Reborn as a tycoon in Hong Kong

September 18, 1978.

Today is Monday, at around two o'clock at noon. Levis, who is the head clerk at Hong Kong Electric, was supposed to be at work at the company, but he was not at the company at this time. Instead, he was invited to meet with someone.

Although the chief executive of Hong Kong Electric is called Levis, he is actually not Chinese, but British. His real name is Levis. Because he has worked in Hong Kong for many years, he gave himself the Chinese name of Levis for convenience.

Just like Peter Wei, the vice president of Hutchison Whampoa. His real name is not this. Peter is his English name, and Wei is the surname he added to himself for work convenience.

There are many similar people, including people like Wei Peter and Levis who just added and modified their surnames; there are also people like Shen Zhou who directly gave themselves a Chinese name, all for the convenience of work.

"Mr. Levis, I am Liao Siren, Mr. Lin's assistant. Please come here."

Liao Siren was waiting outside. After seeing Levis, he took Levis to see Lin Baicheng.

"Lin Sheng!"

After a while, Levis saw the young man who was standing at the top of Xiangjiang at a young age. Hutchison Whampoa, in which it holds half of the shares, has a total market value of more than HK$20 billion, making it the listed company with the highest market value in Hong Kong. With a net worth of more than HK$10 billion, it means it is standing at the pinnacle of Hong Kong.

"Mr. Levis, please sit down."

Lin Baicheng asked Levi to sit down.

"Thanks."

Levi's was not polite and sat down opposite Lin Baicheng.

Liao Siren poured Levi's a cup of coffee and then sat aside.

Levi's was not going to play a guessing game. He said directly: "Lin Sheng, you asked me to come out to meet today. You must have something to tell me, and it is related to Hong Kong Electric, right?" He and Lin Baicheng had never dealt with each other before. There was no business relationship between the two parties, and he was the chief executive of HK Electric, so he knew after a moment's thought that Lin Baicheng's appointment with him to meet was related to HK Electric.

"Since Mr. Levi is quick to speak, I will speak frankly."

Since Levi's was so direct, Lin Baicheng stopped playing riddles and said directly: "I asked Mr. Levi out today because I wanted to discuss something with Mr. Levi. But before discussing this matter, I want to inform Mr. Levi that I have already I bought about 300 million shares of Hong Kong Electric, equivalent to 22.9% of Hong Kong Electric’s shares.”

"Today, I am the largest shareholder of Hong Kong Electric."

Hong Kong Electric Group is one of the two major power suppliers in Hong Kong. The other is called China Electric Power. However, China Electric Power cannot compare with Hong Kong Electric in terms of scale. You must know that Hong Kong Electric is one of the top ten listed companies in Hong Kong.

In addition, HK Electric, like HSBC, is one of the few companies without family control. It has a large number of shareholders and very few shares. There is no major shareholder holding a large number of shares, so the board of directors is controlled by the management. As long as the management does not cause serious losses in company management, the annual shareholders' meeting will not remove the directors of the management, and the management will always control the board of directors.

"What? Lin Sheng, you have already acquired so many shares of Hong Kong Electric?!"

Levis was shocked when he heard this. Although he had guessed that Lin Baicheng's meeting with him was probably to discuss the acquisition of HK Electric, he did not expect that Lin Baicheng had already acquired so many shares and directly became the largest shareholder of HK Electric.

Although nearly 23% of the shares do not allow Lin Baicheng to become the absolute controlling shareholder of HK Electric, the difference is not much. It is entirely possible for Lin Baicheng to become the absolute controlling shareholder of the company. And if this happens, then the management will have no room for bargaining with Lin Baicheng, and Lin Baicheng will do whatever he says.

"Lin Sheng, you should have started acquiring shares of HK Electric a long time ago, right? The recent trend of HK Electric's stock price has been very stable, and there is no sign of large-scale buying. Therefore, it is impossible for Lin Sheng to acquire so many shares recently."

After a short meeting, Levi's calmed down and guessed that Lin Baicheng had been eyeing HK Electric a long time ago, so he was able to acquire so many shares when the stock price trend was stable.

"Yes, I started asking people to acquire HK Electric's shares in May."

Lin Baicheng nodded and admitted. It took almost four months to acquire nearly 23% of the shares. The amount acquired every day was not large, so the stock price was not driven up and the intention to acquire was not discovered.

"really!"

Levis shook his head with a wry smile, and then said: "Lin Sheng, you asked me out today because you wanted to gain control of Hong Kong Electric, right?"

"good!"

Lin Baicheng did not hide anything: "I will continue to increase my holdings in HK Electric until I hold at least about 40% of the shares."

Levi's knew that Lin Baicheng's financial resources were capable of doing this, so he had no choice but to say: "Sheng Lin, HK Electric has been operating independently over the years and is managed by our management. The company's benefits are also increasing every year. All shareholders have brought high returns. Mr. Lin, you are optimistic about HK Electric. It is an honor for HK Electric, but if Mr. Lin personally participates in the operation of HK Electric, he may not necessarily be able to do better than us."

In the past, the management of Hong Kong Electric has always made the decision. But if Hong Kong Electric has one more major shareholder with a large number of shares, it means that the management of Hong Kong Electric has an additional manager. If possible, everyone wants to make the decision themselves, not Follow orders.

Lin Baicheng knew what Levi was worried about, so he said with a smile: "Mr. Levi, if you pay attention to the management of Hutchison Whampoa, you should be able to find that the management of Hutchison Whampoa has not changed much. I personally only care about Hutchison Whampoa." When formulating a development plan, the specific implementation is still left to the management. As long as the management does not violate my plan or make major mistakes, I will not interfere indiscriminately."

"That seems to be the case."

After Levi's heard this, he thought about it and found that Hutchison Whampoa's management had indeed not changed much, which showed that Lin Baicheng was at least not a messy person and would not reject the original management team.

Liao Siren said at this time: "Mr. Levis, Mr. Lin now holds nearly 23% of HK Electric's shares. If the shareholding is increased by less than 20%, basically no one will be able to hold more shares than Mr. Lin. Therefore, if nothing else happens, Mr. Lin will definitely get control of Hong Kong Electric."

"It's just that we also know that it will take some time for Lin Sheng to control the board of directors and then the management if the board of directors objects. However, if this is the case, then Mr. Lin will definitely not agree with Mr. Levis and you, the original management. I will reuse it again, I believe you can understand this too, Mr. Levis."

Of course Levi's understands this. If their management firmly opposes Lin Baicheng becoming the controller of HK Electric, then when Lin Baicheng takes control, they and their management will definitely not reap the benefits and will be kicked out of HK Electric immediately.