The subprime mortgage crisis that originated on Wall Street spread to the European continent and quickly evolved into a global financial crisis, which had a huge destructive effect on the European banking industry.
Governments around the world have launched large-scale relief policies in an attempt to save financial industry giants that are crucial to the national economy. This is a bloody moment.
On October 5, 2008, the U.S. federal government held an emergency economic meeting between the two houses and reached a consensus on important issues. The Federal Insurance Commission maintained the feasibility of the insurance mortgage program and quickly promoted a US$700 billion rescue plan.
On October 8, 2008, the Federal Reserve lowered the discount rate again to 1.75. Compared with the discount rate of 4% at the beginning of the year, it has significantly lowered the discount rate six times, releasing more than US$2.3 trillion in liquidity to the market.
On the same day, on the other side of the Atlantic, the British Treasury implemented an emergency rescue plan for Bradford-Bentley Bank, a major mortgage bank. This move was criticized by both the government and the opposition.
The Sun pointedly revealed in its report;
This is a dangerous game played by the financiers of London's Warship Street and the greedy speculators of Wall Street. These financial elites use this to obtain huge incomes of tens of millions of pounds. They wear crisp custom-made suits and go to high-end drinking parties, drive sports cars and bring
The beauty lives a luxurious life.
When the bubble burst, millions of workers in the British Isles lost their jobs, but the government used the taxes paid by the people to save the perpetrators of these crimes.
Perhaps in the whole of Europe, only HSBC can follow the rules of the financial industry and bring the last hope to depositors.
The European financial industry has been hit hard by this, and may be set back 20 or even 30 years. This is a huge disaster for the entire society.
…
The newspaper's remarks were somewhat exaggerated. In fact, the resilience of the world economy is beyond everyone's imagination. In just two years, it has quickly recovered and regained its vitality.
But now, European and American society is walking in the darkest part of the tunnel, and we still don’t know when the light will come.
While European and American societies have generally been hit hard by the financial sector, the Chinese dragon in the East has not been greatly affected.
This should be thanked for the lag in the internationalization process of China Dragon's financial industry. It should also be thanked that Lehman Brothers' packaged junk bonds are rarely sold to the mainland. It should also be thanked for HSBC's mainstay role in Huaxia's foreign trade, occupying most of the
International exchange market.
HSBC's sound operating style has resulted in the global financial turmoil rarely affecting mainland China. However, the severe economic recession brought about by the global financial turmoil still inevitably affects mainland China's exports.
October 7, 2008
Grupo Santander, Spain's largest bank, announced that it would accept 7.8 billion euros in government relief and start merger negotiations with HSBC.
On October 8, 2008, Fortis Financial Group, a large bank and asset company in the Benelux countries, all received government relief and some of its assets were nationalized. The governments of Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg invested a total of 11.2 billion euros (about 16.3 billion euros).
USD) amount given to the bank.
Belgium purchased 49% of the assets of Fortis Financial Group's Belgian unit, while the Netherlands made an emergency capital injection for Fortis Financial Group's Dutch unit, and Luxembourg agreed to provide loans in exchange for 49% of the convertible shares of Fortis Financial Group's Luxembourg unit.
On October 11, 2008, Wachovia, the fourth largest bank in the United States, was acquired by Citibank Group.
On October 14, the German Finance Minister announced the rescue of Hypo Real Estate, a holding company headquartered in Munich and composed of several real estate finance banks.
Just one day later, on October 15, the rescue plan was suspended. The German government announced that it would invite HSBC to participate in the Hypo Real Estate rescue plan and expressed its efforts to promote cooperation between the two.
To this end, the German government will provide a certain amount of government low-interest loans to support HSBC in using market means to solve Hypo Real Estate's urgent problems.
On the same day, the Icelandic government took over Grettel Bank, the third largest bank in Iceland, and sent people to urgently contact HSBC in an attempt to obtain financial assistance from the world's largest banking group.
Although Europe and the United States invested a lot of money, the stock market still spent this dark half month in a sharp decline.
Especially the financial industry is the hardest hit area. The best performing companies, HSBC and Bank of America, saw their market value drop by one-third. HSBC's market value dropped from US$445 billion before the financial crisis to US$306 billion, which is considered a strong performance.
Yes.
The market value of many other international financial institutions has been cut in half, and some are even less than 20% of their original market value.
Such market performance has severely damaged a large number of European and American pension funds, long-term stable investment funds and the insurance industry, and the market is in mourning.
The British government announced that it will provide a 25 billion pound bailout package to the following financial institutions, including:
Abbey, Barclays, HBOS, Lloyds TSB, Nationwide, Royal Bank of Scotland Group and Standard Chartered.
Other financial institutions will also receive a 25 billion pound bailout, which will be used in exchange for preferred shares of the above-mentioned banks. This plan is considered to be a semi-nationalization of the company.
Wang Yaocheng flew to France on October 7 and lived in the beautiful Cedar Manor in the south of France. He has always lived in seclusion and remotely directed the merger and reorganization of consortiums around the world.
Since he moved in, dignitaries and celebrities from various European countries have come to visit him.
in the manor
Wang Yaocheng had just seen off several financial industry colleagues from the Netherlands and walked back slowly with his hands behind his back, a thoughtful look on his face, considering HSBC's positioning in the global financial industry.
