Reborn as a landlord in Shanghai

Chapter 105 Target: Zhang Lei

Although Mao Xiaoyu didn't have a lot of money, only about 2000 million, it was enough for a branch to have a lobby manager to receive her.

"I'd like to open a securities account and also get financing from HSBC," Mao Xiaoyu said directly after arriving at the lobby manager's office.

"Alright, let me take a look for you first. But since Mr. Mao is seeking financing from HSBC, I believe you should already know the details of the financing process, so I won't go into details. Now, let me check your bank statement to see how much financing we can offer you." The lobby manager said reassuringly while busy checking Mao Xiaoyu's bank statement on the computer.

"I don't have much transaction history here, I've just deposited money into it twice. This card is also new, but when I was in China, I had my assets notarized at your HSBC bank, so I believe there shouldn't be any problem with financing," Mao Xiaoyu said confidently.

"The information is out. Your information shows that your credit is very good, and you can get 5 times the financing. However, I must remind you that investing in Hong Kong stocks is risky. If you borrow too much, you may lose everything. So, Mr. Mao, do you need 5 times the financing?" After looking at Mao Xiaoyu's information, the lobby manager asked Mao Xiaoyu seriously.

Upon hearing the lobby manager's question, Mao Xiaoyu wanted to say "five times the leverage is fine," but she didn't say it aloud. Instead, she asked, "Excuse me, how's Tencent's stock doing lately?"

"You mean Tencent, the company that makes QQ messaging? I've heard some news about that company recently. It's been a year since it went public, and the lock-up periods for all its shareholders' shares are starting to expire one by one."

This led to shareholders who received Tencent's original shares selling nearly ten million shares in just one and a half months. Among them, the largest shareholder, Ma Huateng, sold 10 million Tencent shares in July alone.

Originally, Tencent's stock price was around 6 yuan in July. However, due to the large number of shareholders selling off their shares, the price has now fallen below 6 yuan because there are too many Tencent shares on the market.

The reasons for this are twofold: first, too much Tencent stock was sold off during this period, leading to an oversupply in the market and a low stock price; second, the major shareholder, Ma Huateng, sold too many shares, causing panic among shareholders.

After all, even major shareholder Ma Huateng has sold so many shares. As ordinary shareholders, we are afraid that there may be some problems with Tencent. In addition, Tencent's profitability has not been able to find an accurate target, and its current profits can only support its current market price.

"So, considering all factors, it's normal for Tencent's stock to be trading below 5 or 6 yuan recently. However, in the long run, Tencent's stock should be able to rise," the lobby manager explained to Mao Xiaoyu.

Hearing what the lobby manager said, Mao Xiaoyu realized that Tencent had been making things so complicated lately, but wasn't this exactly what she wanted?

After all, the lower Tencent's stock price falls, the lower the price they can get their hands on it.

Moreover, Tencent's stock price has been consistently rising. Even when it fell, it was only in 2008, when the global stock market crashed due to the US subprime mortgage crisis. Otherwise, Tencent's stock price has generally been on the rise.

In that case, should I allocate more funds to invest in stocks?

"Then may I ask Manager Ge, what is the annual interest rate for this financing if I use leverage this time?" Mao Xiaoyu asked.

"The annual interest rate for financing can be as high as 9%," Manager Ge said directly.

"The annual interest rate for this financing is too high. I can only offer 6%, 7%, or even 9% at most. I can get financing anywhere else, so why would I need to go to HSBC? Besides, I will be trading through your HSBC brokerage firm for the rest of my business. I'm sure you'll make a lot of money over the course of a year," Mao Xiaoyu said.

Manager Ge hesitated for a moment, then nodded and said, "Then let's go with 7%. If your stocks must be traded through HSBC Securities, we will monitor the entire process. If your stock price falls to the risk control line, HSBC Securities has the right to liquidate your position, and you will need to compensate for any losses."

"Okay, I agree. By the way, if I want to use leverage, when will the funds arrive?" Mao Xiaoyu nodded and asked.

"It depends on how urgent things are, Mr. Mao. If you're not in a hurry, it will take a day or two for the money to arrive. If you are in a hurry, we can expedite the process and the money can arrive today. However, the fee will be slightly higher," Manager Ge told Mao Xiaoyu.

