In Hong Kong, we build a global business empire

In January, Dai Shi reported to Lin Haoran that Galaxy Securities had secretly helped him acquire 1% of the shares of Bank of East Asia.

Today, Galaxy Securities has been separated from the original Universal Investment Company, and the business in Hong Kong is managed by the Hong Kong Land Group.

With Huo Jianning keeping an eye on things, Lin Haoran has always been quite confident about the affairs of Galaxy Securities.

In a flash, four months have passed.

Since coming to Japan, he hasn't even spoken to Dai Shi on the phone once.

At this moment, Dai Shi told him in a serious tone that there was bad news from the Bank of East Asia and asked him to return to Hong Kong.

This made him even more curious.

"Dai Shi, can you tell me in detail what's going on?" Lin Haoran asked directly.

"Our secret acquisition of Bank of East Asia has been exposed. The Li family hopes to negotiate with you. As for how the news was leaked, I will tell you slowly.

Over the past few months, we have been secretly acquiring shares step by step and have successfully become the second largest shareholder of Bank of East Asia, second only to the Li Peicai family. So far, we hold 18.34% of the shares, but it is still far from the 32.3% shareholding of the Li Peicai family.

In the past two months, our progress has become slower and slower as our shareholding ratio has increased. The share price of Bank of East Asia has also risen by nearly 10% in the past six months.

All of this was within our expectations. Just a week ago, a board member of Bank of East Asia publicly announced that he would sell his 3.3% stake in Bank of East Asia in the short term due to urgent need for cash. I thought it was an opportunity at the time, but did not rush to contact him.

Until two days ago, I learned from Mr. Cui Zilong that since they could not find a suitable buyer, the other party decided to sell it at a price 5% lower than the market price. So after getting Mr. Ma's approval, I secretly contacted the other party.

However, I did not expect that this shareholder of Bank of East Asia did not really want to sell his shares. Rather, because we had continuously absorbed stocks from the secondary market over the past six months, the number of sell orders for Bank of East Asia in the secondary market had decreased, which made them worried about whether someone was eyeing Bank of East Asia. So they used this shareholder to spread false information and set a trap to lure us into the trap.

Our people just contacted the other party and expressed their intention to acquire the company, but the other party said that they would raise the price by 20%. This was completely different from the information they had released, and it didn't seem like they wanted to sell their shares at all.

I thought the other party had changed their mind at the last minute and didn't care, but unexpectedly, today Mr. Li Guobin, the head of the Li Peicai family, called me personally. They wanted to find out our background and intentions, and also wanted to test our bottom line on the acquisition.

However, I did not tell him how much shares of Bank of East Asia we now control, so he wanted me to report to you and he wanted to talk to you.

Boss, I am the one who bears the greatest responsibility for this matter. You gave me full authority to take charge of the secret acquisition of Bank of East Asia, but I messed it up in the end. I failed your expectations. When you come back, I can take the initiative to demote myself and accept any punishment from the company." Dai Shi said in a low voice with a guilty look on his face.

Lin Haoran said calmly, "It's too early to talk about this now. The most urgent thing is to solve the problem at hand. We can talk about demotion and punishment later. Tell me first, what do you think about negotiating with the Li family?"

Dai Shi took a deep breath and tried to calm himself down. "Boss, I think this negotiation is both a crisis and an opportunity for us. Before calling me, I just talked to Mr. Ma about this matter. He thinks that although our acquisition has been exposed, we already hold a certain percentage of shares and have bargaining chips to negotiate with them."

Lin Haoran nodded, and after thinking for a while, he said, "Okay, I understand. I will be back in two days. Don't feel guilty about this. I will take care of it after I return!"

After hanging up the phone, Lin Haoran sat in a chair and fell into deep thought.

Li Peicai family.

This top family in Hong Kong, one of the four major families in Hong Kong, is in no way inferior to the Li family in strength.

Among the many Chinese banks in Hong Kong, Bank of East Asia has become the largest Chinese bank since Hang Seng Bank was acquired by Bank of East Asia.

The Bank of East Asia not only has many branches in Hong Kong, but also has a certain market overseas. For example, it opened a branch in New York in 1968 and officially entered the US market. In 1972, it established branches in London and Singapore to serve inter-bank trade and investment.

In this respect, it is far ahead among the Chinese banks in Hong Kong.

The development foundation of Bank of East Asia can be said to be very solid, however, its market value is less than HK$3 billion.

In other words, the cost for Lin Haoran to acquire Bank of East Asia will not be very high.

This is also the reason why Lin Haoran took a fancy to Bank of East Asia.

Originally, he was thinking about whether he could slowly devour the Bank of East Asia in secret, but now it seems that he was thinking too much.

The main reason is that the Li Peicai family, the largest shareholder of Bank of East Asia, controls too many shares, a full 32.3%. Together with the 5.99% held by Societe Generale and the 3.82% held by China Construction Investment (Hong Kong) Co., Ltd., the shares held by the three major shareholders have exceeded 42% of the total shareholding.

In addition, Galaxy Securities has secretly absorbed 18.34% in the past six months.

