marketing talent since he was a child. At the age of 10, he sold snow shoveling services to his neighbors after the blizzard to make money; at the age of 16, he used the summer vacation to sell ice cream on the beach near New York, earning enough college tuition.
Belfort (left) and DiCaprio in the movie (right)
When he was 23 years old, he disregarded his parents' objections and gave up his medical school to find a job selling seafood and meat. With outstanding sales skills, Belfort quickly achieved the company's first performance. However, the profit brought by such low-end sales is limited. He is thinking about finding a place where he can use sales skills to maximize profits, such as Wall Street.
Facts have proved that selling pork and selling stocks have the same underlying skills and logic. The difference is that the latter makes 100 times more money than the former. In 1987, Belfort joined the veteran securities company L.F. Rothschild, and soon afterwards suffered the famous "Black Monday" of the 1987 stock market crash. The company went bankrupt and Belfort was disadvantaged.
But in this company, he met his first mentor in the financial field: Mark Hanna (the role played by McConaughey). The mentor taught him two things. One is that the three elements of Wall Street success are masturbation, cocaine and prostitutes; the second is that the secret of making money is to allow customers to invest continuously, so that the broker can earn a lot of real money commissions.
Mark Hanna (left) and the appearance in the movie (right)
Obviously, Belfort has actively practiced these two golden rules in his later career. In 1989, he rented the garage of a used car dealership and founded Stratton Oakmont. The partner was Danny Porush. The two were introduced to him by Belfort's wife. In the movie, Porush is aliased to Donnie Azoff and played by the fat Jonah Hill. In addition to Porush, Belfort has also brought in a group of friends, such as Kenneth Greene and Victor Wang, who are amateur cannabis dealers, and more people through them. Stratton's top 100 employeesAt work, most of them are drug clients of the first two fierce men, and the history of this fraud company's turmoil began.
The rustic Stratton Big Four in the movie
is worth noting: In the movie, the female reporter who interviewed him, Aliyah Farran (the prototype is a Forbes female reporter Roula Khalaf) called him the "wolf of Wall Street", but in fact, This title was actually invented by the protagonist Belfort himself in his autobiography. At that time, no one called him a "wolf" whether in the company or in the mass media.
Real News Report (Part 1) Reports in Movies (Part 2)
In the eyes of Wall Street, the real "wolf" should belong to Carl Icahn (Carl Icahn), a tens of billions of dollars in operation, Stratton Oakmont obviously does not Inflow, it's just that it focuses on the characteristics of "New York office + financial fraud + extreme luxury", and it is closer to the public's impression of Wall Street than traditional institutions such as investment banks, hedge funds, and insurance companies.
Belfort (right) and a private helicopter,
in 1995, but such a team full of drug dealers, idiots, and waste, how did Belfort transform it and turn it into a fraud team with amazing money-holding ability? Enter class time below.
2. Routine design: how the real scam works
First of all, Comrade Belfort, as the chief designer of Stratton Oakmont, put forward two basic theories:
theory 1. : the top 1% of the rich in Americans, although On the surface they are very rational and cautious, but in private, most of them are incorrigible gamblers. They cannot resist the temptation of gambling. Even if they know that someone is out in the casino, they will not give up those opportunities to make big gains.
Theory II : Those young men and women who are full of sex fanatics and have low IQs can undergo systematic training to become very Wall Street style. When they chat with customers, they will make them feel like they are communicating with senior bankers, reducing their preparedness and buying products. These two theories overturn the two traditional understandings of the public. One is that the leek of social elites is not easy to cut; the other is that financial sales that can convince customers require professionalism and credibility and cannot be quick.