"Then let it arrive the day after tomorrow. By the way, could you arrange a few trading computers or traders for me then?" Mao Xiaoyu said after calculating the time.

"The computers are easy to arrange. We have a securities company with plenty of computers. As for the traders, that's also easy to find. We'll arrange that for you," Manager Ge said.

"Then we've set the financing date for the day after tomorrow. As for how much to raise, let's raise five times the amount. My account currently has HKD 19.5 million. As for the extra tens of thousands of RMB, just leave it there. As for the margin, I don't need to pay anything. If there are any problems in the end, just give me the bill."

"HK$19.5 million, if financed 5 times, equals HK$97.5 million. As for the margin, it is guaranteed by Standard Chartered Bank in mainland China, which can guarantee a margin of HK$2 million. However, this margin will also charge interest, at 7% per year."

So, adding up five times the amount of financing and the margin, the total comes to exactly HK$80 million. Mr. Mao, is this correct? If so, then we'll proceed with the loan based on this financing amount and interest rate.

Manager Ge directly calculated the 5x return on Mao Xiaoyu's financing and handed the bill to Mao Xiaoyu to ask about it.

Mao Xiaoyu glanced at the bill, did the math in her head, and knew there was nothing wrong with it.

HK$8000 million, with HK$720 million in interest annually—it's quite terrifying to think about. Mao Xiaoyu now just hopes that Tencent's stock won't perform too poorly, otherwise, she'll really be in trouble.

"No problem," Mao Xiaoyu agreed.

Now that Mao Xiaoyu was all set up, Manager Ge started to handle things for her. After more than an hour, the securities account was finally settled. Now all that was left was to wait for the financing funds to arrive the day after tomorrow, and then Mao Xiaoyu could start trading stocks.

Mao Xiaoyu stood outside the HSBC branch, looking at the HSBC sign and feeling the light, fluttering HSBC card.

"Sigh!" He couldn't help but sigh.

There's still over 21 RMB in my HSBC card, which is about 20 HKD. I don't know how many months I'll be staying in Hong Kong, so I'll have to be careful with my money.

Of course, Mao Xiaoyu had more than just this amount of money. Before coming here, to prevent financial problems and to prepare for any unforeseen circumstances...

Mao Xiaoyu mortgaged the house that Sister Liu sold to her to the financial company where Li Mingyue worked, and received 30 RMB. This money is in her Bank of China account. If she really needs to use it, she will have to go to the Bank of China in Hong Kong to get the money.

However, Mao Xiaoyu doesn't plan to touch that money unless absolutely necessary; it's for last resort.

Now that Mao Xiaoyu has finished dealing with everything in Hong Kong, she can now focus on her own affairs.

First, buy a local Hong Kong mobile phone and choose a phone number that can make international calls. Then, call your family, colleagues, and anyone else who needs to come over to let them know.

In this way, Mao Xiaoyu spent more than 1000 Hong Kong dollars to buy a mobile phone, and then recharged it with 500 dollars to get a SIM card.

After I got the phone and SIM card, I called home to let them know I was safe.

After finishing her work at home, Mao Xiaoyu called Guo Xiaoyan and gave her her phone number in Hong Kong, asking her to call her if she needed anything.

As for the third call, it was of course to Li Mingyue. After all, Li Mingyue was still keeping an eye on her domestic stocks, and if there were any signs of trouble, she would have to call her.

Although the A-shares market in China shouldn't fall much further now, we still need to prepare the necessary contingency plans. After all, if something goes wrong because they can't reach us by phone, we'll definitely regret it terribly.

It took Mao Xiaoyu quite a bit of time to give Li Mingyue this phone number. After all, there's so much money in Big A (a major financial institution), and Mao Xiaoyu hadn't checked it for a day or two, so she definitely had to ask.

Fortunately, all the news from Li Mingyue was good. Li Mingyue told her on the phone that no matter which stock Mao Xiaoyu bought, the price had started to rise slightly. As for Moutai, which had been losing money, it was almost back to break-even. Of course, it was still a little short, but not by much. This was good news.

