Chapter 371 Specialization in the art industry

The next morning, Lin Haoran left home early and went straight to Kangle Building.

Soon, he arrived at Ma Shiming’s office.

“Boss, are you really planning to return Jardine Matheson to that British financial group?” Ma Shiming couldn’t wait to ask as soon as he saw Lin Haoran.

Now, as the head of the management of the Landmark Group, he was naturally the first to know about such a big thing happening in the Governor’s Mansion.

“It is not impossible to consider transferring the controlling stake of Jardine Matheson to them. Mr. Ma, what do you think is the value of Jardine Matheson compared to the Jardine Matheson Group?” Lin Haoran suddenly asked this question.

Lin Haoran’s question left Ma Shiming speechless for a moment, and he fell into deep thought.

After careful consideration, Ma Shiming said: “The value of the Hong Kong Land Group is much greater than that of Jardine Matheson! I have worked in Jardine Matheson for more than ten years and am very familiar with the whole process of Jardine Matheson.

Today, the biggest advantage of Jardine Matheson is that it has done well in the internationalization path and has a very good international reputation. However, according to the annual financial statements, many of the companies that Jardine Matheson has invested in internationally actually suffer losses, and they often do so.

All in all, the profits that Jardine Matheson Group earns from its overseas subsidiaries each year are actually not that much. Instead, the profits generated for it by Jardine Matheson Group’s Hong Kong subsidiaries, such as Jardine Matheson Holdings, Jardine Matheson Securities, Wharf Holdings, and Gammon Construction, are higher.

However, now that it has lost Wharf Holdings and Hong Kong Land Development, Jardine Matheson’s own strength has been greatly reduced. Its own strength is naturally much worse than that of Hong Kong Land Development. It can be seen from the market value on the stock market that the market value of Jardine Matheson is much lower than that of Hong Kong Land Development! “

After listening to Ma Shiming’s views, Lin Haoran couldn’t help but nod in agreement, secretly admiring in his heart that in his previous life, he was worthy of being one of Li Jiacheng’s right-hand men. Ma Shiming’s views really made him satisfied.

It was a wise decision to invite Ma Shiming back from Singapore.

If you ask others, they may not be able to get such profound insights.

“Mr. Ma, you also know that now that I have been united by various forces, I may have to give up my controlling stake in Jardine Matheson & Co., which makes it impossible for me to fulfill my previous promise to you to hand over the management of Jardine Matheson & Co. to you.

But please rest assured, no matter what, I will always leave the control of the Hong Kong Land Group in your hands. Now I have an idea. I want to take advantage of their eagerness to regain the controlling stake in Jardine Matheson to privatize the Hong Kong Land Group. What do you think of this idea? “Lin Haoran asked with a smile.

“I’ve lost control of Jardine Matheson, but I’m already very satisfied with being able to manage the Hong Kong Land Group. In the past, even Mr. Niu Bijian rarely took care of the affairs of the Hong Kong Land Group. Usually, he would only discuss with Mr. Bao Fuda when encountering major events. Most of the time, Mr. Bao Fuda made his own decisions in the Hong Kong Land Group. Therefore, my work is already very fulfilling as long as I manage the Hong Kong Land Group.

But, boss, are you really going to privatize Hong Kong Land? I don’t think it’s necessary. Hong Kong Land’s market value is as high as more than 10 billion Hong Kong dollars. Even though it has fallen since you took over, it is still stable at about 10 billion Hong Kong dollars. It is quite difficult to privatize it.

More importantly, as a listed company, Hong Kong Land can share a lot of risks with you. Once privatized, you will need to bear greater risks alone. “Ma Shiming expressed his confusion and concern about the privatization plan of Hong Kong Land proposed by Lin Haoran.

In his opinion, privatizing the Hutchison Whampoa Group, which has such a huge market value, is obviously not a wise choice.

Those British financial groups always hope to control more power with fewer shares.

For example, Halil Sento, the former chairman of Qingzhou Cement Company, and the Keswick family, the largest British shareholder of Jardine Matheson, only held a dozen percentage points of shares, but they all tried to take full control of the entire company.

Their purpose is obvious, which is to obtain the greatest benefit at the lowest cost and lowest risk.

But his boss wanted to do the opposite, which was something Ma Shiming didn’t understand.

As a British, Ma Shiming naturally learned Western management knowledge.

Aren’t business owners all about getting the most profit with the least risk?
However, Lin Haoran did not intend to explain too much in this regard.

Only he knows how terrifying the future development of Hong Kong real estate will be.

In other words, according to the future development trend of Hong Kong real estate, the Swire Group will not have any risks at all!
In this case, continuing to maintain the status of the Swire Properties as a listed company and allowing so many people to hold shares is nothing more than distributing money to everyone.

