Free Web NovelHu Jintao kept letting out loud bursts of laughter, as if satisfied.
He must have worked hard to twist his words around like that just to indirectly say “give me money.”
I covered the corner of my lips, which was creeping upward, with my glass and spoke.
“But even if the funds are sufficient, can you win over the people in the military?”
No matter how much money the Shanghai faction had, there was no way the nominal highest leader, Hu Jintao, and his close associates had no money.
And yet they were severely pushed aside by the Shanghai faction.
Even the next leader was pushed aside by the Shanghai faction, forcing him to choose Xi Jinping.
That was the decision Hu Jintao made, who never wanted to hand over power to anyone from the Shanghai faction, even over his dead body.
As a result, China’s decades-long tradition would end up broken...
“Do not worry. If the funds are sufficient, there is no faction within the Party that can beat our Communist Youth League in numbers.”
He sounded far too confident, didn’t he?
I had never seen anyone who shouted victory drunkenly like this bring back good results.
“The Shanghai faction is absolutely not an easy opponent. They are not people you can deal with just because you have enough funds and manpower.”
“I know them better than President Kim does. I am not taking them lightly, so do not worry. I simply want to enjoy this feeling for today.”
Hu Jintao, holding his glass, let out a loose smile. I could not believe him at all.
Would Hu Jintao and the Communist Youth League really be able to become the mainstream faction this time?
Looking at him, still untrustworthy, I shook my head inwardly.
If Hu Jintao’s power alone wasn’t enough, then I would make it enough.
We continued drinking while having various conversations.
Only at dawn could I finally separate from Hu Jintao.
“Hoo... This is exhausting.”
“We’ll head straight to the hotel, Boss.”
Drinking with someone you don’t particularly like was never enjoyable.
As Chief Ma finished speaking, the car picked up speed.
Watching the scenery change quickly, I closed my eyes.
When I woke up, I was in bed.
It seemed Chief Ma had moved me. My throat was dry from drinking and sleeping.
I drank the water prepared on the bedside table and got out of bed.
I walked to the window and opened the blackout curtains.
The sudden flood of strong sunlight stung my eyes. I closed them briefly to adjust.
When I opened them again, the Beijing cityscape unfolded below the floor-to-ceiling glass.
This place changed day by day so rapidly that you could feel the development each time you visited.
People who looked tiny as ants walked busily like parts of a machine.
This time I lifted my head and looked at the sky.
Whether it was smog or fine dust, a blurry haze obscured the view.
For a long while, I looked down at Beijing and organized my schedule, gathering my thoughts.
When I opened the door and stepped outside, Han Kyungyeong was there.
He had his laptop open and was concentrating on something. To the point he didn’t even notice me approaching.
“Hyung.”
I tapped his shoulder lightly and spoke.
Startled, Han Kyungyeong finally stopped what he was doing and turned his head.
“Ah, damn, you scared me! You’re up? When did you come in? Have you ever woken up this late?”
Making a deliberately exaggerated fuss, he smiled.
Ridiculous guy. I sat beside him and spoke.
“I got in at dawn. What are you doing?”
“Ah... The crude oil price keeps going up strangely, so I was monitoring it. Even though OPEC said they would increase production.”
“Yeah?”
“When you see stuff like this, you really can’t tell what’s good news and what’s bad news in this field.”
“Let me see.”
When I gestured, Han Kyungyeong turned the laptop so I could see.
I already knew crude oil prices were continuing to rise.
But the trend of crude oil prices was completely different from my expectations.
Seeing the steeply rising figure, I spoke.
“Seems like the prolonged Yukos situation in Russia is amplifying anxiety.”
“It probably had some effect, but that can’t be all. The United States is trying so hard to contain oil prices, but for it to move in the opposite direction...”
His voice held unease. I smiled as I responded. freewebnσvel.cѳm
“In the end, whether it’s good or bad news depends on how you take it.”
