Chapter 205: Every Detail
After Liu Zhicheng concluded the talks with John Shi on behalf of Dragonair, he had made his attitude clear. Now it depends on the results of John Shi's communication with shareholders after he returns.

In the Sailing Building, Liu Zhicheng is holding a work meeting for his companies.

Liu Zhicheng first asked Sun Lina of the City Group: "Have you found a suitable bookstore chain to acquire in RB during this period?"

"Mr. Liu, according to your request, I contacted several chain bookstores through an intermediary, and three of them are willing to sell.
The largest of these bookstores is called Jiekou Bookstore," said Sun Lina.

"The bookstore at the street corner?" Liu Zhicheng couldn't help but ask.

It sounds a bit like Japanese, but Liu Zhicheng has never heard of this name. It should not be one of the famous small bookstores.

"Yes." Sun Lina continued to introduce: "This Jiekou Bookstore was established in 1945 and is now headquartered in Chiyoda District, Tokyo.
There are 217 bookstores under its umbrella, which are basically spread across the entire RB region except Hokkaido.

There is just one problem. Jiekou bookstores are mainly located in small cities in RB. In large cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, and Yokohama, there are only two or three small bookstores each.

The biggest problem at present is that RB has become increasingly urbanized, with the population mainly concentrated in cities such as Tokyo and Osaka.
These big cities are also where young people gather, so comics and their peripheral products are also among the best-selling areas.”

"Well, these don't matter much. We can open our own stores in the first-tier cities in RB. We have a lot of properties in these cities anyway.

On the contrary, if we have to conquer small cities one by one, it will be more troublesome." Liu Zhicheng shook his head and smiled.

The most time-consuming part of developing a chain store is developing one small city after another.

Moreover, the initial development costs will be relatively high, requiring site selection, decoration, personnel training, etc.

The situation in big cities is much simpler and centralized management is also convenient. The only trouble is the high rent, but at the same time the profits are also relatively lucrative.

Sun Lina took some photos and handed them to Liu Zhicheng, saying, "Mr. Liu, these are the photos I took when I investigated more than a dozen street bookstores in RB. Please take a look."

Liu Zhicheng took it and looked at it carefully. They were all photos of the entrance and interior of the bookstore at the corner of the street. It looked like the store was not very big.

"These bookstores are not large in scale. They are basically a shop front that serves as a stall, and they mainly sell student learning materials, comic book magazines, and music tapes," Sun Lina went on to introduce.

Liu Zhicheng smiled and said, "It doesn't matter if the area is small. We need a sales network, and our own products in the future will not require too much space."

RB's comics industry is extremely developed. Before online shopping and e-comics came along, sales of comics products mainly relied on offline retail.

Therefore, RB comics are also well developed in the terminal retail field, and many large-scale chain comic stores have been born.

At the same time, it has a superior geographical location and a very large area, making it a great place for countless comic lovers to spend their time.

But in fact, larger comic bookstores can accommodate more comic products, which can also attract more comic lovers to come and choose.

Being small also has its advantages. First, it can expand at low cost, quickly covering the entire area with bookstores, and forming a scale effect.

"How much do they offer for this bookstore at the corner of the street?" Liu Zhicheng asked.

Sun Lina said: "We have communicated with the president of Jiekou Bookstore, Haruki Jiekou, several times, and he asked for 4 million yen."

"4 million yen." Liu Zhicheng calculated the exchange rate. The current exchange rate between the Japanese yen and the US dollar fluctuates around 120:1, which means that 4 million yen is only 480 million US dollars.

"Now that the housing prices in RB are appreciating so quickly, all the storefronts of this bookstore are rented, right?"

"Yes, they are all rented. They don't own any property. However, these bookstores are directly operated by them, which is their biggest advantage," Sun Lina replied.

Liu Zhicheng asked: "Why does the owner of Jiekou Bookstore want to sell his company?"

"I'm not sure of the specific reason, but according to our preliminary understanding, he wants to invest in real estate and the stock market in Tokyo."

"So that's how it is." Liu Zhicheng nodded.

Due to the appreciation of RB, a large amount of hot money has entered RB and caused trouble. Now RB's real estate market and stock market can be said to be thriving.

The prices of land and housing in Tokyo change every day, and real estate speculation is indeed more profitable than traditional bookstores.

