Chapter 624: Calculation and Shock

Xiangjiang Xuechang Street No. 6, Xueyan Building.

This building is not outstanding in this area, and its total height can only be considered medium to high.

However, almost everyone of status in Hong Kong knows this building, especially those in charge of the financial branches of the UK, US and other countries in Hong Kong.

This is because there is a big Buddha living in this building – Rothschild & Sons Hong Kong Limited.

Although Rothschild & Sons is only considered to be upper-middle class in terms of capital in the Hong Kong financial sector, its deep background cannot be concealed. The name Rothschild is a gold signboard in the eyes of those who know what is good.

Xia Yu knew about this company, but he never took the initiative to get in touch with them, and he even hoped that they would ignore him.

It wasn't that Xia Yu was afraid of them, but he knew that before he became stronger and could protect himself, there would be great disadvantages to getting in touch with them.

After all, through those memories, Xia Yu understood very well their hypocrisy, greed, and brutality.

However, Xia Yu did not want to take the initiative to contact them, but he could not prevent the Rothschilds from wanting to contact him.

At this time, Charles Rothschild, in his fifties, and his son Sean Rothschild, in his thirties, were sitting face to face.

'Father, this is the 3.1% stake taken from the Kadoorie family,'

Sean Rothschild handed his father the file bag.

Charles Rothschild glanced at it and then put it down again.

The Rothschild family was not lacking in intelligence. In London, they had noticed George Berkeley's contact with Burton Keswick, and had thus learned that Xia Yu was eyeing Hongkong Land.

The Rothschild family, which had originally planned to find a suitable opportunity to get in touch with Xia Yu, immediately told Charles Rothschild to start working on this.

Without clashing with Xia Yu, Charles Rothschild came up with the idea of buying what Xia Yu wanted and waiting for Xia Yu to come to him.

After some screening, the Rothschilds took a fancy to the 3.1% stake in the Hongkong Land Group held by the Kadoorie Family Investment Company.

The Kadoorie family is of Jewish descent, and the Rothschilds can be said to be the top Jewish family, the Jewish royal family.

So when Sean Rothschild came knocking, Rowland Kadoorie easily transferred the stake in Hongkong Land he held.

However, the Land Group is huge after all, and even 3.1% of the equity is still worth nearly 200 million Hong Kong dollars at market value.

Although the Rothschilds were able to come up with the money, they didn't feel the need to do so, as they were going to sell the shares soon anyway. So they approached HSBC and leveraged ten times the financial leverage to acquire the Kadoorie family's stake.

'Father, what should we do next?'

Sean Rothschild asked Charles Rothschild, his head slightly bowed.

Charles Rothschild's eyes flashed with a look of thought, and he said lightly, 'Once we have the shares, we will have the initiative. Next, you go to the stock exchange and update the shareholding information, and then we just wait for his people to come knocking on our door.'

Once the Rothschilds and their subsidiaries disclosed their 3.1% stake, it would definitely attract the attention of the hunters scrambling for the shares of the Hongkong Land Group. As long as Xia Yu wanted Hongkong Land, he would definitely come knocking on their door.

Waiting for the prey to come knocking on the door was not much different.

Sean Rothschild thought for a moment and nodded: 'That's right, Dick Keswick and Phil Keswick will not easily sell their shares, and it will be very difficult for Xia Yu to take them down. As for the shares of the other two members of the Keswick family, he may have already taken them down, but there are many people eyeing Hongkong Land, and it will be difficult for him to acquire two-thirds of the shares again to force a privatisation.'

'Then father, the share price of Hongkong Land is still going up, should we continue to acquire some?'

Charles Rothschild casually said, 'Do as you like, but keep a good grasp of the price. The more shares of Hongkong Land you can get, the better.'

'I know.'

...

In the afternoon, in the chairman's office of the Jiuding Building, Bao Yugang and Huo Yingdong paid a joint visit, and Xia Yu served them tea personally.

Just as he took a sip of tea, Bao Yugang could no longer contain his curiosity and asked, 'Yu, is Bright Foundation your company?'

Fok Ying Tung also quietly put down his teacup and looked at Xia Yu.