In the futures and stock markets, where massive amounts of money move, whenever an issue occurs, every kind of interpretation follows, and people move accordingly.
Humans are naturally easily swept up. But since I knew the future, I had confidence that I would not be swept up by such things.
“For us, nothing about this is bad, right?”
We had bet massive funds on the oil price rising.
The more oil prices rose, the greater our profit.
“More than that, I think we need to acquire Yukos.”
Closing the laptop, I brought up the Yukos acquisition proposal the Kremlin had given me.
After listening silently for a while, Han Kyungyeong finally spoke.
“That’s unexpected. I thought they’d nationalize it.”
“They have no choice. If they force nationalization, their image of embracing a market economy will take a hit.”
And since they suffered during the Soviet era through nationalization, they would want to avoid it if possible.
As for me, either direction was profitable, so I volunteered to acquire it.
“We’ll start asset evaluation through the bank in Germany. Hyung, go to Russia yourself and check whether they’re evaluating properly or pulling any tricks.” freewebnovёl.ƈom
“Let me rest, you maniac obsessed with work. You never stop pushing.”
He made a show of his complaint. I laughed and comforted him.
“Just wrap up this project and then rest. Eva said you should rest after finishing your work in Korea too. Hyung, but how’s your dating life these days?”
While I was listening to the dating life I hadn’t heard about for a while, Chief Ma entered the room.
“You are awake, Boss? What would you like for your meal?”
Already? It was well past lunchtime.
So that was why Han Kyungyeong teased me about waking up late.
“Hyung, did you eat?”
“What time do you think it is? Of course I ate.”
“Yeah? Then I’ll eat something light.”
I asked Chief Ma for some simple bread and a drink, then turned back to Han Kyungyeong.
“Yukos still has time, so forget that for now. Did you read the investment plan for Baidu and Alibaba?”
“Of course I did. That’s why we came to China. For Alibaba, we need to put in at least fifty million dollars, and for Baidu, we need to put in around twenty million more. Only then can they expand their business as they want. That’s just the first round—we might need to invest even more.”
There was a reason to invest this aggressively into Baidu and Alibaba.
These two companies had to counter Yahoo and eBay, which had entered China.
As I nodded quietly, Han Kyungyeong continued speaking.
“If we accept investment from other investors, our share will shrink. So doing a paid-in capital increase and taking all of it ourselves seems better. I tried thinking of ways to hit the 49% limit, but no matter how I look at it, that seems the best.”
Even if I set the overall plan, the details were always one step above mine in Han Kyungyeong's hands.
I appreciated the thought, but there was no way we could take the entire 49%.
We had to bring in new investors.
“I agree that’s the best, but there’s a variable in the plan. I think we need to invest the Communist Youth League’s funds. Only into Alibaba and Baidu for now.”
“The Communist Youth League? Why the hell all of a sudden?”
I summarized what I had discussed with Hu Jintao yesterday.
“Ha... This damn country is openly insane. And that bastard calls himself the highest leader.”
“It can’t be helped. If one person cannot hold absolute power, then in the end, they buy people with money to protect their own power. Jiang Zemin from the Shanghai faction is very good at that, so of course you need massive funds to fight him.”
Han Kyungyeong frowned deeply.
It was similar to lobbying in America, but naturally he wouldn’t like it.
“Don’t look at it too negatively. It’s not bad for us. Since they’re investing themselves, they’ll naturally relax regulations, and they’ll keep producing favorable policies.”
It was exhausting persuading someone so frustrated, but I finally got a good outcome.
To increase his own wealth, Hu Jintao would push favorable policies.
“How much do we need to lower our share ratio?”
“If we give them about twenty percent, how much of our own shares can we maintain?”
“We need to guarantee some amount for the founders, so around forty percent... But how much investment is coming in?”
Counting on his fingers, he asked abruptly.