"Because Jiekou Bookstore does not have any properties, and the net profit of the entire bookstore last year was about 3000 million yen,
So we think that the 4 million yen quoted by Haruki Kaiguchi is a bit expensive." Sun Lina said seriously.

Liu Zhicheng nodded and said, "Well, but we have wasted too much time on the strategic layout of RB Bookstore, so we must make a quick decision.

It's just a few million dollars anyway, don't worry too much about the price. When you go down, arrange for someone to do the final negotiation. If it's really necessary, sign the contract at this price."

"Ok."

Liu Zhicheng thought for a moment and continued, "After acquiring this bookstore, if you feel that there are not enough stores, especially in large cities such as Tokyo, Yokohama, and Osaka, you need to expand on a large scale.

You will be in charge of this matter personally. Ask Assistant Han to coordinate with us regarding the shops. If we have our own shops, we will try to use them. If we don’t have any, we can rent or buy them. Anyway, we need to expand rapidly.”

"Okay." Sun Lina asked again: "Mr. Liu, if we acquire Jiekou Bookstore, do we need to change the name of the company?"

"No, let's just use this name. I think he should be well-known in RB. If we change his name, we will basically be starting from scratch again." Liu Zhicheng shook his head and rejected it.

Kadokawa Bookstore has been in business for several decades and is certainly well-known among residents living near its store. There is no need to affect its profitability for the sake of a so-called name.

Sun Lina nodded and said, "I understand."

"Yes, let's leave it at that for the bookstore. Just let me know once you've agreed on the price." Liu Zhicheng nodded.

The acquisition was only worth two to three million US dollars in total, so he would not pay too much attention to it. To him, time was money, and he just needed to complete the acquisition quickly.

"Okay." Sun Lina continued.

"Let's leave the bookstore business at that for now." Liu Zhicheng then asked Han Chunxi, "How is the recent real estate acquisition in Japan going?"

The investment in RB Real Estate is a joint action between Shanfeng Investment and Lyon, mainly to prevent exchange rate losses and arbitrage.

This is also the investment project that Liu Zhicheng has been planning to invest in for ten years, and it is given top priority among his investment projects.

In the past, RB made a large amount of R yuan loans to the mainland, which eventually resulted in a large amount of exchange rate losses.

The initial construction of Yantian Port is also using a loan of R yuan. Liu Zhicheng once gave a kind reminder, but he could not change the wheel of history. "Before the Plaza Accord, we had already purchased dozens of office and residential buildings in Koto, Bunkyo, and Shinagawa, Tokyo, with a value of 100 billion yen.
Now, because housing prices are rising too fast, we have slowed down our pace," said Han Chunxi.

Hundreds of billions of yen sounds scary, but it is less than 10 billion US dollars, which is still far from my investment goal.

"Well, what about banks? Which local banks in RB should we cooperate with?" Liu Zhicheng asked.

When the real estate market is booming, it is of course more cost-effective to buy a house with a loan, but for such a large investment, strategic banking cooperation is of course necessary.

"We chose Japan's Sumitomo Bank, which is one of the top ten banks in Japan in terms of size and has some business in Hong Kong. When we purchased properties before, some of the loans were provided by Sumitomo Bank," said Han Chunxi.

"Well, let's manage the relationship with Sumitomo Bank better and make it our group's partner in RB." Liu Zhicheng nodded and said.

To do business in RB, it is natural to cooperate with influential local consortiums or banks.

As long as there is stable bank support, property acquisition will be faster and more frequent, because banks also want to facilitate transactions and then lend money to make a profit.

"Property acquisitions must be accelerated, and the remaining value of property loans must be used for secondary loans, and then invested in the Tokyo stock market, where the Nikkei index and real estate stocks are bought up." Liu Zhicheng continued to instruct.

To outsiders, this was a crazy act, but Han Chunxi knew the boss's intention, which was a crazy harvest.

"Mr. Liu, should we set up a cordon so that we can respond immediately?" Han Chunxi asked.

"Well, let's set the real estate sector in 89 and the stock market in 90." Liu Zhicheng nodded.

Han Chunxi was surprised after hearing this. Others set the warning lines at certain points, but Liu Zhicheng set them at years.

How optimistic is the RB market!

"Okay." Han Chunxi answered mechanically.

"Well, just send someone to keep an eye on it. That's all for today." Liu Zhicheng continued, "Mr. Hao, do you have any big plans recently?"

"Mr. Liu, I should be sent to participate in RB's big move this time. I will definitely get 10 billion US dollars." Hao Qingwen joked.

