Chapter 672: Resolving the grievances of a previous life

Xia Yu felt more and more at ease as he handed over the antique business to George Berkeley and Hua Shengshi.

The remaining employees of the Galaxy Fund continued to operate London gold, but since the price of London gold had been steadily rising, the workload was not heavy. Most of the time, they could just sit back and watch as the funds grew and grew...

As for Bright Fund, Xia Yu didn't need to worry about it at all. George Berkeley could easily handle the acquisition of bank stocks and speculation in the US dollar/British pound.

Xia Yu therefore continued to devote his energy to the construction and improvement of Huashang Bank.

Before he knew it, September had arrived.

Sotheby's auction house had finally recovered all the shares and completed the privatisation.

From the beginning of the process to the completion of the acquisition, a total of £240 million had been spent.

After the acquisition, Xia Yu personally went to Sotheby's auction house. After some understanding, he kept the original general manager, Ron Eric.

Ron Eric is just a professional manager. According to the information provided by Guangming Fund, he is a pure person with a high work ethic. Although he gets along well with Sam Nelson, there are no other complicated relationships.

Xia Yu also discovered that Ron Eric had been in the position of general manager for fifteen years, knew Sotheby's like the back of his hand, and was even largely responsible for the company's development to the extent it had reached today.

Xia Yu was not worried about him stirring up any trouble, so he simply let him continue to control Sotheby's.

However, he did not hesitate to dismiss the heads of the cashier, finance and personnel departments.

Kornhill International's business in the UK was doing well, and Xia Yu easily found satisfactory talent to fill the vacancies.

Afterwards, Xia Yu had a long chat with Ron Eric for the whole morning, telling him his own ideas for the future direction of Sotheby's and the strategies available for development, while also injecting 30 million pounds to be used for the acquisition of art centres and exhibition galleries, the establishment of branches, the signing of artists, and so on.

After just dealing with Sotheby's, another piece of good news came: the deal with the Eskenazi family was completed.

The stake held by the Bright Fund was priced at £28 million.

The 6,218 Chinese cultural relics of the Eskenazi family were priced at £53 million, with an average price of less than £10,000 per piece.

Although the quality of the items varied, Xia Yu felt that the total value was definitely far more than 53 million pounds. The price was definitely excellent value, and after 40 years in existence, the antiques were worth at least tens of billions of yuan.

However, compared to the price paid by Huashengshi, which was acquired from ordinary people or down-and-out nobles who did not know their value, the current price was definitely high. After all, the Askenazi family had been in the antiques business for a long time, and they had some discernment and thinking.

In the end, the Bright Foundation paid for the shares of the Eskenazi Company Limited it held, plus 25 million pounds in cash, to acquire all the antiques.

Due to the sheer volume of antiques, even Xia Yu's country manor could not hold them all.

Therefore, Xia Yu bought another manor near the manor and asked Huashi to move all the antiques there for temporary storage.

Thinking about the large quantity of Chinese antiques he had obtained, Xia Yu couldn't help but feel itchy and drove with Li Qian and the others to the manor.

Once inside the manor, Xia Yu found the entire hall filled with old wooden boxes. Many of the boxes were rotting at the edges, and Hua Shengshi was leading a group of grey-haired old men as they selected them. Every five or six seconds, Xia Yu heard four people wailing, all lamenting the poor preservation of the antiques.

'Good afternoon, Hua Lao, and all the old gentlemen!'

Xia Yu had a very good attitude towards this group of people, and smiled as he stepped through the door.

'Hello, Mr Xia!'

...

After a few pleasantries, Xia Yu let the elderly men get on with their work and went to find Hua Shengshi alone to find out what the situation was.

'Hua, what's the situation?'

'Mr Xia, because we were in a hurry, we didn't even unpack the boxes before ordering them, so no protective measures were taken for the antiques. They have been gathering dust in the Escenazi family's vault. Some antiques have been seriously damaged due to problems with transportation and preservation.'

'Now that all the antiques have been shipped back, we are unpacking and sorting them again, and taking preliminary protective measures. After they have been sorted, it would be best to fly them back to Hong Kong.'