Even if he, as the boss, could use his status as a controlling shareholder to gain more benefits, he would still have to give away a lot in the end.

Unless he takes a criminal path and embezzles all the profits.

With his current abilities, he is unwilling to commit crimes. This kind of thing can easily give others a handle on him, so there is no need for it.

Therefore, since the Swire Properties Group does not have any risks and will only be a huge gold mine in the future, continuously creating countless wealth for him, it would be a pity not to privatize such an enterprise.

He wants to privatize anything that can generate huge cash flow for it.

Just like the China Gas Company, if it were not for the fact that it was a public utility listed company that could not be privatized, he would have wanted to privatize the China Gas Company long ago.

Because he knew that the earning power of China Gas Company was even much higher than that of Hong Kong Electric Group. These public utility listed companies could almost be called companies that made money without doing anything. No matter what happened in the market, they would not be affected at all.

Since listed public utilities such as Towngas and Hong Kong Electric cannot be privatized, then it should be possible for him to privatize Hongkong Land, a company that can also make money without doing anything in the future, right?

Although it seems too difficult to privatize the Jardine Matheson Group now.

The difficulty mainly comes from funding.

Once he raises enough funds, there will basically be no problem in privatizing the Hutchison Whampoa Group.

The difficulty now lies in the funding issue.

He needed to raise several billion Hong Kong dollars in a short period of time. Although it was not difficult for him, he could just take out a loan directly.

But is it worth it to accumulate so much debt in a short period of time?
This is a problem that Lin Haoran has to face.

After all, even he could not guarantee that he would be able to raise tens of billions of Hong Kong dollars to repay this debt next year.

“Mr. Ma, I am full of confidence in the future of Hong Kong Land. If Hong Kong Land, like the British-owned consortium, starts to invest and develop blindly, causing the debt of Hong Kong Land to increase, I will definitely not think of privatizing it.

But now, under my taking over, the Jardine Matheson Group has suspended its decision to expand aggressively. The debt ratio of the Jardine Matheson Group is now very good. In this situation, I am naturally not afraid of any risks that the Jardine Matheson Group can bring to me.

Mr. Ma is probably worried that the real estate bubble will break out again in Hong Kong, right? Even if there is a real estate crisis similar to that in 1973 in the future, in my opinion, the real estate industry in Hong Kong will soon recover and have greater room for development, just like in 1973 and 1974.

Therefore, as long as the Landmark Group maintains a low debt ratio, I am not afraid of any real estate crisis!” Lin Haoran continued.

Ma Shiming nodded and replied, “This kind of thing is not within my scope of management. You have to make the decision yourself, boss. I can only give you some advice. Since you are full of confidence in the future of the Hong Kong Land Group, I will not dissuade you.”

“The main difficulty I am facing now is that the amount of funds that need to be raised is huge, which makes me very conflicted. If I want to privatize the Hong Kong Land Group, I must raise billions of Hong Kong dollars in a short period of time. Therefore, I am thinking about how to reduce the amount of funds that need to be raised in order to achieve the goal of privatizing the Hong Kong Land Group.” Lin Haoran sighed and continued.

The pressure of raising billions of Hong Kong dollars in a short period of time is indeed huge. It would be great if it could be reduced.

“Boss, you Chinese people have an old saying that ‘every profession has its own specialties’. For issues like this involving billions of Hong Kong dollars, I suggest you consult a financial expert. I am mainly responsible for grasping the general direction of the company and planning the future development of the group.” Ma Shiming said with a smile.

Financial expert?

After hearing what Ma Shiming said, Lin Haoran couldn’t help but fall into deep thought.

Speaking of which, the financial expert who impressed him the most should be Huo Jianning.

This general, who is also Li Jiacheng’s right-hand man in another world, is actually from the finance field.

Moreover, he had read the introduction of Huo Jianning, and found that Huo Jianning not only had great talent in finance, but also had a strong talent in negotiation.

In this case, why not ask Huo Jianning for advice, and at the same time test him to see if he has any good ideas.

He has been training Fok Kin Ning for more than a year. At first, he let Fok Kin Ning serve as the financial director of Ching Chau Cement Company, and later transferred him to Hong Kong Electric Group. Now Fok Kin Ning also holds an important position in Hong Kong Electric Group.

However, Huo Jianning has been in the training stage, and Lin Haoran has not paid much attention to his recent situation.

It’s time to examine his performance.

Although Huo Jianning is only 29 years old now, in the business world, many successful entrepreneurs have also started to emerge in their twenties.

If it can be seen this time that Huo Jianning’s abilities have improved significantly, then we can consider transferring him to a higher position.

Even letting him take charge of a company is not impossible.

After all, as the number of companies he controlled increased, the problem of lack of capable assistants became increasingly prominent.

It would be great if Huo Jianning could become his right-hand man as soon as possible.

(End of this chapter)