Chapter 906: Raising Their Boards Over A Dozen Times!
The raising of boards is a measure by stock exchanges across countries to avoid large capital acquisitions that cause stock volatility and cause shareholders to suffer: generally, when a company holds more than 5% of the stock, the buyer has to announce his shareholding ratio to all shareholders, thereby warning and informing shareholders of the risk.
On the 16th of September, Jiadian Group had collectively raised their boards for 23 of Samsung’s subsidiaries all over London, Korea, China, Mexico, and other countries!
This also meant that at the same time, Jiadian Group held 5% of the shares of 23 subsidiaries under Samsung.
At that moment, the whole world was shocked.
No one had expected that Jiadian Group would suddenly play such a game of overtly gathering materials in the dark while secretly building their own empire. They had already laid low for more than a month, but they suddenly launched a sneak attack on Hong Kong, directly holding 5% of the shares of many subsidiary companies of Samsung.
However, the public were not too sure about the release of this signal. They did not know why Jiadian Group was buying these stocks.
‘Is he planning to acquire Samsung? Or is he trying to create trouble for the company’s management?
‘But, they both represent completely different things though.’
This caused many shareholders to stop selling and wait patiently for the announcement.
Soon, Jiadian Group made a statement on all the major trading platforms.
The statement did not explain the acquisition of the shares of the company. It only said that Jiadian Group supported Eroter Management and the Spab Fund and requested a reorganization of the company and a re-election of the board of directors.
Other than that, as a major shareholder, Jiadian Group also requested for Samsung to take responsibility for the N7 plane mishap. They also requested Lee Junki, the president of Samsung, to resign.
With that, everyone understood one thing: although they did not know what Jiadian Group was up to, Samsung was going to be in chaos.
After all, a few major shareholders were working together to pressure the company into changing teams. Even though there was no legal effect, the company would definitely be under a lot of pressure.
Especially when there was Jiadian Group, which was a powerful competitor. There was no doubt that Samsung had fallen into internal strife.
Therefore, the shareholders sold out again, and the price of Samsung dropped again.
Wei Lin and Little Deeny, who were lying in ambush on the market, started to collect Samsung’s shares.
Thus, shares throughout the various subsidiaries of Samsung rose and fell in this tug-of-war.
At that moment, inside the head office of Samsung, Lee Jaerong was listening to the report from her subordinates.
After hearing the report, his face darkened and he asked, “What did the secretary say?”
The secretariat was the highest decision-making department in Samsung who would report directly to the Lees. Among them, there were 400 “staff officers”. Half of them came from the management department, while the other half came from the technical department. When various subsidiary companies or even the corporation encountered problems, the secretariat would formulate strategies and detailed plans based on the problems.
The president, on the other hand, would usually make a comprehensive judgment after listening to the secretary’s judgment and plan.
Lee Jaerong’s subordinate said, “The secretariat believes that in this situation, we need to eliminate the negative impact and not directly go against the big shareholders. Therefore, they are prepared to accept some of the other party’s suggestions and give a positive response to Jiadian Group’s statement.”
The man took out a plan and handed it to Lee Jaerong.
Lee Jaerong, who was sitting behind the desk, took the document and read it carefully before he nodded and signed the plane.
The next day, Samsung held a press conference. They gave a positive answer to the suggestions made by Eroter Management and Spab.
The company agreed with the two major shareholders’ suggestion, so it decided to recruit an independent director into the board of directors and offer 40% of its cash as a dividend.
As for Jiadian Group’s purchase of shares, they had also made their own response. Jiadian Group’s purchase of shares was an affirmation of Samsung. It was precisely because they were confident in the management of Samsung that Jiadian Group would purchase the shares of many companies.
Samsung also welcomed the trust that Jiadian Group had in the company, and they were willing to open their arms to every shareholder who wanted to invest in Samsung. In fact, they welcomed everyone to invest and enjoy the dividends.
In fact, Samsung’s appropriate response was very outstanding. Su Yang was clearly trying to undermine them, but in the end, they defined it as a positive behavior.
Coupled with the fact that some of them had accepted the majority shareholder’s proposal and responded immediately, it made Samsung even more popular in the stock market.
In fact, because they were prepared to send the corporation free cash, the shareholders’ confidence in Samsung started to increase.
As a result, the most important subsidiary of Samsung, Samsung Electronics, began to rise. This also stopped the decline of other subsidiaries.
Just as everything was going well…
A storm arrived again that afternoon.
At America’s Stock Exchange, Jiadian Group issued an announcement, offering a premium to buy up to 6% of the shares held by several unknown financial companies.
Therefore, Jiadian Group now held 11.12% of the shares of Samsung Electronics, officially becoming the second largest shareholder of the company.
Not long after Jiadian Group made the announcement in Korea, in London, Mexico, Korea, Europe, and many other securities markets, Jiadian Group also made similar announcements.
After several acquisitions, Jiadian Group will also receive 5-8% of shares from eight listed companies.
It became one of the three important subsidiaries of Samsung, the top three major shareholders.
The whole world was shocked again.
If Jiadian Group had caught Samsung Group off guard yesterday and no one could tell what Jiadian Group was up to… Their ambition was as clear as day at that moment… They wanted to annex Samsung!
Moreover, this was the kind of annexation that would be exacted without any warning!
This was a blatant malicious acquisition!
After all, holding the shares of more than twenty important subsidiary companies at the same time was completely out of the scope of normal business acquisitions. It was basically throwing money at them!
Now that things had come to this, Jiadian Group no longer tried to hide it. Su Yang held a press conference in Shanghai that was open to the world. He then announced at the press conference, “Jiadian Group has many new technologies that surpass modern technology, but they don’t have an outstanding channel or factory to produce and sell them.
“And Samsung happened to satisfy all of that.
