In Hong Kong, we build a global business empire

Chapter 523 Borrowing chickens to lay eggs
The next morning, Lin Haoran went to the headquarters of Citibank Japan Branch.

Before leaving, he made a special call to Walter Reston, the chairman of Citibank, and told him that he had a big business to cooperate with Citibank's Japanese branch and needed the other party's introduction.

Walter Reston gave Lin Haoran the phone number of the general manager of the Japanese branch and told Lin Haoran that he would ask the other party to assist.

After all, Walter Reston knew very well that the big business that Lin Haoran was talking about must not be a small business.

Citibank has cooperated with Lin Haoran quite a few times, so they naturally know how to satisfy this important old customer.

Today, Keiko Yamada did not come with us, but went back for vacation.

The car finally stopped in front of a dozen-story building in Tennozu, Shinagawa District, Tokyo.

The headquarters of Citibank Japan Branch is located here.

Citibank entered the Japanese market in 1902, and its strength in the Japanese market far exceeds that of its branch in Hong Kong.

In the square in front of the building, there are the national flags of Japan and the United States, as well as the logo flag of Citibank. Obviously, this building belongs to Citibank.

In comparison, Citibank in Hong Kong only rents an office in a commercial building owned by the Hong Kong Land Group.

From this, we can see that Citibank obviously attaches more importance to the Japanese market.

But it is also normal. Although Hong Kong is a very important city, and even has the mainland market behind it, it cannot be compared with the Japanese market in this era.

The other bodyguards stayed downstairs, only Li Weidong and Li Weiguo followed him into the building.

As soon as he entered, the receptionist respectfully took him to the elevator and went directly to the 12th floor of the building.

After passing through the winding corridor, we finally arrived at an office with the word "President" written on it.

In Japan, the president often represents the highest position in a company.

At this time, the office door was opened, and a middle-aged Japanese man wearing gold-rimmed glasses and looking somewhat elegant was already standing at the door waiting.

"Hello, Mr. Lin, nice to meet you. I'm Yasuya Igawa, welcome to Citibank Japan." The middle-aged man respectfully extended his right hand and greeted Lin Haoran in fluent English.

Apparently, he had been notified in advance by Citibank Chairman Walter Wriston.

Even the chairman was very polite to Lin Haoran, not to mention that he was just the general manager of a branch.

"Hello, Mr. Jingchuan." Lin Haoran smiled and shook hands with him.

"Please come in, Mr. Lin. We'll talk inside." Yasuya Igawa made a gesture of invitation.

The two men walked into the office, and Jingchuan Yasuya closed the office door and went to the reception area, then poured a glass of drinking water for Lin Haoran.

After the two sat down, Jingchuan Jingye said directly: "Mr. Lin, Walter Reston has already told me that I will try my best to meet your needs and give you the most favorable price, so if you have any cooperation needs, please feel free to tell me."

Lin Haoran smiled and said, "Mr. Kawai, before we discuss cooperation, I would like to ask you one thing. I heard that Sony is going to announce the global sales data of Walkman in the near future. I guess Citibank should know the specific time, right?"

As one of the world's top financial groups, Citibank has investments in many large listed companies in the world. Some large companies in Japan naturally do not lack their investment. Therefore, Lin Haoran guessed that Citibank must have known the announcement time of Sony long ago.

The media spread the vague news in an apparent attempt to test the reactions of stockholders or to warm up the market before the official announcement.

Compared with the first oil crisis, this second oil crisis does show many differences.

During the first oil crisis, economies around the world suffered severe blows, stock markets generally fell into a slump and entered a long bear market phase.

However, in the second oil crisis, although the economies of various countries were also severely affected, the performance of the stock market was completely different from the first time.

Among the major stock markets in the world, except for the West German stock market which experienced a sharp decline due to special factors, the stock markets in other major markets such as Japan, Hong Kong, the United States, the United Kingdom and other places have all ushered in a bull market.

The market capitalization of many companies in these markets has achieved significant growth in the past two years, and investors have flocked into the market, driving stock prices to continue to rise.

During this period, the performance of Japan's stock market was basically similar to that of Hong Kong, the United States and other countries, and both showed strong growth momentum.

Therefore, Sony's market value has almost doubled in the past two years.

"Mr. Lin, do you think Sony's stock price will rise sharply after it releases the global sales data of Walkman?

I have to remind you that three days ago there was a rumor in the market that the sales data of Walkman was extremely impressive, but the market response was quite flat and did not show the expected enthusiastic response. Therefore, I suggest that you may not need to pay too much attention to this.

As for the specific time of Sony's announcement, according to my latest understanding, Sony's board of directors has officially confirmed that it will release the latest financial report on March 3, and will also announce the global sales data of Walkman last year. "When answering Lin Haoran's question, Igawa Yasuya's tone was full of surprise and advice.

December 3rd?
It is currently March 3th, which means there are still ten days left, and there are only seven trading days.