“I haven’t discussed details yet. They said they’d contact me tomorrow, so I’ll talk to them then. Based on the current corporate valuation, how much is twenty percent?”
“I need to calculate it. For Alibaba, we must invest at least fifty million to adjust the shares properly. Baidu’s a bit tricky...”
Counting his fingers again, Han Kyungyeong suddenly pulled out his fountain pen.
He flipped over a sheet of paper and began scribbling calculations.
I left him to it and got up just as Chief Ma brought the meal.
“Did you eat, Chief?”
“Yes, I ate.”
I nodded and sat at the table, eating what Chief Ma had brought.
When I returned, calculations seemed mostly done, and Han Kyungyeong spoke.
“I’ll need to speak with the management to be exact, but it looks like we need to redirect this round of investment to their side. Then through paid-in capital increase, Alibaba can adjust up to around forty-five percent. Baidu will need to drop to forty percent.”
Then he handed me the paper.
Following the messily scribbled numbers, I tried reading it, but it was such rough writing that it was hard to decipher.
“If you say so, then that’s that. Hyung, stay in Beijing and organized this with the management.”
“You’re going to Shenzhen alone?”
“Isn’t it better to move separately than together? We need to finish quickly. I’m planning to visit Tencent, then stop by my cousin’s filming set, so I’ll go alone.”
This time, Cheon Ji-young was appearing in a Chinese drama.
I had heard she was filming on location here, so I planned to visit briefly.
“All right then. I have plenty of people to meet in Beijing about investments anyway.”
“If I go straight from Beijing to Moscow, that’s better. Finish Yukos and then rest.”
“Hey, you ruthless boss!!”
Leaving behind Han Kyungyeong, who was calling out while swinging his fist, I returned to my room.
For some reason, whenever I ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) came to China, I felt drained. I went into the bathroom and soaked my tired body in the warm water I had prepared.
We departed Beijing and arrived at Shenzhen Bao’an International Airport.
It was a schedule departing at dawn and arriving in the morning.
What surprised me was that not only foreigners, but even mainland Chinese had to go through entry and exit checks.
“How ridiculous. Same country, but exit-entry passes?”
To protect the socialist system, they went this far? It was just laughable.
Chief Ma took the exit-entry pass he received in Beijing, finished the procedure, and returned.
The moment we exited the airport, we moved into the prepared car.
“Let’s go directly to Tencent headquarters.”
Leaving the airport, we entered the city center of Shenzhen.
Since Shenzhen was geographically close to Hong Kong, it was designated as a Special Economic Zone during Deng Xiaoping’s era and developed according to a planned design.
They intended to make it a special administrative region combined with Hong Kong when Hong Kong was returned to China, but due to opposition from Hong Kong citizens and political reasons like the Tiananmen protests, the plan was scrapped.
Even so, Shenzhen attracted Hong Kong companies using its proximity advantage and was rapidly developing.
“We’ve arrived.”
While I admired the cityscape, we arrived at Tencent’s headquarters building.
Leaving all the bodyguards behind, Chief Ma and I alone got out of the car.
As we tried entering the building, a security guard blocked us.
“What brings you here?”
“We came because we have an appointment with CEO Ma Huateng.”
The moment we mentioned meeting the CEO, the guard’s face instantly became friendly.
“Are you the ones from America?”
“Yes. Please tell him my associate has come as well.”
“Yes, understood. Please wait a moment.”
After contacting someone, the guard returned and guided us.
We took the elevator, and inside the meeting room, two men were waiting.
Ma Huateng and Zhang Zhidong—faces I remembered as well.
Tencent was founded by five people joining forces. Where were the other three?
Hiding my curiosity, I entered the meeting room, and the two stood up.
“Welcome. I’m Ma Huateng.”
Ma Huateng extended his hand first, and I grasped it lightly.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Kim Muhyuk.”
Facing the two founders of Tencent, which would become a future giant in China’s IT industry, I smiled.
