Chapter 386 United Energy Group

 Things are not over yet...

  Next, Northern Gas announced a trading halt and released a disclosure of important matters, announcing that it would issue 665 million new shares to complete its full acquisition of British Oil and Gas Investments.

  This acquisition will be subject to approval from relevant British regulatory authorities.

  Before the trading halt, Northern Gas' share price was around £4.75, with a total share capital of approximately 478.5 million shares and a market value of around £2.273 billion.

  Based on this stock price, the market value of the British Oil and Gas Investment Company they merged into is about 3.16 billion pounds, equivalent to 6 billion US dollars, which is the same price at which Vanguard Group acquired 10% of the company's shares.

  At this time, the largest asset owned by British Oil and Gas Investment Company was its 30% stake in Kolo Petroleum. The oil company was preparing to exploit Block 1 of the Kolo offshore oil field, which had proven reserves of more than 500 million tons.

  It can be said that the price of Northern Gas Company's acquisition of British Oil and Gas Investment Company was not high, and was even very favorable, so this acquisition was quickly approved by the relevant departments.

  Afterwards, Northern Gas Company applied to change its name to United Energy Group (UEG), which includes businesses such as oil development and natural gas pipelines.

  After this reorganization, the total share capital of United Energy Group is approximately 1.1435 billion shares.

  Among them, Caesars Fund holds approximately 421 million shares of the former Northern Gas Company, accounting for 88%, plus 598.5 million shares of the former British Oil and Gas Investment Company, accounting for 90%, totaling 1.0195 billion shares, accounting for approximately 89.15% of the total share capital of United Energy Group.

  America's Vanguard Group holds 66.5 million shares, accounting for 10% of the former British Oil and Gas Investment Company, and approximately 5.8% of the total share capital of United Energy Group.

  After completing the reorganization and being approved to change its name to United Energy Group (UEG) and reopening, the stock price rose directly from 4.75 pounds before the suspension to more than 7 pounds, an increase of more than 55% in one day, thanks to this favorable impact, especially the extremely considerable profit expectations of Kolo Oil, in which UEG holds a 30% stake, in its offshore oil field business!

  The market value of United Energy Group also exceeded 8 billion pounds.

  Afterwards, with the first exploratory well drilled by Kolo Petroleum Company in Block 1 of the Kolo offshore oil field, oil was successfully produced at a depth of only about 800 meters.

  And after testing, the crude oil produced in this block is light sweet crude oil, which has a lighter density, lower sulfur content, higher oil yield, and is high-quality oil.

  Similar to this crude oil is North Sea Brent crude oil, which is also a light, low-sulfur crude oil and has become the pricing standard for the London crude oil trading market.

  According to estimates, the first oil well in Block 1 will have an initial daily output of more than 10,000 tons, making it a high-yield well!

  Influenced by this news, and the excellent oil test results of the second exploratory well, the share price of United Energy Group rose again by more than 50% in the following week, approaching 11 pounds, and its market value exceeded 12 billion pounds.

  Of course, this is a later story.

  …

  "Baby, you look a little tired recently. You should rest more..."

  Hearing Barron's words, Bonnie leaned her head on his shoulder and said softly:

  "My dear, you know I was a little busy recently. After all, it was the first time I dealt with the acquisition of a company of this size. But now it's ok. I can give myself two days off."

  What Bonnie was talking about was the acquisition of the well-known British independent production company TalkbackTHAMES by her Giant Studio in early March.

  This independent production company has produced many popular variety shows and television programs.

  However, with the sudden rise of many SDTV programs, including Summit Studio and Giant Studio, which have grabbed a lot of user viewing share in the variety show field, other independent production companies are also facing considerable pressure.

  Now, with the development of Giant Studio, the programs produced by Bonnie and her team, such as "Dancing Miracle" and "Shining Life", are very successful. Next, while continuing these two programs, Bonnie has other ideas and hopes to produce a new variety show. Now the staff of Giant Studio is a little insufficient.

  In this case, acquiring other production companies became Bonnie's option, and the one she set her eyes on was TalkbackTHAMES.

  After more than a month of negotiations, Giant Studio finally successfully acquired TalkbackTHAMES for 65 million pounds.  

  It can be said that during this period of time, without Barron watching over her in London, Bonnie has been working very hard. She has to manage Giant Studio, plan new programs, and is busy with the acquisition of TalkbackTHAMES. She has almost become a workaholic.

  In the past two years, the field of program production in the UK has indeed begun to change. Not only Bonnie's Giant Studio, but also Summit Studio under Summit Media is making a series of acquisitions, bringing some creative small and medium-sized independent production organizations under its umbrella.

  Not only in the UK, Summit Media is already formulating overseas expansion plans to acquire production companies in Northern Europe, Australia and the United States.

  "You look so beautiful today, baby."

  When they were getting ready to go out together, Bonnie changed her clothes and came down. Barron looked at her with deep admiration in his eyes and praised her.

  Hearing his words, Bonnie naturally had a sweet smile on her face, but she said coquettishly:

  "Am I not always beautiful?"

  The light green satin dress she wore really showed off Bonnie's beautiful figure, and her every move was extremely elegant.

  The weather in London in April is still a bit chilly, but putting on a fur coat outside can block out a lot of the cold.

  Today is a banquet hosted by the royal family, which is quite large. Barron will bring Bonnie with him.

  "You will be the most eye-catching presence tonight, baby."

  Before getting off the car, Barron kissed his girlfriend on the lips and spoke to her lovingly.

  When they arrived, the banquet hall inside Buckingham Palace was already very lively.

  And there is no doubt that when the young and handsome Duke of Devonshire entered the hall with his beautiful girlfriend, he also attracted countless people's attention.

  Along the way, Barron also met many acquaintances.

  "Barron, this may be the first time you've met my son, Hugh, who has been attending boarding school."

  The Duke of Westminster approached Barron with a boy.

  "Hello, Hugh, what a handsome young man..."

  Barron shook hands with the boy opposite him and said to him with a smile.

  Well, the Hugh Grosvenor in front of him inherited the Westminster family at the age of 25 after the current Duke of Westminster died unexpectedly more than ten years later. In his previous life, Barron had also seen many reports in China saying "Inherited a fortune of hundreds of billions at the age of 25, owned half of London...blah blah".

  However, Hugh Grosvenor in front of Barron was only 14 years old. Facing Barron, the youngest and richest duke in England at that time, the young man was still very shy.

  Speaking of which, after April, various wealth lists for this year have been announced one after another.

  Thanks to the fact that Barron has invested and held many industries in the form of funds and offshore companies, such as Rich23 Capital, Global Industrial Investment Fund (GII Fund) and Caesar Fund, according to the statistics of those media and institutions, Barron's wealth has not increased significantly compared with last year...

  Of course, there has definitely been an increase. After all, companies including Google and Summit Media, which he invested in or held, have been listed one after another.

  In the British rich list released by British media such as The Times and The Guardian, Barron unsurprisingly continued to be the richest man in Britain, continuing to surpass Abramovich.

  On the Forbes Global Rich List, thanks to the appreciation of the pound, Barron's net worth in US dollars has also increased slightly, ranking fourth among the world's richest people, after Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Indian steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal.