Rebirth of England

Of course, the main reason why Peninsula Oriental Group chose to acquire the Piraeus Port in Greece together with the Chinese company is that the port itself was acquired by COSCO Group for 35 years of operating rights last year. .

After that, COSCO Group also plans to expand the size of Piraeus Port and build it into the largest port in the Mediterranean. The advantage of Peninsula Oriental Group is their years of experience in port operations, and COSCO Group, which is backed by China, The Group is one of the best in the world in terms of human resources and infrastructure capabilities. Cooperation between the two parties can also produce maximum benefits for each other.

In addition, Barron knows that the "Belt and Road" plan promoted by China in the future will bring considerable throughput to the Piraeus Port, and the location of this port is also very suitable for this plan. important.

The Asian market itself is a very important market for the Peninsula Oriental Group. In this market, it will become increasingly difficult to ignore the influence of China, one of the two superpowers in the future.

And it’s just doing business with China, and it doesn’t involve choosing sides. Which of the big American companies, including Apple and Microsoft, is not like this?

According to Peninsula Oriental Group's plan, they plan to acquire all the shares of Piraeus Port together with COSCO Group. COSCO Group will still hold 67% of the shares, and the remaining shares will be held by Peninsula Oriental Group. In this way, if they cooperate with the United States in the future If there is a conflict, then Peninsula Oriental Group, as the "minority shareholder" of the Port of Piraeus, will naturally have nothing to do with China. When the time comes, Barron can only spread his hands and say this...

"There are other people who have contacted me in the past two days, Your Highness the Duke."

"South Korean?"

"Yes, they are very well-informed and are trying to convince me to give them the order for the group's LNG ships..."

Barron was not surprised at all by what Ed Christian mentioned on the phone.

At this time, both Japan and South Korea have deep-rooted operations in China, and it would not be surprising to receive news that the Peninsula Oriental Group is preparing to order LNG ships from China's shipyards.

And since China has been able to produce LNG ships, South Korea-related consortiums that have a monopoly in this field have also been keeping a very close eye on China.

Of course, they do not hope that Huaxia Shipyard’s LNG ship business will receive such a large order, and it is expected that they want to cut it off.

But I'm afraid they will be disappointed this time. After all, what Peninsula Oriental Group wants is not just to order these 5 LNG ships. In addition, this time it will also involve a package of cooperation projects. North Korea is certainly not the best target for the Eastern Bloc on the peninsula.

Otherwise, why would they cooperate with South Korea on this matter? Wouldn't it be better to cooperate directly with their suzerain country, the United States?

The problem is that American capital simply wants to use European countries, including Greece, as blood bags and is not willing to invest resources in development. This runs counter to Barron's purpose.

…

Knowing that Barron would stay in Shanghai for a few days and fly to London immediately after returning to Australia, Fan Bingbing cherished the opportunity to spend time with him.

There is nothing we can do about it. It is already April, and Britain will soon usher in a more important moment - although Brown has not yet announced the time for this general election, Barron already knows privately that this time Still much the same as in his previous life, Brown will dissolve his cabinet in early May and then call a general election.

During his time in Shanghai, in addition to accompanying Fan Bingbing and his two children, Barron also handled some matters.

Among them, he met the boss of Alibaba Company, Ma, who came to Shanghai.

"Thank you very much for supporting me on Alipay, Your Highness."

Boss Ma was not surprised that Fan Bingbing was with the British Duke. After all, Fan Bingbing had met him on behalf of Barron before, and this was once the most well-known female star in China. It has obtained powerful resources and gradually moved behind the scenes in China, which also made Boss Ma speculate about this.

Now Barron is acting like this, directly meeting Boss Ma in this bungalow with Fan Bingbing, which makes Boss Ma think that he is a friend.

What Boss Ma said is that in the second half of last year, at the shareholders' meeting of Alibaba Company, he discussed with the shareholders of Alibaba Company and proposed to transfer 70% of Alipay's shares to a mainland Chinese company.

The reason why Boss Ma did this is that China is about to issue the first batch of payment licenses. If Alipay wants to get this license, it must be converted into domestic capital.

Otherwise, if Alipay is still owned by Alibaba, it will be difficult to obtain a payment license because its major shareholders include British, Japanese and American capital.

Of course, Barron also understood that in addition to the reason that Boss Ma publicly stated, there were also reasons that he did not say out loud, including that the Alibaba founding team, led by Boss Ma at this time, did not hold a large shareholding in Alibaba. , and after these years of development, Boss Ma can also see the significance of Alipay to the entire Alibaba company. If Alipay can be independent from Alibaba and maintain control of Alipay, then Boss Ma can also reversely strengthen him. control in Alibaba.

Even so, after the shareholder representatives including Yahoo and Softbank raised objections, as a major shareholder of Alibaba, Barron still expressed his support for Boss Ma, which was something that Boss Ma was very grateful for.

Of course, Barron was able to do this, in addition to knowing that in his previous life, although Yahoo, which held 40% of Alibaba's shares at the time, and Softbank, another major shareholder, did not agree with this decision, they were finally persuaded by Boss Ma. In addition, Boss Ma insisted that Alipay should be controlled by a domestic company, so DS Holdings and Rich23 Capital's shares in Alipay through holding Alibaba can be completely realized by "selling" to the domestic company Tianhe Capital.

"It is very normal to make such a decision, Jake, as I have always told you, my investment in Alibaba is only a financial investment. I am not interested in the operation of this company, and I think Alibaba is the right choice under your leadership. This is why we give you the voting rights of the shares we hold."

Of course, the premise of Barron's saying this is that Boss Ma cannot harm their interests in the operation of Alibaba.

Just like when Boss Ma spun off Alipay from Alibaba, he also promised Alibaba shareholders, including Baron, that they would be compensated for their holdings before Alipay goes public in the future.