In Belfort's eyes, this is completely nonsense: social elites are more greedy in virtue than the people at the bottom, and as long as they master packaging and marketing routines, they can be obedient. With the
theoretical framework set up, Belfort has found a field that is naturally suitable for fraud: the pink sheet market (Pink Sheet) of . The
pink sheet market has a long history in the United States and is a type of OTC (over the counter). Stocks listed and traded in this market do not need to provide financial reports or regularly disclose information. Most listed companies have these characteristics: stock prices are less than $5 (mostly only a few cents), skyrocketing, and information is serious Asymmetric and easily manipulated by brokers.
1 The "pink list"
printed by the National Quotation Bureau (National Quotation Bureau) in 984, in this lawless field, the Belforts who are good at sales are like fish in water. Stratton Oakmont recruited 1,000 employees at its peak, frantically calling potential customers, selling stocks, and earning generous commissions (up to 50% of the stock price).
However, this kind of business of selling other people's stocks cannot satisfy Belfort's appetite. They subsequently invented a “pump-and-dump” technique, commonly known as “pump-and-dump” in China, but it’s more powerful: it controls both the bargaining chip and the major shareholders. Control the rhythm of retail trading.
In the movie, the company operated by Stratton is Steve Madden Ltd., which specializes in women's shoes (hereinafter referred to as Madden Shoes ). The founder Steve Madden is a well-known designer and the childhood playmate of partner Danny Porosh. Danny convinces good friendsFriends, let Stratton package his company to go public. In the process, Belfort made tens of millions of dollars by manipulating stock prices. The
film did not elaborate on the details of the village, but according to the SEC investigation report, the operation can be divided into 6 steps:
1. The company that created the IPO: Stratton Oakmont's core competitiveness is to sell customers "a company with unlimited potential." stock". The Madden shoe industry, which is engaged in the design and manufacture of women's shoes, meets this condition: you can brag about him as the next Armani, Jimmy Choo or Chanel, anyway, there is no way to prove it.
2. Control the chips: The key to the plan is to control enough equity in advance. U.S. securities laws only allow underwriters like Stratton to hold 5% of Madden’s shares. In order to circumvent this regulation, Stratton first issued to an intermediary at a price of $4 per share, and then secretly at a price of $4.25 per share. After selling it back, they eventually controlled 85% of the shares.
3. Find a good bidder: is naturally the leeks cultivated in advance by Stratton-retail investors. Stratton sales staff will allow retail investors to make a small amount of money on one or two IPO projects and win the trust of retail investors. Once trust is established, Stratton sales staff will tell these customers: I have a project that can make a lot of money, you must participate!
In this case, the sales will tell the customer: Madden Footwear's issuance price is 4 US dollars, but it will definitely rise to 20 US dollars after listing, and I can help you get the "new" quota. Many customers were so happy after hearing that they immediately called in for $100,000 and waited for the new shares to be issued. By this means, Belfort can roughly estimate the purchasing power of leeks.
4. Change the bait : Shortly before the IPO, sales staff will call to tell customers: Madden Footwear’s IPO is too hot, and the new quota for 4 US dollars is very small, but once the stock starts to go public, I can help You buy at the "market price" as soon as possible. Many customers think that this "market price" will only be a little higher than $4, anyway, the money has passed, so they agree, and only a few will refuse.
5. Manipulate the market: After the stock IPO, Belfort began to increase its stock price. The target price is calculated by backwards calculation: If Belfort wants to sell 1 million shares in hand, the purchasing power of Stratton customers is about 22 million U.S. dollars (estimated through step 3), so the stock price needs to be raised from 4 dollars per share to 22 dollars per share, and then sold to them for 22 million dollars (the cost may be only a few cents).
In the pink sheet market, the way to increase stock prices is much simpler than that of large exchanges. The easiest way is to "knock": buy and sell between Stratton's own accounts, but this method is too blatant. Because it controls most of the bargaining chips in the Madden shoe industry, Belfort can slowly push the stock up through small market orders, all the way to the target price of $22.