“That’s why I’ve decided to use Jiadian Group’s overseas funds and the cash that Project Hermes has raised to speed up the acquisition of Samsung. I believe that before long, Samsung will become a subsidiary of our company.”
At that very moment, the entire world was in an uproar because of this piece of news!
No one expected Su Yang to be so straightforward about his ambitions. They also did not expect Su Yang to have such a huge appetite. ‘He’s actually set his eyes on Samsung, the world’s top 15 corporation, Samsung.’
Especially since Samsung was Korea’s tycoon, and it was the business card Korea had used throughout their interactions globally. Hence, if this business card was taken away through an acquisition, Korea was definitely going to be shamed!
Hence, when Su Yang said that, the whole world fell silent. Everyone was waiting for both Korea and Samsung’s reaction.
That night, everything was peaceful.
The next day, Lee Jaerong updated his own status on Facebook. ‘Barbarians have come knocking. But we’ve got the people and the entire country behind us.
That afternoon, for the first time, the spokesperson from Samsung responded to the matter. He said, “Jiadian Group has openly engaged in a malicious acquisition. However, our company is a national enterprise of Korea and we will not allow foreign companies to control or even acquire our company.”
Thus, the battle officially began.
The shares of each of Samsung’s subsidiaries were already divided. Now, it became even more obvious. This was because some of the shareholders believed that since Jiadian Group wanted to snatch the shares of Samsung, the stock value of Samsung would most likely skyrocket.
But many more shareholders were very rational. After analyzing the stock structure of Samsung stock market, they concluded that the acquisition plan of Jiadian Group would most likely fail.
If it did not end soon, it would most likely be sold on a large scale.
Coupled with the N7 scandal that had been exposed recently, the management struggles of Samsung would definitely affect the profits and operations of the company this year.
Therefore, they were not optimistic about the future of Samsung.
However, the rise and fall of the stock market did not mean much to Su Yang at that point in time. This was because he had already planned everything beforehand and would not be affected by the current stock price.
Therefore, on the third day, Jiadian Group raised its card again and announced that it had bought some shares of the other listed companies of Samsung from a few financial companies, increasing the shareholding of the twenty plus large companies of Samsung to more than 10%.
As for the exact percentage, because it did not exceed 15%, it was not publicized.
In three days, after raising the signboard dozens of times, Jiadian Group had already displayed their dominance, and everyone could see the determination of Jiadian Group.
Therefore, the members of Samsung were also panicking.
Lee Jaerong, who had been smiling confidently, could not smile anymore. He paced around the office for a long time before making a few phone calls to several large banks and financial companies that held the shares of the company.
As the person in charge from Samsung, he knew who stood behind Samsung, and he knew who held the most important shares.
Although Samsung had a lot of stocks on the market, it was already difficult for Su Yang to purchase them when the price was above 10%.
Therefore, what he needed to do at that moment was to stabilize the group of bankers and financial magnates behind him so that they would still stand behind him. This way, even if Su Yang bought all the loose shares in the market, he would not be able to obtain the actual control of Samsung. He would have a chance of winning.
After a few phone calls, Lee Jaerong sighed in relief. Even though the financial giants were angry about what had happened recently, they still supported him.
After receiving the good news, Lee Jaerong finally relaxed.
However, just as he was starting to relax, bad news arrived. News about N7’s explosion had spread far and wide.
Consumers from many countries began to complain about Samsung, demanding compensation and treatment.
Under the lead of Southwest Airlines, several companies in America issued a ban on N7s from boarding.
This made things worse for Samsung.
Lee Jaerong did not dare to be careless when it came to the company’s strategy.
He knew that if this matter was not handled properly, Su Yang might not even need to change the board of directors and he would still be kicked out.
Therefore, three days later, as a last resort, Samsung announced to the public and admitted that there was a quality issue with the N7, which could lead to spontaneous combustion. They also announced that it would recall 1.7 million N7s that had been sold worldwide.
At the end of the press conference, Goo Jindong, the marketing president of Samsung, bowed and apologized.
On the same day, Samsung Electronics’s shares fell drastically. Even the subsidiaries that had just stopped falling started to fall.
At that moment, Jiadian Group, which had been silent for almost a week, raised its cards crazily again.
Once, twice, three times…
Jiadian Group raised its boards to more than 20 of Samsung’s subsidiaries and announced that they already held more than 15% of the shares of these companies.
Jiadian Group’s insane feat of acquisition of Jiadian Group and their terrifying ability to absorb shares shocked everyone in the world.
After all, this was Samsung, not just any Tom, Dick or Harry. The market value of Samsung Electronics alone had exceeded 100 billion USD. Because of these acquisition rumors, it had risen to 110 billion USD.
Together with the other subsidiaries, their total market value was estimated to be around 180 billion USD, which would be over a trillion yuan!
‘Su Yang actually dares to force his way into a company of this level?!
‘How much would that have cost him!?
‘He has already thrown out hundreds of billions of USD!’
A few days ago, when Su Yang raised his card for the second time, everyone thought that he was crazy.
Meanwhile, Samsung had also put pressure on Jiadian Group.
After that, Jiadian Group had indeed calmed down for two days. However, just when everyone thought that Jiadian Group was going to give up like the last time they attacked Korea, it turned out that they were going to do it right at that moment?!
They raised their boards for the third time!
‘He doesn’t even care about anything at all!
‘What kind of trump card does Jiadian Group have?
‘Why is he so confident!’
Due to the N7 explosion and the forced hostile takeover by Jiadian Group, the whole world was talking about it. Many experts and scholars started to analyze the possibility of Jiadian Group acquiring the company.
These experts and scholars came to a pessimistic conclusion from the size of the two, the state of the company, the country’s regulations, and the calculation of cash reserves.