"Ten billion US dollars? You thought you were the American father of RB." Liu Zhicheng said seriously: "You work for Huangpu Group."

"Got it." Hao Qingwen smiled helplessly and reported: "At present, all our work is progressing according to plan.
Among them, the key project in Tin Shui Wai, two office buildings and ten residential buildings in the first phase, will be delivered by the end of this year.”

"Well, you just need to sell the residential building as planned. As for the office building, you need to rent it out at a low price, mainly to electronic technology companies. If you have any questions, you can ask Mr. Huo.

In terms of transportation, you own KMB, so you need to arrange enough routes. I hope it is convenient for people from Tin Shui Wai to go anywhere.”

"Okay." Hao Qingwen nodded and continued: "Mr. Liu, there is one more thing. Due to land restriction policies and other reasons, land is becoming increasingly tight. Do we still need to go to the auction to buy more land?" Hao Qingwen asked again.

"What do you think?" Liu Zhicheng did not answer but asked back.

"I think we should participate. Although we have abundant land reserves, with development year after year, they will definitely become less and less," Hao Qingwen analyzed.

"Well, we will of course go to the Hong Kong government's land auction. This is also a support for the work of the Hong Kong government, but we don't really have to buy every piece of land.
Just pick the high-quality land, especially the land in Hong Kong Island, you don’t have to hesitate. ” Liu Zhicheng nodded and said.

Not to mention that the real estate crisis has just ended and is still in a recovery period. Even when housing prices were at their highest in 81, if it was land in Central, Liu Zhicheng would not hesitate to buy it.

Because Central is the core of Hong Kong's economy, it has a strong ability to resist risks. Even during the real estate crisis, when the average house price in Hong Kong fell by half, the average drop in Central was only 20% to 30%.

Secondly, during every wave of real estate boom, Central has the largest appreciation rate.

This is also the most attractive aspect of Hong Kong's real estate market.

"Okay." said Hao Qingwen.

"Well, you can handle the other small projects yourself." Liu Zhicheng nodded.

He has begun to delegate power appropriately. Otherwise, he would be exhausted if he had to make decisions on everything.

We traveled through time to enjoy life, not to work like a slave, except for farming, of course, which is a kind of enjoyment in life.

In addition, the office receives briefings from its subsidiaries on a daily basis, and the audit department conducts regular inspections.

Liu Zhicheng had everything under control and was not afraid that they would go beyond the scope of the general policy he had set.

"There is another more difficult problem. The Hong Kong government has introduced a new policy that requires a certain time frame for the development of newly auctioned land.
Developers cannot hoard land for a long time, which is disadvantageous to us developers." Hao Qingwen reported another new situation.

“First, we will try to negotiate with the Hong Kong government to see if we can develop the land later. If that is not possible, we will just follow the contract and build it and then maintain the land ourselves, and then sell it to the public after a few years.

In addition, you should communicate more with the Chinese real estate tycoons on this matter. If there is a problem, don't take the lead alone. "Liu Zhicheng thought for a while and said.

Liu Zhicheng remembered that in his previous life, there seemed to be a situation where real estate developers challenged the Hong Kong government. He wondered if it was caused by this new policy.

"Okay, Mr. Liu."

"In addition, your supermarkets, Lane Crawford shopping malls, and hotel businesses should also go abroad appropriately. You can't just develop in Hong Kong.
Especially for hotels, going global is conducive to enhancing brand influence." Liu Zhicheng said.

"Mr. Yuan, your investment in China Power in the mainland and the grid-connected power transmission project must be planned in full. Don't let me need to upgrade the quality in two years.
At that time, all the power plants in Xiangjiang will be shut down, leaving only the emergency power plant. How is the connection with Hong Kong Electric going now? "

"Mr. Liu, the construction is already underway. We are preparing to start construction together with the new undersea tunnel," Yuan Tianfan reported.

“Well, we also need to hurry up with the Tai Lam Tunnel. Don’t waste time on it. This is an important part of the group’s overall strategy.

Wang Sheng, it's the same with you. The expansion of Beijing West also needs to be expanded to other places. Although we have settled in Malaya, it is far from enough. "

Liu Zhicheng rarely holds a group work meeting once a year, and explains every detail clearly.

"As for Niu Sheng's Zhigao International, I will listen to your report alone when the time comes."

(End of this chapter)