6. Close the door and hit the dog: When the stock price rises to $22, Stratton fully executes the customer's buy order, which is to invest all $22 million in the purchase of 1 million shares, and those "mouse hole accounts" controlled by Belfort Almost the only seller, $22 million was transferred to Belfort's pockets, which is the celebration moment in the movie.
Customers who bought stocks for 22 dollars, if they want to sell them in the market, will find that they can’t sell them at all, and no one wants them even if they fall below the issue price of 4 dollars. In this way, wealth was transferred through seemingly open market transactions. The simple summary of
is: in a legal trading place, by secretly manipulating the price of the traded goods, the wealth in the pockets of ordinary investors is transferred to the wallet of the scam designer, and the victim feels that "their investment level is not enough, so Lose money", come back next time. Does
sound familiar? That's right, because we are everywhere here, let’s not talk about foreign-style things like air coins and horses. A-shares perform this kind of bridge almost every day. From this perspective, it is still the old saying. Yes:
is a global scam friend, and it does not distinguish you, me or him.
3. The core meaning: how to sell hope to customers
I have to say that although Belfort is full of misconduct and caused losses to countless families, he is indeed a world-leading salesman. After being released from prison, he systematically summarized his sales experience and invented a whole set of marketing system: Straight Line Persuasion.
Belfort’s "Straight Line Persuasion System" training material
is actually based on the theory of Martin D. Shafiroff, a famous telemarketing master. Belfort believes that the work of "persuasion" should be divided into internal and external lines: internal state management and focus control, external marketing methods and persuasion skills, salespersons should focus on "pick up the phone" and "complete the transaction." Straight line.
Belfort (real person) who lectured around after his release from prison
The above theory is relatively boring, I believe most readers will not need this skill. Let’s take a splendid telemarketing clip of the movie as an example to illustrate the various tricks of the linear persuasion system:
1. Creating/reversing supply and demand: first pave the way. In the movie, one case Belfort used is: Sell this to me Sell me this pen, and he thinks the best way is: helps customers create demand (creat urgency) . In the restaurant, his friend Brad designed a "please help me sign a name" scene, which created the customer's demand for pens.
In this telemarketing, Belfort went a step further and demonstrated the "reverse supply and demand" skills: first he mentioned the postcard sent by the customer to the stranger, and reversed the supply and demand relationship, starting from "I want to "You recommend stocks" becomes "You beg me to recommend stocks to you", and the demand side becomes the demanded side.
2. Suspense your appetite: After letting customers know that they are the "demand-side" role, quickly gives a rough outline of the products you can provide, and fully mobilizes customers' attention within 4 seconds.
3. Packaged goods : Use professional and complex vocabulary to package the stocks you want to sell, and boast of junk companies as high-tech companies. In this process, the salesperson has to show 100% trust in the goods he sells (meaning: even believe in what he says).
4. Throw out the temptation : Emphasize to customers the profit that this investment can bring, and further enhance customer interest. Customers will discount the revenue in their hearts, so you must not be conservative. Give an amazing revenue expectation to make the customer feel: "This kid feels like a big mess, but even if he can earn half or even a quarter of what he said, It’s also very good."
5. Consolidate trust : After the customer accepts the temptation you threw, the urge to buy is stirred in his heart, but rationality will hinder this impulse, and the customer will ask in his heart: Is this kid reliable? Spectrum? At this time, it is necessary for the salesperson to re-emphasize his professionalism and credibility (whether he has it or not, all with a mouth) to dispel such doubts.
6. Complete the transaction: the last doubt of the customer is dispelled, and the purchase behavior occurs. The salesperson must immediately lock it in to avoid the customer's impulse to fade away and cause regret.
The above is a simple demo version of the "Straight Line Persuasion System". In fact, all the systems are more complex, and the system has solutions for all the responses of customers.
