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After hanging up the phone with Run Run Shaw, Lin Haoran went back to his villa in Deep Water Bay to prepare for his first meal of 1981 with his parents at noon.

After lunch, Lin Haoran said goodbye to his parents and went to Kangle Building.

The Kangle Building was deserted today. Except for some staff on duty, other employees did not come to work.

On New Year's Day, except for a small number of staff on duty, most people will have a day off.

Lin Haoran walked into Ma Shimin's office. The current head of the Jardine Matheson Group had been waiting there in advance and was now on the phone.

"In the past, major real estate projects always took the opportunity to promote sales on New Year's Day. I just learned that many real estate projects launched discount activities today, but there were very few customers who actually bought houses. Most of them were just 'shills' hired by the real estate projects.

It seems that if you, the boss, do not take any action, Hong Kong may really face a real estate crisis. Your personal influence in Hong Kong is really too great. "Ma Shimin put down the phone and said to Lin Haoran with some emotion.

If the situation is allowed to continue in this way, Lin Haoran will undoubtedly offend many real estate developers in Hong Kong.

After all, although this matter was made up by those media outlets, in the eyes of everyone, the source of all this was because of Lin Haoran.

It is really disgusting what Jardine Matheson did.

Lin Haoran smiled nonchalantly and said, "It's not that easy for me to take the blame. Starting today, this matter should be settled."

As long as he can take over those five pieces of government land, the "rumor" that Lin Haoran is not optimistic about the future of Hong Kong real estate will naturally be refuted.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, the sun shines through the clouds and shines on the busy city, adding a bit of vitality to the city.

There were crowds of people on both sides of the streets in Central.

During New Year’s Day, many companies have holidays, so naturally more people go out to play.

Lin Haoran and Ma Shimin arrived at the Lands Department on time to participate in the official land auction that the Governor's Office had been raising funds for nearly a month.

Unlike previous auctions, this one was unusually quiet. Apart from Hong Kong Land Development, Wheelock & Co. and Swire Properties, no other real estate companies participated in the bidding.

The auction actually took place in a conference room in the Lands Department's office and was presided over by an official from the Lands Department.

The atmosphere at the auction seemed a little strange.

The owner and general manager of the Hong Kong Land Group were present in person, while Wheelock and Swire each only sent one less-known senior executive.

It can be seen from this that these two foreign companies were more of a face-giving act for the Governor-General's Office and did not take this official land auction seriously at all.

In the past, those who participated in the auction were either the owners of real estate developers or at least general managers.

And now, Wheelock and Swire did not even send senior executives at the general manager level, which is enough to show their perfunctory attitude towards this official land auction.

The official presiding over the auction looked at the scene and sighed.

In the past, he had personally presided over many government land auctions, but he had never encountered a situation like this one.

Every time, there are at least a dozen real estate companies coming to bid.

I remember that he once presided over an auction of government land, with more than 30 representatives from real estate companies competing. The quality of the government land auctioned that time was actually far inferior to the land being auctioned today.

Even so, the bidding was still extremely fierce, and the prices of some plots were even raised to more than twice the starting price before they were finally sold.

Today, the scene before us is more like saying that these pieces of government land have already been decided rather than being an auction.

And bidding seems to be just a formality.

Lin Haoran and Ma Shimin sat on chairs in the conference room. The officials' voices echoed in the empty meeting room, sounding particularly clear.

The first piece of land is a piece of land next to Lung Wo Road, about 100 meters east of the Central Connaught Building. This piece of land is even less than 50 meters away from the Central Pier.

This piece of land also has the highest starting price among the five government lands, with a starting price of HK$10.5 billion.

According to current market conditions, the share price of this land is at least between HK$18 billion and HK$25.

The reason why the starting price of the official land auction is set so much lower than the market price is naturally to leave room for the auction to rise, so that the auction appears to be extremely fierce.

Otherwise, if the starting price is set directly according to the market price, it will not be so attractive.

However, the government miscalculated this time. It did not expect so many incidents to happen in Hong Kong during this period, which resulted in no one being willing to participate in the auction in the end.

If the government had known the result would be like this, it would never have been willing to put these high-quality plots of land up for auction a month ago.

As soon as the official finished his introduction, Ma Shimin, as the representative of the Jardine Matheson Group, raised his sign and shouted out the price.

As for the representatives of Wheelock and Jardine Matheson and Swire, they did not take any action at all.

As expected, this plot of land with the most advantageous geographical location was won by the Hong Kong Land Development with a starting price of HK$10.5.

