Hong Kong 1980: The Savage Era

Chapter 405 Chapter 406 [Failed Again]

Mid April

Li Jiacheng and other major Chinese investors decided not to continue the dispute and wanted to have a formal showdown with Simon Keswick.

Rumor has it that, under the arrangement of Matheson, who used to be the managing director of Hutchison Whampoa of the Jardine Matheson Group, Jardine's chairman Simon Keswick, Jardine's managing director Steve Boyce, Jardine Fleming's managing director Frederick Smith and other Jardine's senior executives, at the invitation of Li Ka-shing, went to the Hutchison Conference Room of Hutchison House in Central to hold a meeting with Chinese tycoons including Cheung Kong Chairman Li Ka-shing, Henderson Land Development Chairman Li Zhaoji, New World Development Chairman Cheng Yu-tung and CITIC Fortune Chairman Rong Zhijian. Nearly 30 people attended the meeting, and the scene was extremely grand.

At the meeting, Li Jiacheng expressed his hope to acquire the 15% stake in Hutchison Whampoa held by Jardine Matheson at a price of HK$25.3 per share.

Li Jiacheng's suggestion was naturally rejected by Simon Keswick. Simon Keswick hoped that the purchase price could be raised to 21 yuan per share, which was the price of the stock market crash, on the grounds that the asset value and rent of the Hong Kong Land Company had not decreased.

Li Jiacheng refused, but also raised the purchase price to 16 yuan per share. Of course, Ximen refused.

Li Jiacheng was very smart. He immediately asked Simon Keswick to buy the shares held by their Chinese financial consortium at the same price. However, Simon Keswick did not react enthusiastically.

Although the negotiations failed, the Chinese financial consortium did not delay and launched a full acquisition at 15 yuan per share the next day.

Dean Securities Investment Company Office

"Husband, your calculation was wrong. The Chinese financial group has launched a comprehensive acquisition." Bai Jinyan smiled and placed the newsprint in front of Luo Qihong.

This was a rare time for her to see Luo Qihong miscalculate.

Luo Qihong laughed and said, "Don't you understand this trick? Li Jiacheng was unwilling to attack head-on in the early stage. The current attack is just the result of failed negotiations, or he wants Jardine Strategy Company to buy the shares of Hong Kong Land in their hands at a high price."

"With such a large amount of stocks involving several Chinese companies, Li Jiacheng certainly doesn't want everyone's investment to suffer losses. Even if he can't take over the Hong Kong Land, he should exit with a profit."

"You mean to say that the stock price is just a false rise and will soon plummet?" Bai Jinyan is quite good at securities investment, but unfortunately he is still a little lacking in acquisitions.

"You see, Simon Keswick will soon find Li Jiacheng to renegotiate, and the shares held by the Chinese consortium will definitely be sold to Jardine Strategy, and that weird agreement will also be signed by Li Jiacheng." Luo Qihong said with a sneer.

Such tricks have been played out so many times, but some investors still believe in them. Is it really just greed?

There is certainly nothing unfair to the stock investors here. To put it bluntly, stock and securities investment is a gamble, and winning or losing depends on your own ability and luck.

There is no way I can help losing everything.

"Forget it, let's not be greedy, otherwise we will fall into those people's trap." Bai Jinyan sighed.

The acquisition was done by a Chinese-funded consortium, so of course the stock price was decided by the Chinese-funded consortium. Bai Jinyan was just a small investor.

"In fact, Li Jiacheng and his team only hold 8% of the shares of the Landmark Company. It is clear that they have no confidence in acquiring the Landmark Company. They are just testing the determination of the Keswick family." Luo Qihong smiled slightly. "Now that they know that Ximen is unwilling to sell the Landmark Company, it is not surprising that they choose to retreat."

"What created the market's illusion is that the Chinese consortium is too big. If we calculate the market value of the companies owned by those few people, it would probably account for more than 15% of the Hong Kong stock market. This is such a huge force, so the outside world thinks the consortium can succeed in the acquisition."

After Luo Qihong's analysis, Bai Jinyan suddenly realized that it was his own cognition that deceived him.