Straight Line Persuasion diagram
Belfort introduced this method to Stratton Oakmont. Each salesperson is equipped with a thick line book, pick up the phone and say, what the customer refuses, what the customer hesitates, and how the customer fluctuates Said that all customer psychology is in the grasp of Belfort. Relying on this set of knowledge, STratton's stock promotion business has never been profitable. The
film made a big advertisement for Belfort's sales training courses. In addition to providing training to major companies around the world, he also went to give lectures everywhere, with an appearance fee of $30,000 per hour. In fact, Belfort only spent 22 months in jail for betraying his accomplices. After his release, he lived in a $3 million house in California and lived a comfortable life by training, speaking, and publishing books.
Belfort and his fiancée traveled on a private jet together. In 2012,
seemed to be a wonderful story of the "prodigal son turning back". As for those investors who were deceived by Stratton Oakmont, most of them couldn't get back the principal (the customer lost 200 million US dollars, which only recovered about 10%). In the movie, they are not described at all. At the end of the
movie, Belfort gave trainees a sales training class. In the film, the person who introduced Leonardo was Belfort himself.
A meaningful picture is that ordinary people sitting in the audience want to learn Belfort’s marketing know-how. In the eyes of these focused students, Belfort is not a wicked liar, but a worshipping idol. .
As for the victims of Stratton Oakmont, this 179-minute movie has never mentioned it. The reason is simple: no one likes to listen to the stories of the victims. In reality, what they get most often is not sympathy, but ridicule and ridicule.
In this era, making money depends more and more on the "stock transfer" of wealth instead of "incremental creation." Everyone wants to be a sickle, and everyone does not want to be a leek. Therefore, those who plunder the wealth of others are often admired and admired by the public.
Luo Jialiang said a classic line in "Genesis": "This society laughs at the poor and does not laugh at the prostitution. If you take a step faster, no one will mind, but if you take a slow step, you will always be looked down upon."
Isn't this our reality?
4. Domestic case: The ups and downs of the local financial wolf
was released in "The Wolf of Wall Street" in 2013, and a financial company was incorporated in China on the other side of the ocean, called Daji Group; half a year later, another company called e-zubao The company was also incorporated. The two companies completed the entire process from expansion to destruction in a very short time. When
will review and review them in the future, people will find that they are the Chinese version of Stratton Oakmont. There are four things in common between the Chinese version and the American version:
1. The barbaric growth of cross-border youth: is the same as Belfort, who once promoted seafood and meat. The founders of these two companies also cross-border entry. Financial sector. Ding Ning, the founder of
e Zubao, studied junior college in Anhui Vocational College of Industry and Trade, but soon went through a long-term suspension. At the age of 17, he joined the Bengbu Yanbaishi blockade plant run by his mother at the age of 17. Seals, screws and can openers have basically nothing to do with finance. Although Ma Shenke, the founder of
Da Group, worked briefly at the Bank of Communications in Jining, he was only a credit staff member of a small branch and had nothing to do with the so-called "capital operation and wealth management" in Lujiazui in the future.
is such two cross-border youths. In just one or two years, they defrauded tens of billions of funds and ruined countless families. The
crossover is ironic. As Comrade Wang Dali said: “A financial professional has one advantage over a non-professional person: knowing which financial activities are illegal. So professional financial professionals People are generally poorer than non-professionals."
2. Disguised as regular financial companies : , these two companies are actually doing illegal fundraising under the banner of Internet finance, which is essentially a Ponzi scheme, but in With careful packaging, they present to the public the image of a professional financial or high-tech company.
Take Da Group as an example. It rented four or five office spaces in the financial core area of Lujiazui. Later, it rented a whole building in Changtai Plaza of Zhangjiang Hi-Tech. It was used as the company’s headquarters.Businesses such as "wealth management, capital operation, and comprehensive financial services".
As for e-zubao, its advertisements have landed on more than a dozen provincial satellite TVs and won CCTV primetime advertisements. President Zhang Min also appeared on the "Investment and Wealth Management" column of CCTV Securities Information Channel. In this regard, they have the same idea of packaging Stratton Oakmont with Belfort.
