Chapter 780 Target: Wheelock & Co., The Third Largest Foreign Company in Hong Kong!

February 7, 1983.

The 25th day of the twelfth lunar month.

There are still a few days until New Year's Eve.

At this time, it is close to the Spring Festival.

Since January 3, during the working days, Hong Kong has been trying the fraud case of Jianing Group and Chen Songqing.

There are too many debts, witnesses, and material evidence involved. During the trial, Chen Songqing denied that the fraud crimes had nothing to do with him, or directly pushed the crimes to his subordinates or other people.

So much so that the citizens of Hong Kong seem to have become spectators for more than a month. Many people are paying attention to the news about Chen Songqing, while Yang Ming has set his sights on another thing.

The third largest foreign bank in Hong Kong.

Wheelock Bank.

In 1979, Yang Ming began to plan to swallow up Wheelock.

However, before that, there was no opportunity.

At this time, Yang Ming felt that the time had come and even matured.

Yang Ming just went to see Teresa Teng.

At this time, in February, it was already the fourth month of pregnancy, and Deng Liyun's belly began to become somewhat obvious.

Yang Ming was still very happy when he thought that he would be a father in five months.

Yang Ming stood at the window and looked out.

"Master, Mr. Mai Lisi is here."

"Please ask him to come up."

Mai Lisi received a call from his boss when he was off work.

When Mai Lisi came up, he saw the boss looking out the window and didn't know what he was thinking.

"Boss, I'm here."

"Mailisi, I want to tell you two things, both of which are very important."

"Boss, you say."

"First, my woman has been pregnant for more than four months."

The boss's woman has been pregnant for more than four months?

Mai Lisi was really surprised.

Before this, he had always hoped that the boss could have a child, which was naturally because he was worried that something would happen to the boss and there would be no suitable heir to inherit this huge empire group.

Now the boss's woman is actually more than five months pregnant.

"Boss, congratulations!"

Mai Lisi was very happy to hear the news, and he was really happy for the boss from the bottom of his heart.

"Among these executives, except you, no one else knows yet. I don't want to tell anyone for the time being. I will tell them when the child is born."

Merlis nodded.

The boss's child will have a bright future. If he can be a suitable heir, his future will be even brighter.

"Boss, is it Miss Sarah or Miss Diana who is pregnant?"

Yang Ming shook his head.

"Neither of them."

Since it wasn't them, Merlis didn't ask any more questions.

"The second thing is about Wheelock & Co., the third largest foreign company in Hong Kong. Now it's time to swallow this foreign company."

The third largest foreign company in Hong Kong?

Yang Ming has swallowed up Hutchison Whampoa and Jardine Land.

These two major foreign companies are the second and first largest foreign companies in Hong Kong, and the remaining ones are Wheelock & Co. and Swire.

However, as for Swire, the Swire family has concentrated its shares and even cross-holdings. It is basically impossible for the Empire Group to swallow up Swire.

On the contrary, Wheelock & Co. is different.

At the beginning, when Yang Ming integrated his shipping group and established the First Hong Kong Shipping Group, his real goal was to target Wheelock & Co.

It seems that after four years of preparation, the time has finally come.

In January 1972, the board of directors of Wheelock announced that the 32.175 million common shares issued would be converted into A shares, and one B share would be available for every two A shares. The par value of each B share was one-tenth of that of the A share, but it had the same voting rights as the A share.

In July 1972 and June 1974, Wheelock issued a large number of B shares twice.

At that time, people in the industry estimated that the main purpose of Wheelock's move was to enable the board of directors to regain control.

Although the issuance of B shares was not a very open and aboveboard thing, it did play a great role in defending control.

This also became the main reason why no one wanted to attack Wheelock during the takeover wars in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

However, the "B share fortress" is not unbreakable.

Any outside consortium can propose to hold a special shareholders' meeting as long as it obtains enough equity. By canceling the privileges of B shares, control will immediately fall into the hands of investors holding a large number of A shares.

Historically, the board of directors of Wheelock also naturally understood this principle. Therefore, after discovering that the Jardine Matheson Group still held a large number of Wheelock A shares, it took measures to protect itself.

Wheelock's main approach is to change the status of its listed company, the joint venture, from a subsidiary to an associated company. The specific measure is to reduce the shareholding of the joint venture from the original 50.7% to less than 50%.

Because according to the Hong Kong Company Law, a subsidiary is not allowed to hold shares of the parent company unless it has held them before becoming a subsidiary.

After the joint venture was converted from a subsidiary of Wheelock to an associated company, it can hold Wheelock shares.

That year, the joint venture injected two cargo ships into its Po Fook Development and sold its Lane Crawford shares to the same series of real estate trusts to raise funds to continue to absorb Wheelock shares.

By the end of 1981, its holdings in Wheelock had increased to 10.99%.

At that time, people in the securities industry analyzed that the Wheelock Board of Directors seemed to intend to cultivate the joint enterprise into a major shareholder of Wheelock Company in order to help the Wheelock Board of Directors defend control.

However, the battle for Jardine Matheson to acquire Wheelock never broke out. At that time, Jardine Matheson's Land was also coveted by Chinese tycoons. Later, it fell into financial difficulties due to serious mistakes in investment strategies. Under the situation of being unable to take care of itself, it was naturally impossible to launch an acquisition.

In history, Wheelock played a great role in defending control by issuing A shares and B shares. Under normal circumstances, it is difficult for other consortiums to break through.

It is precisely because of that that although Yang Ming had long set his sights on Wheelock, he had never had the opportunity to start, just like the Jardine Matheson of the Joseph family in history, who wanted to acquire Wheelock, but had no way to acquire it.

However, there is a saying.

The fortress is often broken from the inside.

If the Zhang family, the largest shareholder of Wheelock Bank, and John MacArthur, the second largest shareholder, work closely together without any conflicts, other consortiums will not be able to swallow Wheelock.

Now, Wheelock, this fortress, has internal problems.

"Boss, do you mean it's time to acquire Wheelock?" asked Marley.

Marley had long known that the boss wanted to acquire Wheelock, the third largest foreign bank in Hong Kong.

Now the opportunity has really come.

"According to what I have learned, the conflict between the Zhang family and John MacArthur is getting deeper and deeper, and the Zhang family is very likely to sell all the shares of Wheelock."

Marley was really shocked when he heard it.

While others were paying attention to the cases of Chen Songqing and Jianing Group, he didn't expect that the boss had already noticed the situation of Wheelock.

Chapter 1!

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