According to market research, the market value of listed companies owned by the Luo Qihong family accounts for 5.6% of the total value of the Hong Kong stock market, which is 9.7 billion yuan less than the 246% owned by the Li Jiacheng family.

This is only on the surface. Li Jiacheng's private company is far smaller than Luo Qihong's, such as Dehe Real Estate Company's assets worth tens of billions and De'an Securities Investment Company's total investment value of over 10 billion.

Adding all these together, the wealth of the two families is actually not much different. "It seems that this acquisition will fail again." Bai Jinyan sighed, "It's really difficult to successfully acquire the Landmark Company."

Luo Qihong smiled and said, "Of course it is difficult to acquire. Even now, Hong Kong Land is still the leader of Hong Kong real estate, and Cheung Kong Holdings has not surpassed it yet."

"Besides, this is the last bit of face left for the British. Unless we have more than 2 billion yuan in cash and use the money to stun the Keswick family and scare them, our chances of winning are not high."

"Why do I feel that you are the leader of Hong Kong Real Estate Company?" Bai Jinyan actually made such a bold statement.

"Ahem!" Luo Qihong was choked by the water. After a while, he calmed down and then continued, "You underestimate the Hong Kong Land Company. The 11 commercial buildings in Central alone are worth nearly 2 billion yuan. How can our family beat them?"

"Really?" Bai Jinyan still didn't believe it and stared at Luo Qihong seriously.

Luo Qihong nodded seriously, "For now, of course, it's hard to say in the future."

"Can we snatch something more from the Landmark Company?" Bai Jinyan seemed very obsessed with the title of first.

Luo Qihong shook his head. "It's difficult. We don't like other properties, and we don't want to sell the properties in Central."

"Well, what a pity." Bai Jinyan said.

We couldn’t get much benefit from attacking the Jardine Matheson Group last time, let alone getting a bargain.

As Luo Qihong expected, 11 days later, Jardine Matheson Strategic Holdings announced that it would spend 18.34 billion yuan to purchase 8% of the shares of Hutchison Whampoa held by the four major consortiums. At the same time, Jardine Matheson Chairman Simon Keswick said: Jardine Matheson will not sell Hutchison Whampoa because Hutchison Whampoa is an "irreplaceable work of art".

Jardines spent 18.34 billion yuan this time in the hope of clearing away all speculations at once and demonstrating Jardines's long-term investment banner.

As soon as the announcement was made, the share price of Swire Properties began to fall, but the decline was not large, after all, it had strong assets as a foundation.

Bai Jinyan was also very happy because she made over 100 million yuan in profit from this battle, which was no less than what any of the four major conglomerates earned.

Compared with the performance of the four major conglomerates, Hong Kong Dragon Airlines has fallen into crisis and is being suppressed by Cathay Pacific Airways. Now, three years have passed, and the situation has not changed much.

Although Dragonair received official approval from China and Hong Kong in September to operate irregular charter flights between Hong Kong and Beijing, and between Hong Kong and Shanghai, its hopes of turning losses into profits are slim.

The Swire family was very cunning. In 87, seeing that Dragonair was about to take off, they immediately issued new shares to mainland state-owned enterprises, giving Cathay Pacific a mainland background, while Dragonair's advantages disappeared.

Such an operation proves that Dragonair is no longer able to recover.

However, Dragonair is small in scale and can still be profitable, it just depends on how it is operated.

In fact, when Luo Qihong met with Pao Yue-kong, Pao Yue-kong had already revealed that he wanted to sell Dragonair's shares, and he saw no chance of Dragonair winning.

Luo Qihong is naturally not in a hurry. He only holds more than 1% of Dragonair's shares, so even if he loses money, it is no big deal.

Luo Qihong really wanted to help Cao Guangbiao for a simple reason. Cao Guangbiao knew that it would be difficult for Dragonair to make a comeback, but he still tried his best to support it. This was a kind of patriotic sentiment.

But Luo Qihong's business philosophy told him that he could do a business that would lose money, but he could not do a business that would lose money all the time.

(End of this chapter)