Chapter 380: Unequal Treaties, the Highest Level of Freeloading!
The next morning, Lin Haoran appeared at Jardine Matheson again with his bodyguards.

There are a lot of things to deal with this time.

However, most of the work does not need to be done by him personally, but is done by Ma Shiming, the head of the group.

As for Lin Haoran, his job was to sign various agreed terms with the British financial group Jardine Matheson.

As the boss of Jardine Matheson, Niu Bijian also played an important role in this incident.

In the conference room on the 19th floor of Jardine House, Lin Haoran, Ma Shiming, Fok Kin Ning and the legal team of the Hong Kong Land Group were sitting on one side of the conference table.

On the other side of the conference table, Henry Keswick, Niu Bijian and other representatives of the British financial group sat opposite each other.

Even the four British shareholders of the Hong Kong Land Group appeared on the scene at this moment.

Although Lin Haoran was not clear about what promises Henry Keswick and others had made to them that persuaded them to willingly sell their shares in the Hutchison Whampoa Group to Lin Haoran, these had nothing to do with Lin Haoran. He only needed to sign a contract with these four people and purchase the shares in the Hutchison Whampoa Group they held.

Lin Haoran even saw Bao Fuda, whom he had not seen for a long time. It was obvious that the former executive director and general manager of the Landmark Group had been called back by Henry Keswick.

Compared with Niu Bijian, Bao Fuda obviously listens to Keswick more. Now that he is about to regain the controlling stake in Jardine Matheson, Henry Keswick naturally called him back.

Outside the window, you can see the bustling scenery of Hong Kong, but the atmosphere inside is a little solemn.

Lin Haoran held the contracts prepared by Jardine Matheson and confirmed the terms with the other party one by one.

The signing of each contract means that part of the assets or rights of Jardine Matheson or its British shareholders has officially changed hands, and the beneficiaries are naturally the Hong Kong Land Group and Lin Haoran.

The legal advisor of the Jardine Mathematics Group and Ma Shiming had come ahead of time and had already reviewed these contracts in detail, but Lin Haoran was still worried and read them again.

After all, the interests involved in these contracts are not small.

First, the four British shareholders of the Hong Kong Land Group signed a contract to transfer each other’s shares.

The four British shareholders together hold 10.2% of the shares of the Hong Kong Land Development. For these four contracts, Lin Haoran will eventually need to spend HK$10.42 billion.

The four British shareholders signed their names readily, and Lin Haoran also signed his name slowly.

After acquiring these 10.2% shares, together with the 41.3% previously held by Universal Investment Company, the 6% held by Hong Kong Electric Group, and the 0.85% shares acquired from the stock market two days ago, Lin Haoran actually already controls 58.35% of the shares of the Hong Kong Land Development.

Next came the agreement to transfer controlling stake in the Mandarin Oriental and Oriental International Hotel brands from Jardine Matheson back to Hong Kong Land, and a statement of support for Hong Kong Land’s privatization.

Next up is the controlling stake in Kwai Chung Pier No. 5, which the Hong Kong Land Group will acquire from Jardine Matheson for HK$1 million!

……

With the signing of each contract and the implementation of each clause, Lin Haoran felt relieved.

On the other hand, the British financial group, including Henry Keswick, Niu Bijian and others, all seemed to have bleeding hearts.

Although today is a day worth celebrating, it means that once everything is settled, Jardine Matheson will return to their hands.

But Jardine Matheson lost too much.

This is simply an unequal treaty.

But what else could he do? Even so, he had to use the face of the British royal family before Lin Haoran finally gave up Jardine Matheson.

Otherwise, let alone losing it, they would not even be qualified to sign these unequal treaties because Lin Haoran was unwilling to give up Jardine Matheson.

“Mr. Lin, everything that should be signed has been signed. Can we sign these two contracts next?” Henry Keswick handed the two contracts to Lin Haoran and said expectantly.

One of the two contracts was for Lin Haoran to transfer his 19% stake in Jardine Matheson for HK$19 billion; the other was for Jardine Matheson and the Hong Kong Land Group to exchange each other’s shares.

After both parties take back their shares from each other, there will no longer be any affiliation between Jardine Matheson and Swire Properties.

These two conditions are actually unequal treaties. For example, the sale of 19% of Jardine Matheson shares for HK$19 billion is obviously much higher than the market price.

In addition, the value of the shares of Jardine Matheson Holdings held by Hutchison Whampoa is more than HK$5 million higher than the value of the shares of Jardine Matheson Holdings held by Hutchison Whampoa Group.

But Henry Keswick had no choice. Now that these conditions had finally convinced all the British shareholders behind Jardine Matheson, it would naturally be better to sign the two shares as soon as possible.

Because after signing, it means that Lin Haoran has completely severed his relationship with Jardine Matheson and will no longer indirectly control Jardine Matheson through the Hong Kong Land Group.

This is also what Henry Keswick is most looking forward to.