Hua Shengshi said with a heartbroken expression. For someone who has made it his lifelong wish to recover Chinese cultural relics, seeing one after another piece of highly valuable Chinese cultural relics damaged is heartbreaking.

But the incident happened a long time ago, and there is no point in blaming the Askenazi family and the robbers. The best we can do is to take the utmost precautions.

Xia Yu's eyes flashed with regret, and he comforted Hua Shengshi, 'Hua Lao, there is nothing we can do about it. Think of the bright side: although some of them were damaged, the vast majority were retrieved from the British, which is a great piece of good news!'

'Yes, it is definitely a great piece of good news...'

Hua Shengshi muttered to himself.

After a moment of emotion, Hua Shengshi gathered his thoughts and said to Xia Yu, 'Mr Xia, some of the items have already been selected and stored in categories. Would you like to go and have a look?'

'Let's go!'

Xia Yu said immediately, and Hua Shengshi led the way to a room inside.

'Creak...'

After opening the door, Xia Yu saw a row of neatly arranged intact boxes, all of which were covered, so from the outside you would never know what was inside.

Seeing Hua Shengshi walking over to try to open the lid of a box, Xia Yu stopped him directly and ordered Li Wuming to do it.

Soon, the lids of the boxes all over the floor were opened.

The boxes were full of bronze ware!

Dun, fu, bronze knives, bells, etc., are all small and medium-sized bronze ware, and heavy bronze ware such as ding were not seen.

Xia Yu walked further in, looking at the boxes next to him from time to time.

When he reached the innermost part, his pupils suddenly contracted, and he fixed his gaze on the bronze ware in the three large boxes in front of him.

It was the bronze animal heads from the Old Summer Palace!

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, there were seven of them!

They accounted for more than half of the twelve bronze animal heads from the Old Summer Palace!

Xia Yu came back to his senses and squatted down to observe them carefully.

Seeing Xia Yu's actions, Hua Shengshi thought that Xia Yu was interested and introduced, 'Mr Xia, these seven bronze vessels are seven of the twelve animal heads from the Yuanmingyuan Garden. It is estimated that because of the Italian court painter Giuseppe Castiglione and the French designer, the Eskenazi family believes that they are of good value and have specially selected them.'

Xia Yu nodded slightly without replying and continued to observe.

Ox, Monkey, Tiger, Rabbit, Rat, Rooster and Dragon!

Among them, Ox, Monkey, Tiger, Rabbit, Rat and Rat have already appeared in the real world in their previous lives.

The Rooster has been missing for a long time.

As for the Dragon, it is suspected to have appeared at a small auction in Paris, France in 2018, and was bought by a Chinese buyer from Taiwan Province. It is uncertain whether it is real or not, as there has been no news since then.

They are indeed in the hands of the Eskenazi family!

Looking at these animal heads, Xia Yu's eyes were full of emotion. In his previous life, every time an animal head from the previous life appeared in the world, it would cause a huge sensation, and even just some news would be able to make headlines.

Western capitalists manipulated public opinion and used the national self-confidence and emotions of the Chinese people to make money, leeching off the Chinese people. Xia Yu couldn't help but grind his teeth after reading the news online in his previous life.

He never imagined that in this life, these animal heads that touched the emotions of the Chinese people would so easily come to him, and there were even seven of them at once!

"That's good. Once these animal heads are in my hands, they will no longer be used as tools to exploit the Chinese people and hurt their feelings.'

Xia Yu thought to himself, and at that moment he had already decided that while he might sell other antiques, these animal heads would never be sold!

Moreover, he would do his best to acquire the other five animal heads!

As for the outcome, one can only say that one should do one's best and leave the rest to fate!

Xia Yu shook his head slightly and got up, saying to Hua Shengshi, 'Hua Lao, I really like these animal heads. They must be preserved well, and in the future, I will do some more research and try to acquire the remaining five as well.'

Hua Shengshi was taken aback, and said with a smile, "Okay, Mr. Xia!'