In the 18th century, the Kadoorie family moved from Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, to Mumbai, India, and later followed the Sassoon family in Shanghai, successfully establishing their own commercial empire, which was passed on to Michael Kadoorie's generation, which is already the third generation.

His old father, Lawrence Kadoorie, the 86-year-old second-generation head of the Kadoorie family, is still in charge of the huge business machine.

The Kadoorie family has two major assets, one is CLP, which invested in the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant, and the other is the Hong Kong Shanghai Hotel Co., Ltd., which may be more widely known if it is directly referred to by its "Peninsula Hotel" brand. The Hong Kong Peninsula Hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, is the flagship hotel.

Originally, in time and space, people often only knew Li Bancheng, who ranked first in Xiangjiang, but in fact, Kadoorie, a Jewish family, was also one of the top ten powerful factions in Xiangjiang.

In order to expand its "power kingdom", the Kadoorie family's CLP Power is different from other large companies in Heung Kong, and it has already actively entered the inland when others are still in the shadow of the uncertain future of Hong Kong, and the grid connection with Nanyue Province is the earliest major achievement.

After tasting the sweetness of northward expansion, CLP Power invested a lot in the Daya Bay nuclear power plant project, and the participation of Heung Kong Electric Power was mainly to make up for the gap in clean energy, and to help Zheru Xiangjiang's computer business enter the field of power management system at a deeper level.

With the construction of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Station project, due to human factors on the Xiangjiang side, the construction has been delayed again and again, and the start of construction is far away. The Kadoorie family is clearly feeling the strain on their cash flow. In the original time and space. The Peninsula was sniped by speculators on the stock market. This factor is a big foreshadowing.

Therefore, Michael Kadoorie urgently hoped that Tang Huan would exert his influence as the "King of the Hong Kong" to promote the progress of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant project, so as to reduce the cash flow pressure of his family. But I didn't expect to get such an inexplicable decision from Tang Huan in the end.

Seeing Tang Huan's upper lip touch his lower lip, he casually threw out 100 million, and it was still in US dollars, and Michael Kadoorie, who was worried about the family's cash flow, was depressed. If I have $100 million in cash now, I can slowly push forward the progress of the Daya Bay nuclear power plant project.

Looking at Michael Kadoorie who was in a state of aphasia, Tang Huan said very frankly: "The human heart is the most unpredictable thing, it may be harvested quickly and smoothly, or it may abandon you ruthlessly, I don't want to take risks because of this." ”

Michael Kadoorie's lips moved, and he was about to say, "You have also invested in the Daya Bay nuclear power plant project," but then swallowed it back, because he found it meaningless. Tang Huaneng spent $100 million to buy nuclear protection materials that will almost never be used, and naturally he can also maintain his gaseous grace in the construction progress of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Station project.

But then again. Although Tang Huan refused to come forward, he finally stood on the side and played a role. Michael Kadoorie couldn't pick on it, and he didn't dare to pick it, so he could only pinch his nose and follow the words of the richest man.

Tang Huan's eyes were so sharp, he naturally saw that the other party's words were insincere, so he said to the partner from the bottom of his heart: "I am still very optimistic about the prospects of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant, and naturally hope that it can produce returns as soon as possible." If the Kadoorie family is under financial pressure, I can provide financial help, no interest, anyway, everyone knows that the shares of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Plant are the best collateral. ”

Speaking of this, Tang Huan laughed, "Of course, I would like to solemnly state here that Heung Kong Electric has no intention of replacing the second largest shareholder of CLP Power in the Daya Bay nuclear power plant project. After all, CLP's power supply network is spread over most of Xiangjiang, and there is no need for Heung Kong Electric to grab this piece of cake that is destined to be indigestible. ”

Tang Huan's straightforward style has always made Michael Kadoorie's sense of trust very stable, so when he heard the other party's initiative to make this suggestion, he couldn't help but light up, and immediately subconsciously probed: "Mr. Tang is not comforting me, are you really willing to borrow interest-free?" ”

"Everyone is friends, and compared to this relationship, that little bit of interest is really a vulgar thing. Of course, you can't borrow more money than I can do. After Tang Huan finished showing his humor, he seemed to be inadvertently sharp, "You should know that my cash flow has always been very healthy, and I don't even have to deal with HSBC." ”

Upon hearing this, Michael Kadoorie couldn't help but be awe-inspired, because what Tang Huan said was true, and the richest man's financial resources were breathtaking.

