Chapter 1240: A Price Beyond Expectations

The Torii family was at the centre of a storm, attracting attention from all sides.

Under such scrutiny, the news that Keizo Torii and Shinichiro Torii had visited the island branches of multinational banks and financial institutions one after the other was of course impossible to hide.

The situation of the Torii family is well known to everyone, and in particular, many media have reported in depth on it. At this critical juncture, the Torii family had no other choice but to go to multinational banks and financial institutions to borrow money.

The Bank of Bahrain, HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland, Bright Foundation, Wells Fargo Bank, Polaris Capital and many other companies in which Xia Yu holds a stake or has absolute control all have branches in the island country.

The wealthy and arrogant Wells Fargo Bank had been visited by the Torii family, and the news quickly spread through several hands before finally reaching Xia Yu's ears.

'So that's what the Torii family was thinking. They don't want to take the risk of using their own holdings, but they also want to participate in the stock grab. Haha...'

'But the risk is uncontrollable, and it's not up to them to decide!'

Xia Yu's mind raced with a thousand thoughts, and he came up with a few methods that had a certain degree of operability, with an arrow aimed at the Torii family's current holdings.

After thinking about it, he picked up the encrypted phone and dialed the headquarters of Wells Fargo Bank in the United States.

After a few minutes on the phone, Xia Yu got up and left the office, calling Matsumoto Yu and Wang Qi from the next room to go to the operations room together.

Although the Torii family has not really participated yet, it has already been rumoured that they will never sit back and do nothing.

The competition between Mitsui Securities and Jiuding Securities for the shareholders' equity has also quickly reached a white-hot stage, so the stock price of Suntory is no longer something that the two sides can suppress.

After Xia Yu entered the operations room, he saw that the share price of Suntory had skyrocketed to 1387.6 yen per share, an increase of nearly 50% compared to the beginning!

And the upward trend was still unabated!

'How much equity do we have in our hands?'

Xia Yu glanced at Matsumoto Yu and asked in a light voice.

'Boss, so far, there is a total of 20.23%.'

The fluctuating data had been in Songben You's mind, and he easily reported it.

'How much do you think Mitsui Securities has, can you estimate?'

This question was very difficult, and Songben You was silent for a long time before answering uncertainly, 'The exact amount cannot be determined, but we have competed for shareholders on both sides, and we have not taken down the shares of three shareholders, which should have been bought by Mitsui Securities. The combined shareholding of these three shareholders is 3.48%.'

'Plus the shares that Mitsui Securities had publicly held before, a conservative estimate is that Mitsui Securities' shareholding is over 8%.'

Xia Yu quickly calculated that the combined shareholdings of the three parties, his own, Mitsui Securities and the Torii family, accounted for about half of Suntory's total share capital.

This meant that about 50% of the shares were still in the hands of other people, and it was still far from a clear winner, with all three parties still having a chance.

Although it seems that among the three parties, Jifang has the best chance of winning, nothing is certain until the end.

Strike first to gain the upper hand and further expand the advantage!

Thinking about this, Xia Yu instructed Matsumoto Yu, 'Matsumoto Yu, make a plan for a full-scale attack. Buy as much as you can for less than 2,500 yen per share, and temporarily give up the stock market.'

Matsumoto Yu was awe-inspiring and said sternly, 'Yes!'

...

Matsumoto Yu gathered all the acquisition teams and, after issuing new orders, the acquisition offensive by Jiuding Securities became very fierce.

With sufficient bidding authority, they were fierce when negotiating price increases.

In contrast, the various acquisition teams of Mitsui Securities were decimated due to authority issues.

The Torii family was also anxious and did not have time to slowly reduce borrowing costs. In the end, they reached a cooperation with Wells Fargo, which had relatively lenient conditions.

The Torii family urgently raised 3 billion yen in capital, borrowed 60 billion yen from Wells Fargo at a lending rate of 12%, and then used 50.4 million shares of Suntory stock, worth 12% of the total, as collateral to borrow another 60 billion yen, for a total of 123 billion yen.

The 50.4 million shares of stock referred to were shares to be acquired in the future, not the Torii family's existing stock.

The agreement also clearly stipulates that the 12% interest rate is valid for a maximum of one year, and that no early repayment is allowed when the bank assesses the Torii family's assets as creditworthy.

However, if the Torii family repays the loan early, the short-term lending rate is equivalent to an annual interest rate of 12%.

This means that the more than 100 billion yen was credited to the Torii family's account, and even if the Torii family repays it in one day, they still have to pay interest at a rate of 12%.

In addition, the agreement also stipulates that if the Torii family fails to complete the acquisition, the pledged shares fall below 50.4 million shares, or the stock price plummets, causing the value of the 50.4 million shares to fall below the loan amount, the Torii family will need to replenish the collateral within 15 days, or repay the shortfall, otherwise it will be considered as the Torii family's voluntary breach of contract, and Wells Fargo will have the right to take any measures to protect its interests, and the interest rate will remain at 12% until the agreement is completely terminated.

This means that if the Torii family fails to complete the acquisition, they will have 15 days to respond, either by paying the full 120 billion yen principal plus 14.4 billion yen in interest, or by putting up collateral equal to the principal.

It may seem that these conditions are favourable to Wells Fargo, but in reality the bank is also taking a huge risk. After all, based on the current share price of Suntory, the 50.4 million shares pledged as collateral already more than doubles the amount of the loan.

According to normal stock mortgage loans, the interest rate is at least 50%, and it is even higher.

Furthermore, the assets of the Torii family are mainly concentrated in the stocks of Suntory. If Suntory goes bankrupt or its stock price plummets, causing it to become insolvent, Wells Fargo will have to bear the losses on its own.

These risks are not insignificant when added up. Compared to the banking industry, which is generally operating in a stable manner, Wells Fargo's conditions are definitely very lenient.

At least the Torii family still has a lot of autonomy and options.

...

With 123 billion yen in hand, if it only needs to acquire 50.4 million shares, the purchase price can be averaged at 2,440 yen per share. Compared to Suntory's current stock price of only about 1,400 yen, it seems that there is still a lot of room for the Torii family to operate.

Of course, in actual private acquisitions, the stock price can only be used as a reference. The specific price still depends on the seller's psychological expectations and the buyer's negotiation skills.

In any case, with more than 100 billion yen in funds, Keizo Torii's confidence instantly grew, and he aggressively rushed into the battlefield to intervene in the battle for control.

After all, relying on years of cooperation and personal relationships, Torii Keizo still had a lot of advantages. At the very least, if the price was the same, the shareholders' meeting would prefer to sell the shares to Torii Keizo, and they were even willing to sell at a lower price, which was relatively straightforward.

However, in terms of the purchase price, since Jiuding Securities and Mitsui Securities had both contacted all shareholders at the same time, the presence of these two competitors meant that the purchase price could not be lowered.

The battle for Suntory's shares instantly reached a fever pitch.

Of the three parties, Mitsui Securities was the one under the most pressure.

After urgently communicating with Mitsui & Co., Yohei Taya, who was responsible for the takeover, gritted his teeth and directly made a tough decision: he relaxed the authority of each takeover team to 2,900 yen per share!

Yusuke Matsumoto realised that the situation was not right, and after consulting Xia Yu, he also decisively increased the authority of each team, from 2,500 yen per share to 3,000 yen per share.

This raised the level of competition to a whole new level.

Keizo Torii was horrified to discover that the acquisition price had exceeded his psychological expectations.

123 billion yen just isn't enough...