In the mainland, Guo Jingjing and Huo Qigang have always shown the image of a rich family with positive energy and grounding gas, but recently, Guo Jingjing's husband's family, Huo's giants have once again staged a battle for the property of the giants, and it is true that life is far more exciting than the TV set.
Huo Qigang and Guo Jingjing
This year is the 16th year since Huo Yingdong's death, so why has it been so long, and the Huo family is still fighting for family property?
The trigger for this incident was that Huo Zhenyu, the third son of the Huo family's big house, felt that his second brother had concealed his father Huo Yingdong's interest in the development of Nansha in Guangzhou for 7 billion yuan.
For this bit of family property, the brothers turned against each other, and the family affection was already gone, and it was not necessarily a good thing to say that it was too rich.
Huo Zhenyu and Huo Zhenhuan
Huo Yingdong, the head of the Huo family
Let's also start with the old man of the Huo family, Fok Ying Tung, who is also unique among the giants of Hong Kong, who is known as a red-top businessman and was even once suppressed by the British government of Hong Kong.
Fok Ying Tung
During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, he organized a fleet of ships to smuggle materials to the mainland, and during the Period of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, he even transported medicines, cotton clothes, and other materials to the front line.
Transporting supplies
In the 1950s and 1960s, Fok Yingdong pioneered the model of selling house flowers in the Hong Kong property market, that is, the house just laid a foundation, you can subscribe, and then with the progress of the house project, the installment payment, is it déjà vu, yes, after it spread to the mainland, it has become the pre-sale system of houses that we are now familiar with, and the sale of house flowers has also made its wealth to a higher level.
In the past, Fok Yingdong, who made a small fuss, the Hong Kong government turned a blind eye, but seeing that Fok Yingdong was getting bigger and bigger, he began to severely suppress it, and when buying land, he really changed the law to obstruct when developing the container terminal, so Fok Yingdong could only keep a low profile at that time.
Later, with the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Britain, Huo Yingdong then decided to focus on the mainland, cooperated with China in the oil business, and invested in the construction of the white swan hotel, the first five-star hotel in Guangdong, and developed the Nansha area in a big way.
White Swan Guest House
In 1984, China was able to return to the Olympic Games, and it also had a great relationship with Fok Yingdong's private lobbying, and also ran in many ways to restore China's football, basketball, bicycle and other sports organizations to restore their legal seats in the world.
In the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Fok Yingdong proposed to donate to build the Bird's Nest, but because the Bird's Nest did not accept private donations, he later donated 200 million yuan to build the Water Cube Gymnasium.
Water Cube Gymnasium
He was also the first Hong Kong businessman invited to climb the Tiananmen Tower during the National Day military parade. At the time of his death, he was even allowed to wear the national flag and be buried with the honor of a state funeral, an honor worthy of the pride of the Huo family.
Fok Ying Tung funeral
In order to avoid chaos, the will was made early
Because Huo Yingdong knew that the power and profit of the giants would be laughed at by the people of the world, he made a will early when he was still alive in 1978, hoping to avoid this kind of chaotic struggle.
Unlike the principle of Ho Hung Sun in Macau, Ho Hung Sun was a capable person, and finally chose Ho Chao Qiong as his successor. Fok Yingdong's will follows the traditional long order and is more inclined to the long house.
Gambling king Ho Hung Sun
First of all, the big house can be business, but the two rooms and three rooms can only be engaged in the profession of lawyer, doctor, civil servant, etc.
Secondly, all wives and children are beneficiaries, receive a fixed amount of living expenses every month, and cannot distribute the remaining inheritance for 20 years after death.
The Fok Ying Tung family
On the occasion of his death, he arranged that the three sons of Dafang would be in charge of sports, commerce and the development of Nansha respectively, and they should not interfere with each other. The eldest son, Huo Zhenting, inherited the sports business, that is, Guo Jingjing's father-in-law, the second son Huo Zhenhuan took over the business, and the third son Huo Zhenyu took over the development of the Nansha project.
The three Huo brothers
The first family property dispute
It looks perfect and all parties have arranged it. But in 2011, the fifth year after Fok Yingdong's death in 2006, a war for property was staged, and the third son, Huo Zhenyu, took all his siblings, including his own mother, to court, accusing the second brother of embezzling HK$6.4 billion in assets.
This trouble can become the front page headlines of the entertainment industry and the financial circle, after all, it is a tycoon, and the reputation of Mr. Huo is still there, and at that time, under the mediation of Tung Chee-hwa, the former chief executive of Hong Kong, it was considered that there was no judicial procedure, and a reconciliation was formed internally.
Mr tung
Fok Yingdong's estate of HK$30 billion, HK$10 billion divided between the second and third houses, is distributed in the form of pocket money every month, and the remaining HK$20 billion is divided equally by the three brothers of Dafang, each estimated at about HK$6.5 billion, and the remaining 500 million is divided equally between the two daughters of Dafang.
Distribution scheme for the first time when the family property is fought
The second family property dispute
I thought it should be over.
But the next year, Huo Zhenyu sued his second brother Huo Zhenhuan because he learned a new inside story.
Fok Yingdong's ancestral home is Panyu, so in the 1990s, in cooperation with Panyu, the Nansha Development Company was established together, and the Fok Yingdong Fund and the Yourong Company controlled by the Huo family each accounted for one share, with a total shareholding of 51% and Panyu holding 41%.