Hearing Li Mingyue's good news, Mao Xiaoyu finally felt relieved. Then, Mao Xiaoyu chatted with the other party for a bit, almost making the old building tilt, before ending the call.

After Mao Xiaoyu finished making calls to these three people, she then made calls to the four major traders.

Mao Xiaoyu made separate phone calls to Du Yue, trader number 4 at Guoxin Securities; Peng Yu, trader number 13 at Great Wall Securities; Yu Feng, trader number 6 at CITIC Securities; and Wu Tianqing, trader number 7 at Orient Securities.

After some discussion, Du Yue and Peng Yu agreed to come tomorrow. As for Wu Tianqing and Yu Feng, since they haven't received their Hong Kong and Macau travel permits yet, they can only wait a week and come in shifts.

The cost for the four people to come was HK$25,000 per person. HK$10,000 was for round-trip airfare, HK$10,000 was for seven days of accommodation and food, and HK$5000 was the hard-earned money they received.

Although Mao Xiaoyu initially said that the four people would not be paid for their hard work but would be given the opportunity to practice, she would still have to pay them a little in the end. After all, in addition to Hong Kong stocks, they would still need to cooperate on A-shares in the future, and Mao Xiaoyu was not prepared to let a little money cause everyone to fall out.

Everyone was fairly satisfied with the conditions offered by Mao Xiaoyu. Although 5000 yuan for 7 days of freelance work was a little less, the salary was much higher, so it was about right when you considered both the cost and the benefits.

Busy as she was, Mao Xiaoyu made many phone calls and finally finished dealing with everything, finally letting out a sigh of relief.

I've done what I was supposed to do and been busy with what I was supposed to be busy with. Whether I can make money next depends on fate.

Honestly, Mao Xiaoyu's current acquisition of Tencent's shares is really just about making money off Zhang Lei.

In 2005, Zhang Lei received $20 million in investment from the Yale University endowment fund and founded Hillhouse Capital. His first task was to return to China to investigate which high-tech companies were worth investing in.

Eventually, at the Wuyi Small Commodities Market, he saw that all the shop owners had QQ accounts. He felt that the reach of QQ was truly remarkable, as everyone accepted it. He believed that if he could develop his QQ business well, he would definitely have opportunities to make money.

It was because of this decision that Zhang Lei used his $20 million to directly acquire Tencent's shares on the secondary market. This made Tencent Zhang Lei's Hillhouse Capital's first investment in China. Zhang Lei also met with Ma Huateng and shared some insights on development, which led to the friendship between Zhang Lei and Ma Huateng.

Zhang Lei's 400-fold return was precisely because of his investment in Tencent. It can be said that Zhang Lei made Tencent successful.

The news also made Zhang Lei who he is today.

What Mao Xiaoyu needs to do now is to get ahead of Zhang Lei in the secondary market and start acquiring Tencent's shares, thus making Tencent...

First, drive up the stock price of Tencent. When Zhang Lei comes out to buy Tencent shares, find an opportunity to meet with him. If possible, sell your Tencent shares to Zhang Lei.

As for why she did this, Mao Xiaoyu had no other choice. She didn't have enough money on her own, and the money to buy Tencent stock was all financed from banks. Holding onto such stock would be too risky.

Since Tencent's stock is expected to rise, Mao Xiaoyu plans to take advantage of the price increase to make a profit. If necessary, she can gradually use her own capital to buy more Tencent shares later.

Although this way, she will hold fewer stocks in the future, but these stocks will be more stable. When the time comes, Mao Xiaoyu can return to the mainland with peace of mind. Otherwise, with such high financing, how could Mao Xiaoyu dare to return to the mainland?

After all, there are no price limits for stocks in Hong Kong. They can disappear in an instant. If a hundred million yuan is lost, how will Mao Xiaoyu compensate for it?

So, to be on the safe side, I'll buy the shares now, and then sell them when Zhang Lei comes to buy them later, making a profit as much as I can.

As for how much money he can make by selling to Zhang Lei, that doesn't matter. As long as he can make money and buy fewer stocks, he can feel more at ease. Moreover, he can have the opportunity to get to know Zhang Lei, and there may be opportunities to cooperate in the future!