Before you know it, it's March.

When he opened the calendar shelf on the desktop at home, Xia Yu had a feeling that time had flown by.

It seems that in the blink of an eye, I have been in France for more than three months......

When he was leisurely eating breakfast and reading the newspaper, suddenly Li Wuming came over with a sealed envelope and whispered a few words in Xia Yu's ear.

Xia Yu's eyes flashed, then he opened the envelope and took out the information inside to browse.

The information is sent by the net, and generally there is a big event, or something he orders to pay attention to, and the net will continue to send the information to him.

This kind of secret intelligence, combined with the news sent by Jiuding News Agency, can allow Xia Yu to have a clear context of major events around the world, so as to better formulate strategies or give instructions.

Today's intelligence is important, and the intelligence comes from New York, USA.

Argentine President Galtieri led a delegation to the United States and was received by Ronald Reagan.

Combined with information received on 16 February, the Argentine Foreign Minister and the British Foreign Minister negotiated in New York, which eventually broke down.

There is no doubt that when the last negotiation broke down, Galtieri could no longer sit still and wanted to conflict with Britain, but he lacked confidence in his heart, so he hoped to obtain the support of the United States, which is now one of the two poles, so he personally led a delegation to visit the United States.

The reason for the visit is very formal, and as the newly appointed president, he has not yet formally bowed to the United States.

And Ronald Reagan accepted Galtieri's request for a visit.

The specific content of the negotiation must not be monitored, but Xia Yu can guess it.

"Galtieri seems to have forgotten that Ronald Reagan was once an actor!"

"The president of the engineering corps whose head is full of muscles, but has not yet been on the battlefield......"

"Hehe......"

Xia Yu chuckled, then threw the information into the stove on the side, and watched as the white paper full of information was burned to ashes.

"I have less and less time left to stay in France......"

After this thought flashed through his mind, Xia Yu sped up his breakfast a little, and after eating, he drove to the Bright Fund.

......

After Xia Yu came to the office, Leo Martin came to report to Xia Yu with the folder.

"Boss, this is a statistical list of the acquisition results we have completed in the past month, please review it!"

"I'll see!"

Xia Yu responded with a smile, and looked at it after taking the folder.

In late January, he made a list of acquisitions for Leo Martin, asking him to contact Standard Chartered Bank and Royal Bank of Scotland to apply for financial support and use the bank's funds to acquire some targets.

Now, almost 40 days have passed, and the M&A department of Bright Fund has also completed a lot of tasks.

It is mainly concentrated in the wine market.

The French Wine Company, a large French company that produces and sells low- and mid-range wines, acquired 21 percent of the shares of the unlisted company for 142 million francs.

The world's largest wine chain, Edro Nicolas AG, the world's largest wine chain, is also an unlisted company, and Bright Fund has acquired 29% of its shares, becoming its second largest shareholder at a cost of 130 million francs.

With 285 stores, Edwards Nicolas AG now has more than enough to significantly complement the sales segment of the LVMH Group.

Bright Fund also secretly acquired a total of 15.4% of Pernod Ricard Group's shares in separate accounts, which, if announced, would be enough for Bright Fund to become the largest shareholder of the listed company.

Pernod Ricard Group was established in 1975 by the merger of two listed companies, the Pernod Ricard Group, which was established in 1805 and the Lijia Group, which was established in 1932, and became the hegemon of the ouzo wine market after the merger, and now has a market value of more than 4.78 billion francs, which is only 1.1 billion francs lower than the Moët Hennessy Group that was acquired.

However, the company's shareholding is more dispersed than that of Moët Hennessy Group, with the largest shareholder being the Lijia family, with 13.1 percent of the shares and 20 percent of the voting rights.

The second largest shareholder is the Pernoh family, with only 9.2 percent of the shares and 15 percent of the voting rights.

Although the shareholding ratio of the two families is small, the total voting rights have a proportion of 35%, and both families are founders, which is enough to give investors and shareholders confidence, so when the company's equity is very scattered, it is enough to jointly control the company.

The company is chaired by the Pernoh family and the Rica family, and the current chairman is Patrick Rica of the Rica family.