Lin Haoran had a plan in mind.

After Sony officially announced the global sales data of Walkman portable players, its stock price soared by more than 20% on the same day. Although Lin Haoran learned this information inadvertently when browsing related reports in his previous life, he was sure that it was correct.

However, since he noticed that the timing of this market movement was relatively close to the release of Sony's data, he did not expect to make huge profits from it.

Lin Haoran’s main target has always been Toyota Motor’s stock.

This matter can be handled by the staff of Galaxy Securities. He asked Jingchuan Jingye just to confirm the time. Thinking of this, Lin Haoran smiled and said to Jingchuan Jingye: "Thank you very much for Mr. Jingchuan's previous reminder, but the purpose of my visit today is not about Sony.

In fact, I have a large-scale trading plan that I intend to entrust to your bank for execution, but before that, I must emphasize that any details of this transaction must be kept strictly confidential.

I have a long-standing relationship with Citibank and I have always had a high level of trust in it. Therefore, even in Japan, I did not consider local giants such as Nomura Securities, Daiwa Securities or Mitsui SMBC Nikko Securities, but directly chose Citibank. "

At this point, his tone became serious. "Although my trust in Citibank is unwavering, considering the sensitivity of the transaction, I still need to remind you again of the importance of confidentiality!"

Jingchuan Yasuya nodded seriously and said, "Please rest assured, Mr. Lin, you also understand the service tenet of our Citibank. Confidentiality is absolutely the best, and this is also the foundation of our Citibank's global presence.

For your trading plan, we will take the highest level of confidentiality measures to ensure the security of information. If a leak does occur and it is confirmed that it was leaked from our side, we will give Mr. Lin satisfactory compensation. These are all marked in the contract.

So, Mr. Lin, please feel free to entrust your cooperation project to us!"

Seeing this, Lin Haoran nodded with satisfaction.

Securities companies generally have very strict confidentiality agreements and measures to ensure the security of customer information. As a leading global financial institution, Citibank's confidentiality system has reached the top level in the industry.

This is also the reason why Lin Haoran is so confident in Citibank.

Today's Citibank has not yet been taken over by the Squid Consortium, so he is still very confident about the current Citibank.

"In that case, I said bluntly that I needed Citigroup's securities department to quietly and quickly acquire Toyota shares before May, with the goal of holding a 5% stake.

At the same time, we need to ensure that the market price does not fluctuate too much during this process. Can Citibank meet my needs? " Lin Haoran said his purpose directly with a smile on his face.

Lin Haoran gave a very exaggerated statistic.

You know, the current market value of Toyota Motor is as high as 16860 billion yen. Based on the current market value, 10% of the shares is as high as 1686 billion yen.

Converted into Hong Kong dollars, it is about 42 billion Hong Kong dollars.

This is already a huge amount of money.

Lin Haoran was actually very clear that the data was too much, and it was almost impossible to absorb so many Toyota shares in more than a month without making any noise.

He was just exaggerating. As for what Citibank can do, it should just do its best.

As for funding?

He planned to use the chicken to lay eggs without spending a penny himself.

Just let Citibank advance the money first. It will only cost some interest anyway.

This is no different than a loan, but is more flexible.

Because he knew that Toyota's stock price would definitely rise sharply.

In other words, this is a guaranteed profit.

Given his current net worth, Citibank will not only not object to this, but will even strongly support it.

If it were someone else, they would still be worried that the other party would not be able to pay it back, but Lin Haoran was completely different.

There are too many industries under its umbrella, and Lin Haoran has cooperated with Citibank many times. The two parties know each other well, so it is not a problem at all to let Citibank advance the funds.

The problem is that both parties finally agreed on how much interest Lin Haoran would pay.

As for how Lin Haoran will repay the money?
Is this not easy?
After selling Toyota shares, I will naturally have money.

Toyota Motor itself is a very high-quality company. Even after a short-term rise of 30%, it will not fall much in the later period, but will continue to develop in an upward trend.

If he doesn't need the cash, there is no need to sell the stocks after buying them.

"10%?" Just as Lin Haoran thought, even Igawa Yasushi, as the top executive of Citibank's Japan branch, was frightened by this data.

Toyota is not a small company, but a multinational giant whose market value ranks among the top in the world.

If Toyota's market value is compared with other listed companies in the United States, it would rank in the top ten.

Last year alone, in 1980, Toyota exported 191 million vehicles, ranking second among global automakers, with Germany's Volkswagen ranking first.

It is conceivable how strong Toyota is today.

This is also what shocked Yasuya Igawa.

"Why? Can't Citibank handle it? Isn't 10% of the shares too much?" Lin Haoran asked with a smile.

"It is indeed a lot, but it does not mean that we at Citibank cannot get that much. We may even be able to get more than 10% of Toyota's shares. There is still more than a month left until May, which is more than enough time for us, but..."

(End of this chapter)