In the course of the war between Qinhe and Jardine Matheson, HSBC and Tang Huan became enemies; When Qinhe ate Jardine Matheson, the war ended, and everything was settled and could not be changed, the two sides tried to mend the rift, such as the shares of Jardine Matheson in the hands of HSBC, and the maintenance of the original settlement account of the Jardine Matheson family in HSBC and other goodwill measures.

Sometimes, however, trust is hard to regain once it's lost, and the most obvious sign is that HSBC has refused to allow renegade executives like Jobik to rejoin the HSBC board.

After going back and forth, the suspicion and rift between the two sides grew bigger and bigger, until this year, the company almost cleared up all its business dealings with HSBC, including the salary accounts of British employees.

In Xiangjiang, almost no one can completely bypass the existence of HSBC, unless he is a great immortal and does not have the worldly needs of eating, drinking, and sleeping.

But Tang Huan has become an exception, although he has not become an immortal, but he is a god of wealth, when the whole system is established, there are really many ways to make money

In terms of loans, the United States and Japan are the main sources of large funds for Tang Huan, especially the latter's yen loan interest rate is notoriously low in the world. At the same time, it is also a golden age for the banking community in the United States and Japan to expand their business in Hong Kong.

And this is only the source of funds on the surface, not counting the income that Tang Huan secretly speculated.

Therefore, Tang Huan is qualified and has the strength to act without paying attention to HSBC's eyes - Lao Tzu is not used to you, and he still has a lot of funds to support diligence and operation and expansion.

There are as many banks in Hong Kong as there are carp crossing the river. Even the local services of Chinese banks are more considerate and thoughtful than HSBC. Overseas fund exchange services are something that Standard Chartered is happy to take over. And there are many other international banks that complement it.

With the assistance of Tang Huan's IT solutions in management, the business of Qinhe is not only not affected, but is full of vitality.

As for HSBC at this stage, it is essentially a local wealthy owner with a base camp in Xiangjiang, although there have been repeated attempts to expand internationally, but it has never achieved much results, in Europe, and even in the United Kingdom. are not welcomed; After the United States acquired 51 percent of the shares of the American Ocean Bank, the losses were so serious that it was like knocking out a tooth and swallowing it in the stomach.

A large part of the reason why HSBC has repeatedly hit a wall on the road to internationalization is that although it has been very successful in operation, it is still institutionally stuck at the level of British corporate regulations more than 100 years ago, which does not meet the standards of modern companies, has low information transparency, and even the most popular data - the internal reserves, are unknown to outsiders.

Other than that. The extent to which HSBC's profitability has benefited from Xiangjiang's quasi-central bank status is also impossible to assess.

This peculiarity is not something to be played with. It is well known that every economic system has to carry out various settlements at night after the end of the day's operations; Although there are three note-issuing banks in Hong Kong - HSBC, Standard Chartered and Bank of China, when the settlement is made every day, the funds flow to the HSBC account.

In other words, HSBC is counting money when they sleep with their eyes closed. It and its own-controlled Hengfeng Bank have previously accounted for 60% of the retail market share of Heung Kong Bank.

It is HSBC, which is relying on this monopoly advantage to seek an international breakthrough, even if it loses a handful of blood and tears on the American Ocean Bank, it can hold on, anyway, it is far away on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, and it is difficult for Xiangjiang to detect it.

The arrogant HSBC takes it for granted that the loss of the business of Qinhe Yi, the largest consortium in Hong Kong, will not be as miserable as that of the American Ocean Bank, which has been dragged down by the Latin American sovereign debt crisis.

But after being a stranger to Qinhe, HSBC still suffered a heavy blow. It can rely on the family background of the rich man and doesn't care about a few less businesses, but the loss of reputation is a little unbearable.