After HSBC acquired Wachovia Bank and Washington Mutual Bank, it successively acquired four small and medium-sized local banks. Compared with HSBC's huge scale, it increased by about 1/10.
Since all are concentrated in North America, HSBC's business scale, branches, and customer levels have doubled in a short period of time, ranking among the top three in the United States.
Compared with before the merger and acquisition, the North American business ranked between sixth and seventh, which has made a substantial breakthrough.
Wang Yaocheng knows how to give up when things are good. In order not to attract too much jealousy and not to stand out too much, his layout in North America can be concluded.
The overall strategy of HSBC can be transferred to Europe. As one of the three pillars of the world, East and Southeast Asia business, North American business and European business should go hand in hand, and it is safe to strengthen them simultaneously.
Equity shares of European banks that were unavailable in the past are now available one after another for them to choose from.
Especially Germany, Belgium and the United Kingdom were the most active. As for the fringe areas of Europe such as Iceland and Western Greece that came to ask for help, Wang Yaocheng didn't take it seriously at all, and sent them off with a few perfunctory words.
HSBC is still looking at the Western and Southern Europe regions with France, Germany, Italy, and Belgium as the core. This is the essence of the European economy, and related banking business is limited by the expansion of traditional forces and is difficult.
This global financial crisis has given HSBC a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for expansion, which we must seize no matter what.
In previous mergers and acquisitions in North America, HSBC did not actually spend much money. Washington Mutual Bank spent US$1.9 billion, Wachovia Bank spent US$16.5 billion, and several other small and medium-sized banks did not spend much. The most important thing is to bear the burden of their large
shortfalls and debts.
Among them, Washington Mutual lost as much as 77.5 billion U.S. dollars, Wachovia Bank suffered a huge loss of 14 billion U.S. dollars, and the other four small and medium-sized banks suffered losses of nearly 10 billion U.S. dollars.
At the critical moment of the financial crisis, this expenditure of 100 billion U.S. dollars is needed immediately, and subsequent cash flow relief is needed. In addition to HSBC's own funds, plus Washington Mutual's 130 billion depositors' funds, the consortium
Some additional funds are still needed.
To this end, HSBC raised US$140 billion from the Wang Consortium and other major shareholders through an emergency private placement. As a result, the consortium quickly increased its shareholding ratio from 53.6% to 75.7%. HSBC has already revitalized its capital through the injection of funds.
The mergers and acquisitions of US-funded banks have further expanded the scale of operations.
Gradually increasing the shareholding ratio of the core enterprises of the consortium will be beneficial to Wang Yaocheng. Now the equity value of HSBC has been dragged down by the market, shrinking by about 1/3, with a market value of only 310 billion US dollars. This is a
A good opportunity to increase your equity holdings.
There are only two options for major shareholders to increase their equity holdings, one is to buy back shares, and the other is to issue additional shares to dilute the original equity.
HSBC now urgently needs a large amount of liquidity, so it makes sense to choose the second option, which can promote its rapid expansion in Europe and the United States and enhance its intrinsic corporate value.
When the international market picks up and HSBC returns to its value, everything it pays now will be rewarded multiple times.
At that time, the consortium can appropriately reduce its holdings, or introduce strategic investors, etc., to realize the huge profits, reduce the excessive equity ratio, expand the utilization efficiency of funds, and kill two birds with one stone.
Judging from the current situation, Wang Yaocheng has about 111 billion US dollars in cash, and there is also a huge plan to buy shares in Vodafone during negotiations. The total amount of funds can be said to be stretched thin, and it is far from enough to support HSBC Bank's ambitious development plan.
Therefore, when it comes to mergers and acquisitions in Europe, Wang Yaocheng is prepared to use part of the cash and part of the stock to achieve mergers, acquisitions and reorganization, which is currently the most feasible plan.
"Chairman, representatives of the Belgian government and Fortis Financial Group have been waiting for a long time. When do you think we can receive them?"
"Let's take a 20-minute break. I think they'll be happy to wait."
"Understood, I will arrange for them to go to the conference hall in 20 minutes, and you can receive them there."
"Um."
Wang Yaocheng nodded, looking through the arched window carved from the entire red rock, towards the sun-drenched azure cape, where the roaring waves smashed into pieces and made a noisy wave.
The Snow Manor is located on the top of a promontory, surrounded by the sea on three sides, and the warm Mediterranean wind blows in with a hint of coolness.
Wang Yaocheng looked at the beautiful scenery outside in ecstasy, allowing his mind to relax for a moment of peace. To him, these European government officials and financial industry tycoons were just poor people who came to visit him, so there was no need to care too much.
Europe is a long-established free economic market, and the government's bailout of private banks and financial institutions is extremely unpopular in society. The emotionally charged public opinion circles criticized it, and the reputation of the elected government was quickly ruined.
For the ruling parties related to the democratically elected government, this is simply sitting at home behind closed doors, and disasters are coming from the sky.
Will there be no need for elections in the future?
No more votes needed?
Don’t you need public support and good reputation anymore?
Judging from the German government's rapid reversal in rescuing Hypo Real Estate, European governments still hope that private capital will come forward and use market means to solve current major problems. This is also the fundamental reason why HSBC is particularly popular.
In normal times, there is no need to think about such good things, there is no way.