As long as you sign it, the short-term losses won’t matter!

In the future, he is confident that he can once again develop Jardine Matheson through the many subsidiaries controlled overseas! “Of course, Mr. Henry is straightforward, so there is no reason for me to drag my feet!” Lin Haoran laughed.

Immediately afterwards, Lin Haoran signed two contracts with Henry Keswick and James Rothschild respectively.

Naturally, the Keswick family does not have the strength to take over all of this 19% stake.

Therefore, they had no choice but to give up part of their shares to the Rothschild family.

In the end, the Keswick family used HK$10 billion to seize 10% of Jardine Matheson shares from Lin Haoran, while the Rothschild family acquired another 9% of the shares, also spending HK$9 million.

On the other hand, Niu Bijian, representing Jardine Matheson, and Ma Sai Ming, representing the Hong Kong Land Development, also signed an agreement to return shares to each other without incurring any fees.

This contract also has a supplementary agreement, on which a board meeting of Jardine Matheson & Co. was convened by British shareholders led by Henry Keswick, including the Bank of England, and the transaction was ultimately approved unanimously.

This will ensure that they will not regret it in the future.

It would certainly not be possible for Niu Bijian alone to sign the contract on behalf of Jardine Matheson.

As for the Jardine Matheson Group, it was enough for Lin Haoran to agree.

What’s more, this contract is beneficial to the Jardine Matheson Group, so there is naturally no question of going back on its word.

After signing both contracts, Lin Haoran smiled and shook hands with Henry Keswick, saying, “Mr. Henry, congratulations on regaining your position as the major shareholder of Jardine Matheson!”

“Congratulations to Mr. Lin on making further progress in privatizing the Hong Kong Land Group!” Henry Keswick also smiled rarely.

The 10% stake that the Keswick family took from Lin Haoran meant that the Keswick family’s stake in Jardine Matheson had increased from around 12% to around 22%, making them the undisputed major shareholder of Jardine Matheson and the only shareholder in Jardine Matheson who held more than 10% of the shares.

In addition, the Keswick family already has many supporters in the British financial group itself, so compared with the past, the Keswick family now has a stronger controlling stake in Jardine Matheson.

Moreover, according to Lin Haoran’s understanding, Jardine Matheson will not raise external funds for the 30.1% shares it has taken back from the Hong Kong Land Group, but plans to return these shares to the melting pot and disappear completely. In this way, the 22% shares held by the Keswick family will increase to about 30.1% as these 31.5% shares disappear.

In this way, the Keswick family’s controlling stake in Jardine Matheson became more secure.

This is probably why the Keswick family dared to bring in the Rothschild family, the squid consortium!
The Keswick family had no choice but to make such a decision.

The Keswick family was not on good terms with the British shareholders behind Huifeng Bank, and he was also afraid that Huifeng would seize controlling rights in the future.

Therefore, it was extremely difficult for the Keswick family to find a powerful consortium to take over part of Lin Haoran’s shares.

The Rothschild family happened to have this strength. Although their relationship with the Squid Consortium was not very good, after being brought in, it would at least form a three-way balance of power, thus preventing the Bank of Hong Kong from increasing its controlling stake in Jardine Matheson.

The most important thing is that the Keswick family has an absolute advantage. Even if the Rothschild family and Huifeng Bank temporarily unite, their equity will not be higher than that of the Keswick family.

So they are very relieved.

However, all this has little to do with Lin Haoran.

After fleecing Jardine Matheson, Lin Haoran’s next move was to set his sights on the 30.2% stake that the Swire Properties Group had taken back from Jardine Matheson.

Today, Lin Haoran already controls 58.35% of the shares of the Hutchison Whampoa Group, exceeding the trigger point of 50%. Even if he is unwilling, he needs to initiate an application for the privatization of the Hutchison Whampoa Group.

The 30.2% shares returned by Jardine Matheson are still in an ownerless state. Next, it will either continue to raise funds or do as Jardine Matheson planned for its shares.

Lin Haoran naturally chose to continue raising funds and buy these 30.2% of the shares. As long as he acquired this part of the shares, the shares of the Jardine Matheson Group held by Lin Haoran would reach 88.55%.

The funds he used to purchase these 30.2% shares will still remain in the account of the Swire Group in the future.

Next, he only needs to wait for the privatization to be completed, and the funds in the account of the Jardine Matheson Group will naturally belong to him, Lin Haoran alone.

This may be the highest level of getting shares for free!

As the contract was successfully signed by both parties, warm applause broke out at the scene.

Although on the surface the others did not appear to benefit directly from these contracts, it was clear that Henry Keswick had promised various benefits to each of them.

Therefore, strictly speaking, no one loses.

Lin Haoran is undoubtedly the biggest winner in this cooperation.

Henry Keswick took this opportunity to regain control of Jardine Matheson, although they had to sacrifice some of their vested interests for this purpose.

(End of this chapter)