3 The private lives of executives are extravagant and chaotic: There is an old saying in the financial industry: people who make quick money are the craziest to spend money. Like Stratton Oakmont, most of the money scammed by DaDa Group and ezubao from customers was squandered by executives, and very few can be recovered afterwards.
Take e Zubao as an example. The company headquarters is beautiful, and Dingning alone has dozens of female secretaries. For these beauties, Ding Ning is generous. For example, the gifts given to Zhang Min, the president of ezubao beauty, include: up to 550 million cash, 120 million house in Sentosa, Singapore, 12 million pink diamond ring...
Bell Ford once required agents to wear custom suits worth $2,000. Ding Ning also required his secretaries to wear luxury brands such as Hermès and Chanel. "At the most exaggerated time, I bought out all the LV stores and Hermès stores across the country, and then Go overseas to buy..."
As for the classmate Ma Shenke of the Da Group, he was the male pig's feet of the sensational "Zheng YY Yanzhaomen, deputy secretary of the Youth League Committee of a certain technical college in Jining" in 2012. He was just a small employee Meng, as a low-level financial migrant worker, Boss Dai, who is a low-level financial migrant worker, can't even think about how big he will play after his fortune in Shanghai in Shiliyangchang.
Your circle is really messy, you take pills.
4. High salary incentives and crazy expansion : In Stratton Oakmont, Belfort gave salaries far above the industry average to motivate its brokers to sell stocks frantically. In the two domestic companies, the same method is used.
For example, e Zubao, there are as many as 80 senior executives with annual salary of one million, and one month's salary will be paid 6-8 billion. The salary of beautiful president Zhang Min was 150,000/month when he first entered, and it increased later. At 500,000/month, it had risen to 1 million/month before the incident!
Under this incentive, the two companies expanded wildly. Take Dali Group as an example. It took less than two years to open 23 provincial companies, 4 municipal companies, 229 municipal companies, 374 branches, and 717 branch companies across the country. Ezubao also had 130,000 employees at its peak.
Stratton Oakmont became the largest brokerage company in the OTC field in the United States at its peak, employing only more than 1,000 people, and the local version of Wall Street wolves are even more crazy. The above
is the similarity between the two domestic financial fraud companies and the original American version. There is nothing new in the world.
Of course, the biggest difference between them lies in the way of fraud: Daji and ezubao are essentially a simple Ponzi scheme, but under the banner of financial innovation, the losses they cause to ordinary people are compared to Belfort’s 200 million yuan. US dollars, plus one more zero.
5. Ending
On July 22, 2014, taking advantage of the hot screening of "The Wolf of Wall Street", Belfort came to China to promote his marketing master course, silver seats 2,800 yuan, VIP seats 16,800 yuan, and platinum seats 39,800 yuan.
Belfort has come to the right place. This hot land, like the United States in the early 90s, everyone wants to find a way to financial freedom. They are afraid of poverty, afraid of being alone, afraid of not being able to get in the car, and the air is full of panic. The smell nourishes the brutal growth of all kinds of scams. When
came to China in July 2014, the scam by his local colleagues has not been exposed. In another six months, the masses will flock to the stock market like a tide, and in another year, they will flock to the property market; in another two years, they will turn to the currency circle.
sickle and leeks, which one comes first? This question is the same as "the chicken or the egg", which is a unique myth in our anxious age.
But one thing is certain. In this era of stagnant incremental wealth and transfer of stock wealth, our Lujiazui wolf, financial street wolf, and Shenzhen Bay wolf will continue to emerge in endlessly, showing us the dynamics of this era.Ferocious.
is over, thank you for your patience to read, please give me a thumbs up~shun a happy weekend~
reference
[1]. The wolf of wall street, Jordan Belfort, 2011
[2]. How the'Wolf of Wall Street' Really Did It, Ronald L. Rubin, WSJ
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