Although Bright Foundation was exposed in the stock exchange yesterday, the Keswick family did not request a board meeting, and it was not appropriate for Bao Yugang and Fok Ying Tung to ask Xia Yu on the phone, so they came together today to ask for clarification.

If Bright Foundation is Xia Yu's, that would be great, but if not, they will discuss face-to-face how to respond.

After all, the three of them had previously discussed taking action against the Land Group.

The two of them have also been making moves behind the scenes, which were only exposed yesterday.

Originally, Bao Yugang and Huo Yingdong's companies each held 3.2% and 3% of the equity of the Land Group, but after discussing taking action against the Land Group, the two secretly acquired equity without being discovered, and now the two of them have their shareholding ratio increased to 5.9% and 5.7% respectively.

They can now apply to the board of directors of Hongkong Land to give them two additional director seats.

Previously, neither of their shareholdings exceeded 5%, and according to the regulations of Hong Kong's listed company regulations, neither of them could recommend a director.

However, in response to this situation, Hong Kong also has a cumulative voting system, also known as a joint voting system. This system is designed to protect the rights and interests of minority shareholders. As long as the voting rights of minority shareholders combined exceed 5%, they can also jointly recommend a director.

Before this, in order to achieve their own goals and protect their own interests, the voting rights of the shares of Bao Yugang and Huo Yingdong were used together, and they jointly recommended a director to represent the interests of the two of them.

Not only that, excluding the Keswick family, apart from the Swire Group, which has a 5.4% shareholding and a single director seat, all other Chinese tycoons jointly recommend directors.

Cheng Yutong's New World Development holds 3.7%, Lee Shau Kee's Henderson Land Development holds 3.4%, and Li Ka-shing's Cheung Kong Holdings holds 3.1%. The three of them jointly own two director seats.

Stanley Ho's Shun Tak Group holds 2.3%, and the Ho family, one of the four oldest families in Hong Kong, also known as Stanley Ho's main family, holds 3.7%. The two of them jointly hold one director seat.

Hopewell Holdings, owned by the Woo family, holds 3.6%, and Sun Hung Kai, owned by Kwok Tak-sing, holds 3.2%, and the two companies jointly hold one seat on the board.

In other words, when Hongkong Land was being besieged last year, more than 29.2% of the shares were in the hands of Chinese tycoons. Although they were very dispersed, after joining forces, the Chinese capital still had five seats on the board of Hongkong Land, with considerable power of speech and influence.

And now their shareholding ratio has increased again, so the combined shareholding of the Chinese capital in the Hongkong Land Group has reached 34.6%.

If it turns out that the Bright Foundation that has been exposed is Xia Yu's, then the shareholding ratio of the Chinese capital camp will reach 45.1%.

On the contrary, the Keswick family, which has lost 10.5% of its shareholding, will see its shareholding ratio fall to 41.8%.

What this meant was clear to Bao Yugang and Huo Yingdong, which was why they had come over to ask them directly.

While everyone else was still investigating the background of Guangming Fund, the first thought that came to Bao Yugang and Huo Yingdong was that this company belonged to Xia Yu.

Looking at the twinkling eyes of the two men, Xia Yu gave a faint smile and nodded, saying, 'Yes, this company is mine.'

'And!'

As soon as these words came out, the two men's spirits lifted, and they looked at Xia Yu with burning eyes, a possibility coming to mind.

Xia Yu continued, 'The Bright Foundation's shareholding is not the 10.5% that has been made public. I have also taken over the shares held by Claude Keske and Rodney Keske.'

Bao Yu's eyes widened. He knew the shareholding structure of the Hongkong Land Group like the back of his hand, and quickly did some calculations in his mind. He said in surprise, 'So you already hold 31.7% of Hongkong Land Group's shares?'

Huo Yingdong was also shocked to hear this figure. He asked in disbelief, 'Yu, is this true?'

Xia Yu smiled and nodded, then shook his head and said, 'Not 31.7%, but 33.8%. Previously, I asked my subordinates to acquire a total of 2.1% of the shares from the secondary market for me.'