Don't look at the collapse of the Hong Kong Bank, the wave of collapse is still continuing, but the number is still very large, and it is this kind of crisis that makes the originally fierce competition to a higher level, and when grabbing business, it is more and more spitting lotus, "HSBC even said that the richest man is a high-quality big customer, and he will kick it, do you think you are stronger than the richest man, and you will get thoughtful service?" ”

When such arguments became more and more widely known, HSBC finally realized what it had missed, so it tried to make up for it, but it couldn't find a way, and even the news of HSBC's huge losses in the United States began to spread.

Shen Bi, the chairman of HSBC, who originally planned to retire next year, was anxious. Originally, the completion of the fourth-generation HSBC head office building in Hong Kong would become an iconic symbol of glory during his tenure at the helm of HSBC, but no matter how you look at it now, there is a bit of irony in it.

Designed by the Chicago School, the third-generation HSBC Head Office Building in Hong Kong, with a height of 70 meters and a total of 13 floors, was opened in 1935 and was the largest building in the Far East at that time, and is said to be the first air-conditioned building in Hong Kong. So much so that after the Japanese army captured Xiangjiang in 1942, it was used as the headquarters of the "government".

After the end of World War II, with the rapid development of the economy and the sharp increase in business, it was obvious that the third-generation HSBC Xiangjiang head office building was not enough, and it was imperative to rebuild.

Shen Bi was very interested in this, and regarded it as his own political achievement and image project, and specially invited Norman Foster, a representative of high-tech architects and a saint in the British architectural industry, to design the fourth-generation Xiangjiang HSBC Head Office Building. This guy is also the designer of the Xiangjiang International Airport, which opened in 1998.

The fourth-generation HSBC Head Office Building, which began to be rebuilt in July 1981 and completed on May 20 this year, is 180 meters high, with 46 floors and 4 basements, using 30,000 tons of steel and 4,500 tons of aluminum. And the vast majority of the fittings used in its construction are prefabricated – structural steel is made in England; Glass, aluminum enclosures, and flooring are made in the USA; Service facility components are manufactured in Japan.

As a result, the cost of rebuilding the fourth-generation HSBC Hong Kong Head Office Building is quite staggering, at HK$5.2 billion, making it the most expensive building in the world at this stage, and the first building to cost US$1 billion.

Shen Bi wanted to use these halos smashed by real money to draw a perfect signal for his career, but the cost of $1 billion suddenly became a great irony compared to the news of various mismanagement.

During the construction of the fourth-generation HSBC Hong Kong Head Office, HSBC temporarily relocated to the Aon Chinese Bank, also located in Central. Although the fourth-generation HSBC Xiangjiang Head Office Building has now been completed, it is impossible to move in immediately, and there are still many trivial things to prepare.

Shen Bi went out of his way to see the process of HSBC's famous bronze lions being relocated in front of the head office. These two large ornaments are not simple, and have rich historical connotations.

When the third-generation Xiangjiang HSBC head office building was opened in 1935, HSBC's strongholds in China could be said to be everywhere, and Shanghai HSBC naturally became one of the leaders, so that the practice of placing two bronze lions in front of the door was also learned by Xiangjiang HSBC.

It directly copied the two bronze lions placed in front of the Shanghai HSBC Bank, and then placed them in front of his own gate, and also named them: the one that opened his mouth and roared was called "Stephen" - "Stephen", which came from Stephen, the general manager of the head office of Xiangjiang HSBC, and the suggestion of the copycat bronze lion was put forward by him; The other one is called "Stitt" - "Shidi", which comes from the name of Stitt - Shidi, the manager of the Shanghai branch at that time.

When the Japanese army captured Xiangjiang in 1942, due to the shortage of supplies, these bronze lions, together with the bronze statues of Queen Victoria and the Taipan Jackson of the Xiangjiang HSBC Bank, were transported to Yokohama, Japan, to be returned to the furnace to be used as ammunition materials.

After Japan's surrender in 1945, the two bronze lions were discovered by the U.S. military in a dock warehouse, and were ordered by MacArthur to be transported back to Xiangjiang.

It is definitely a high-grade and stylish thing for an enterprise to have such a cultural relics that have gone through ups and downs, so Shen Bi attaches so much importance to it, but as a result, he was here at the gate and was speechless when asked by reporters. (To be continued.) )