Subsequently, he bought 22 square kilometers of Land in Nansha, about 33,000 acres of land, and developed Nansha on a large scale, to know that this place in Nansha was called Siberia of Guangzhou by the former old Guangzhou people, this place is a beach, very desolate.
Nansha, Guangzhou
Even so, in the last twenty years of his life, Fok Yingdong almost put his heart and soul here, investing in the construction of Luoxi Bridge, Shawan Bridge, Nansha Passenger Port, Nansha Grand Hotel, Pearl River Delta World Trade Center, Yingdong Middle School and so on, a series of projects, building bridges and roads, building schools, and buildings, and his dream is to turn Nansha into a second Hong Kong.
Nansha Grand Hotel
The one-dollar share buyback is a nuisance
In 1997, Fok Yingdong transferred the shares of Yourong Company controlled by the Huo family to the Fok Ying Tung Fund for 1 yuan, and although the Fok Ying Tung Fund hung on Fok Ying Tung's name, it was a public welfare fund and did not belong to any party of the Huo family.
However, at that time, it was not known what kind of consideration Fok Yingdong was, and there was also a repurchase clause in the agreement, that is, the Huo family had the right to repurchase this part of the shares at a price of 1 yuan within 10 years, that is, before the end of June 2007.
You can imagine how low the real estate market price was in 1997, how much was the value of this 30,000 mu of land over time, and before the expiration of the repurchase clause in 2007, no one in the Huo family stood up and proposed to buy back this part of the equity, which meant that the repurchase right of this part of the equity was invalid.
Until 2013, Huo Zhenyu himself said, did not know that there is such a buyback clause, and the second huo Zhenhuan obviously knows this buyback clause, but did nothing, Huo Zhenyu felt that this part of the rights and interests should belong to the Huo family, but the second brother to hide, he wants to embezzle, so he sued the second brother, to restore this part of the rights.
Huo Zhenyu
Why would old Third Huo Zhenyu be so concerned about the rights and interests of this Nansha land?
Because Huo Yingdong's arrangement at the beginning was that the third elder was responsible for the Nansha project, he was naturally aware of the value of Nansha.
In 2013, if the buyback clause came into effect, they could get back 100 billion yuan of equity, which is more than three times the total property of the entire Fok Yingdong family of 30 billion, not to mention today in 2022, in the face of such a big interest, Huo Zhenyu was moved.
However, huo Zhenhuan, the second eldest, felt that Nansha was a dream created by his father for charity and for the country, not for personal profit, and this dream should not be distributed as the inheritance of the Huo family, so the second Huo Zhenhuan strongly opposed the distribution of the rights and interests of Nansha to the Huo family as a benefit.
Huo Zhenhuan
And Guo Jingjing's father-in-law Huo Zhenting is also very supportive of the choice of the second eldest, when his father transferred yourong's rights and interests to the Fok Ying Tung Foundation, which is charity, which is his father's act of serving the motherland, so he also feels that he should not be divided.
Timothy
Huo Zhenhuan's lawyer also said that Huo Zhenyu already knew this clause, and even proposed huo Zhenyu, who was in charge of the Nansha project, to buy back in the family meeting, but Huo Zhenyu was too risky and expressed no interest, probably because before 2003, the project had invested billions, but only one passenger port had tens of millions of revenues, and all the others were in a state of loss, and he did not dare to take over.
The case was not accepted by the court until 2015, and it was not officially heard until January 11 this year.
Of course, Huo Zhenyu also has allies, and Huo Qigang's two aunts are on Huo Zhenyu's side, saying that When Huo Yingdong left a buyback clause in the agreement, it showed that Huo Yingdong was not doing charity. And Huo Zhenhuan did not implement the repurchase, just wanted to swallow this money privately.
Nansha industrial layout map
The case statements of lawyers on both sides exceeded 1,000 pages, and it is estimated that it is another protracted case.
Even the judicial officer said that the case was sad, and as a child, he could not understand his father's thoughts, and he also hoped that the Huo brothers and sisters would be able to settle out of court and not ruin the reputation accumulated by Mr. Fok Yingdong throughout his life.
Support Huo Zhenhuan and Huo Zhenting
At least in Maoyan'er' feelings, I support Huo Zhenhuan and Huo Zhenting, because they can appreciate Huo Yingdong's good intentions, if there is no contribution to the motherland in the first half of his life, and he is crowned with the honor of a red-top businessman as a prerequisite, maybe the repurchase clause is just a small cleverness of a businessman, but from the years of his War of Resistance, the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, running around for the motherland's sports cause, and a series of behaviors, the two words of patriotism, running through his life, so the development of Nansha is another continuation of his service to the motherland.
It was the recognition of the state when it died, but there are so many rich people in Hong Kong, there are so many rich people, how come they have not seen other people wearing the national flag, the country does not look at how much wealth it has, but sees the Huo family's fist heart for the country, in exchange for such a special honor.
Then again, the country does not lack that little money, but this is Huo Lao's legacy of serving the country, and the legal reason should help to complete it, so I think that even his own son cannot be destroyed, and what Huo Yingdong left to the descendants of the Huo family is not only that little wealth, but more importantly, the supreme honor left to the Huo family, and the legend of the Huo family's red-top merchants who are remembered by the world. This is something that money cannot buy.
Finally, I would like to ask Huo Zhenyu, is your money enough to spend, is there still a lack of this money, compared to the reputation that cannot be bought with money and the damage to the reputation of the Huo family, is it worth it?
After watching it, I will like it by the way, thank you for paying attention to the channel of cat's eye, we will see you in the next issue.