Afterwards, the other four pieces of government land went through the process one after another and were all successfully acquired at the starting price.

In fact, if the boss of Swire Group was present and saw the Hong Kong Land Group successfully bidding for the land at a price far below the market price, he would definitely participate in the bidding.

Because the head of Taikoo could definitely see what kind of impact it would have once the news of Lin Haoran winning the auction for these plots of land spread. Unfortunately, Taikoo only sent a senior executive with little decision-making power, and before he came, he was instructed by the higher-ups to just go through the process and had no decision-making power to participate in the auction.

As for Wheelock & Co., it has been withdrawing its investments and naturally has no intention of bidding.

This can be considered a great bargain for Lin Haoran.

Otherwise, if Jardine Matheson really participated in the auction, no matter what the price was in the end, Lin Haoran would have no choice but to bite the bullet and join the auction.

Although Governor Murray MacLehose said that the Hong Kong Land Group had no intention of buying all five plots of land, in his heart he was actually determined to buy all five plots of land at any cost.

Nowadays, all of them are bought at a low cost of the starting price, which is naturally a great bargain.

In the end, the Swire Group acquired all five pieces of government land for a total price of HK$30.2 billion.

"Congratulations to Mr. Lin, congratulations to the Hong Kong Land Group!" After the event, senior executives of Wheelock and Swire Group congratulated Lin Haoran.

In fact, although they do not have the power to make decisions, they are able to serve as senior executives and still have certain abilities.

Therefore, when the Hong Kong Land Group acquired the second piece of land, the representative of Swire Properties also saw the seriousness of the situation and even hoped that the auction would be suspended. He wanted to apply to his boss for this.

Unfortunately, the officials did not agree.

Because the officials also knew that the purpose of this auction was to allow the Swire Properties Group to acquire all five plots of land.

Lin Haoran accepted their congratulations with a smile, but he knew in his heart that it was just a polite gesture.

"Mr. Lin, please join us for a press conference at 3:30 p.m." The official from the Lands Department invited Lin Haoran after the auction.

The auction started at 3:00 p.m., but in fact, it didn't take much time at all, as it ended at around 3:10 p.m.

This can be regarded as the fastest-concluded Hong Kong government land auction in history.

No one was bidding, and all of them were won by the Jardine Matheson Group at the starting price. It didn't take long at all.

The Governor's Office understood that restoring the prosperity of Hong Kong's real estate industry would require not only substantial policy support but also broad support from public opinion.

In this auction, the Swire Properties Group acquired all five plots of land, which was undoubtedly an excellent publicity point.

Therefore, before the auction was held, the Lands Department organized a press conference in advance, waiting to be held after the auction was over.

The fact that the Swire Properties Group has acquired all five plots of land represents the direction previously misled by the media, which is undoubtedly a "rumor"!

Through the power of the media, market confidence can be quickly boosted, attracting more attention from investors and home buyers, thereby driving the recovery of the entire real estate industry.

The Governor's Office wanted to restore the prosperity of Hong Kong's real estate industry, so naturally it wanted to take this opportunity to publicize it.

Otherwise, wouldn’t the money the government lost on the land this time be wasted?
If this had happened in the past, the final transaction price would have been at least HK$50 to HK$60 billion.

And now, the deal has been done for just over 3 billion Hong Kong dollars.

Not only that, the bidder of the Swire Group is also required to delay the payment of the land price for three years.

It can be said that this time, the Governor's Office suffered a huge loss!
Naturally, Lin Haoran would not refuse this press conference.

Since we have taken such a big advantage, we have to provide some help to the government.

So he agreed readily.

At 3:30 in the afternoon, Lin Haoran and Ma Shimin were taken by staff to a government press conference.

Many reporters came to the scene, basically all the major local mainstream media in Hong Kong sent people.

Several media outlets that spread rumors and caused trouble, including Sing Tao Daily, Chinese Daily News and Commercial Daily, have sent reporters to the scene.

After all, they are also well-known mainstream media in Hong Kong.

All the reporters were surprised to see Lin Haoran and Ma Shimin appear at the press conference.

They received an invitation to a press conference held by the Lands Department.

Many people know that today is the day of the official land auction, so many people speculate that today's press conference is related to this matter.

But many people have already learned in advance that in fact no real estate developers will participate in this official land auction.

Therefore, many reporters came here with the intention of watching the joke.

This has been a hot topic these days, but Lin Haoran has not come out to refute the rumors.

What does this mean?
It represents the public opinion in the market and may be true!

So the Swire Properties Group would actually participate in the auction?

Many people present had not expected this. (End of this chapter)