This means that the shareholdings of these four major shareholders alone exceed 4%.

Adding the holdings of the shareholders on the board of directors of Bank of East Asia, individual shareholders in the secondary market hold 30% of the shares, which is already good.

In this situation, it is not surprising that old hands like the Li family would notice something unusual.

All in all, this really can't be entirely blamed on Dai Shi. However, since the job was not done well, he should be punished. I'll think about this when I get back.

Considering that the major shareholder owns so many shares, it is actually very good that the Li family only discovered the company’s 18.34% stake.

The Bank of East Asia was extremely important to him, and it was time for him to go back. In the past few months in Japan, Lin Haoran often received calls from Guan Jiahui and Guo Xiaohan. To be honest, Lin Haoran really missed them.

It just so happened that he had just finished dealing with the Toyota Motor issue in Japan, and as for the Southern Company's affairs, he could safely hand it over to Toshifumi Suzuki.

After all, he had acquired Lawson, so Toshifumi Suzuki now only needed to take care of the final details.

As for the Japanese branch of the Jardine Matheson Group, Lin Haoran has already explained everything that needs to be explained to Fok Kin Ning. Next, Fok Kin Ning will develop the Japanese branch of the Jardine Matheson Group step by step and continuously expand its market share.

Moreover, he has been in Japan for 4 months, and it is time for him to go back to Hong Kong. At least he doesn't have to worry about Japan for the time being.

With nearly 300 billion yen in cash as support for development, and the backing of Citibank, there shouldn't be any major problems with development in Japan in the short term.

Since it was confirmed that he would return to Hong Kong in two days, during these two days, Lin Haoran had in-depth communication and exchanges with his generals including Huo Jianning and Suzuki Toshifumi.

On the morning of May 5, Anton Allison returned to Hong Kong from the United States.

When he came back, he also brought the person in charge of Lawson convenience store with him.

That afternoon, Southern Company, which had been well prepared, specially invited many media reporters to officially announce that Southern Company had officially acquired Lawson Convenience Store.

When this matter reached Dayong Company, the other party couldn't even imagine that it was true.

They had just started to receive capital injection and were preparing to compete with 711- convenience stores for franchisees, but in the end they found that their own nest had been stolen?
The Lawson convenience store brand now belongs to Southern Company, the parent company of its competitor 711 convenience stores. So how can they compete with 711 convenience stores for franchisees?

Not only does Lawson USA hold a 35% stake in Lawson Japan, it also has firm control over the convenience store supply chain.

Now, after Southern Company acquired Lawson, these 35% shares and all the supply chains of Lawson convenience stores were naturally transferred to Southern Company.

One of their greatest reliances suddenly changed hands, and the top management of Dayong Company was in chaos.

They held an emergency meeting to discuss countermeasures, but the situation had already gotten out of control, and the previously formulated strategy to compete with 711-Eleven convenience stores instantly lost its foundation.

Now, the only thing we can do is sit down and have a good talk with Southern Company to discuss how to develop in the future.

Lawson has become a subsidiary of Southern Company, and they still want to continue their previous vicious competition strategy, which is totally inappropriate.

In their current situation, they have no choice but to bow their heads.

Otherwise, after the agency rights expire, Southern Company can forcibly take back the agency rights of Lawson convenience stores.

By then, Dayong Company would have lost everything.

When Jardine Matheson learned about this, they couldn't believe it.

They had just invested in Lawson's Japanese branch, but it ended up being acquired by their mortal enemy Lin Haoran.

Their original plan was to support Lawson in competing with 711, making money while also disgusting Lin Haoran.

But now that Lawson has been acquired by Lin Haoran, there is naturally no competition anymore.

The choice before Jardine Matheson was either to withdraw its investment or to retain its shares.

But keeping the shares is equivalent to cooperating with Lin Haoran.

The top management of Jardine Matheson probably couldn't stand this. They hated Lin Haoran for a long time.

Lin Haoran didn't pay too much attention to all this. He didn't take either Jardine Matheson or Dayong Company seriously.

He had already had detailed discussions with Toshifumi Suzuki, who naturally knew how to handle the relationship with Lawson's Japanese branch.

After Anton Allison returned to Japan, Lin Haoran had a private talk with him. In the end, although he was somewhat unwilling, he still agreed. He would take over all the business of Lawson convenience stores, while Suzuki Toshifumi would be in charge of the Southern Company.

After everything was settled, Lin Haoran could return to Hong Kong with peace of mind.

At 5 am on May 26, a private plane took off from Tokyo International Airport.

This time when returning to Hong Kong, Keiko Yamada did not go back with them, but stayed in Japan.

Although Yamada Keiko wanted to go back with her, Lin Haoran had no such plan. If he took her back with him, wouldn't Guan Jiahui, Guo Xiaohan and the others be jealous?

After more than four hours, the plane landed smoothly at Hong Kong's Kai Tak International Airport.

Stepping off the plane, Lin Haoran looked at the familiar Victoria Harbor scenery not far away, and a feeling of emotion welled up in his heart. After several months away, Hong Kong was still prosperous. (End of this chapter)