Xia Yu remembers very well that Pernod Ricard Group has undergone a series of mergers and acquisitions in later generations, and finally developed into one of the world's three major spirits and wine groups, with a turnover of more than 23 billion US dollars in 2011, ranking second in the world's wine industry.

This company is also the focus of Xia Yu's acquisition of Leo Martin.

When the action goal was determined, the Pernod Ricard Group once became Xia Yu's primary target, and then considered that it was necessary to take into account the wine industry and the luxury industry, or to get the LVMH Group out first, so the Pernod Ricard Group was temporarily put aside.

However, after the establishment of the LVMH group, the plan to acquire the Pernod Ricard group must of course be followed up immediately.

As long as LVMH can acquire Pernod Ricard Group, then Bright Fund can occupy a leading position in the French wine market, which is a strategic goal!

Of course, in addition to the three mission objectives of the wine market, in the retail field, Xia Yu also specified a task goal, which is Carrefour Company.

Carrefour became a household name in the world's second-largest retail company, second only to Wal-Mart.

But now, although Carrefour is the pioneer of hypermarkets, it is not even in the top 10 in the French retail market, and Carrefour company, which went public in 1970 11 years after its establishment, has only exceeded 4 billion francs in market capitalization.

No way, the retail industry is one of the mainstream industries in society, whether in ancient times or in modern times, and there are still many old retail giants that have existed in France for hundreds of years, and they are basically controlled by big families.

The founders of Carrefour, Marcel Fournier and Louis DeVrière, are just ordinary people, which is why the cumulative shareholding ratio of the two can be maintained at 30% now, and the company was taken away in later generations.

It is like the Auchan Group, which was established by the Mourier family, which is still 100% controlled after 20 years, and is still in the hands of the Mourier family even in later generations.

Then again.

Now that the market value of Carrefour is low, it just reduces Xia Yu's acquisition cost.

After more than a month of lurking, the Bright Fund spent a total of 823 million francs to secretly acquire 19.5 percent of Carrefour's shares, although the vast majority of them were ordinary shares without voting rights.

However, Xia Yu didn't care, he was interested in Carrefour's excellent business model and future potential.

Moreover, the founders Marcel Fournier and Louis de Vré are not from big families, as long as the Bright Fund is allowed to enter, there are ways to increase their shareholdings until they finally occupy the magpie's nest.

......

After putting down the documents, Xia Yu instructed Leo Martin: "Leo, the acquisition progress of these tasks is not bad, but you still have to let them continue to speed up the progress." ”

"In particular, the French wine company, Edfang Nicolas S.p.A. and Pernod Ricard Group, these three companies are relatively scattered, and the acquisition will not be too difficult, so it must be completed by the end of March! You still have a whole month!"

"And Carrefour, continue to increase acquisitions!"

"With Standard Chartered Bank and Royal Bank of Scotland fully supporting you, don't tell me you can't do it!"

Before Leo Martin could be happy, he heard Xia Yu's stern words behind him, his heart sank, and he straightened his chest and responded with a serious face: "Boss, I will do my best to speed up the progress!"

Xia Yu bowed slightly, and just wanted to send him away, but suddenly remembered a piece of news he had just seen in the newspaper a few days ago, which was about Decathlon sports stores.

The retailer, which specializes in sporting goods, has since become one of the world's top performers, with annual sales of more than 10 billion euros.

And now it is just a small company that has just been established for six years, and there are not many stores, it is when it is weak, and the founder Michelle Relec is also an ordinary person, and this is the best time to start!

He instructed Leo Martin again: "Leo, there is a company called Decathlon in France, which is a retailer focusing on the field of sporting goods, and the founder is called Michel Relec, you go and buy this company, and on the premise of retaining its founder, you can buy as high as you can." ”

Leo Martin nodded obediently and said, "Okay!"

"Do you have anything else?" Xia Yu glanced at Leo Martin and asked softly.

"No!" said Leo Martin, shaking his head decisively.

"Boss, then I'll get busy first!"

"Go!" Xia Yu finished speaking, picked up a newspaper next to him and read it......

PS: Ask for tickets on Monday