Chapter 811 Opportunity
On June 28, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced that former British Prime Minister Brown was selected as the new president of the organization. His term will begin on July 5 and last for 5 years. Year.
As early as early June, the topic of who should replace Strauss-Kahn, who resigned as head of the IMF due to the "sexual assault incident", had already begun to be hotly discussed.
In addition to Brown, there is also Agustín Carstens, governor of the Central Bank of Mexico, who has announced that he will join the competition for the position of president of the International Monetary Fund. He is Brown's main competitor.
It is worth mentioning that Christine Lagarde, the French Minister of Economy, Finance and Industry, who took over this position in the original time and space, did not join the competition this time.
The reasons behind this are more complicated, but the most important thing is that Lagarde did not receive the same support from the United States as in her previous life...
U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said at the International Monetary Fund on the 28th Before the executive board meeting, he publicly expressed his support for Brown, leading the outside world to believe that the former British Prime Minister, who had the support of the United States, was destined to become the new president.
According to Reuters comments, this selection of president is the most fiercely competitive since the establishment of the International Monetary Fund.
After the International Monetary Fund confirmed its new managing director, Brown issued a statement saying:
“I am deeply honored by the Executive Board’s confidence in me, and I will work hard to serve the International Monetary Fund’s All members work..."
British Prime Minister Cameron also called Brown to congratulate him.
Cameron's spokesman claimed in an interview:
Brown's appointment as head of the International Monetary Fund is a victory for Britain and a victory for Europe.
It is worth mentioning that the appointment of Brown’s president was announced together with the appointment of the IMF’s first vice president. Lipsky, the current IMF first vice president, will retire on August 31. He said he will not renew his term and will be replaced by Zhu Min, former deputy governor of the Central Bank of China and current special adviser to the IMF president.
This appointment also reflects the increased voice of emerging countries, including China, in the IMF.
In this regard, Brown said in an exclusive interview on June 29:
“China’s share in the International Monetary Fund will continue to increase in the future. We can see that Asia took the lead in recovering from the previous economic crisis. This also reflects the economic vitality of Asia, which will be the most dynamic region in the global economy in the future."
Many people believe that Brown will face many challenges during his tenure as president in the next five years. The urgent one is to launch a new version of measures to assist Greece and deal with the European debt crisis.
Just now, on June 28, the five-year austerity plan proposed by Greek Prime Minister Papandreou won a majority of votes in Congress, clearing major obstacles for obtaining international financing and avoiding default.
The Greek Parliament supported the plan with a vote of 155:138.
Reducing spending and increasing taxes are the prerequisites proposed by European countries and the IMF for providing bailout to Greece.
Currently, the focus turns to the second round of voting to be held on the 29th.
This round of voting is mainly aimed at approving the implementation of the austerity plan.
With the positive results of the first round of voting, the second round of voting is also expected to pass smoothly.
While Papandreou is running forward, officials from the German Ministry of Finance will meet with people from the country’s banking and insurance industries on Wednesday to jointly discuss Germany’s role in the Greek rescue based on the new rescue plan proposed by France. role.
Although demonstrators in Greece are protesting against economic austerity measures, Lagarde still called on Greece to pass a new economic austerity plan.
In an exclusive interview on the 29th, Brown said:
“In communicating with European leaders, I will insist on necessary fairness and will not shrink from toughness...”< br>
In this interview, he showed a relatively tough attitude towards Greece: "If difficult choices have to be made, I will not be a little bit merciful. In order to ensure the sustainable development of public finances and thereby To restore the country’s competitiveness, the Greek authorities must make difficult but necessary adjustments.”
...
As soon as Brown was elected president of the International Monetary Fund, Barron was on the phone and congratulated him.
At this time, he had left London and came to the Borromeo Islands in Italy...
This is the traditional territory of the Borromeo family, and this is not Barente I came here once, and this time I came here because Beatrice Borromeo was on vacation. She returned to Europe from New York, and she happened to be back here with Barron.
When Barron arrived here, in order to show his attention, the "Beautiful Island" with the most beautiful scenery in the Borromeo Islands was temporarily closed to the public and was specially used to welcome him.
Speaking of which, among the four sisters of the Borromeo family, although the other sisters all married well, Beatrice’s eldest sister married an Italian count and was also the chairman of API Petroleum Group; the second sister married a director of Fiat Group The third sister is married to a German prince...
It can be said that all of them have extraordinary status, but I am afraid that the net worth of these people combined is not as good as that of Barron. Well, he is also a The Duke of England...
So although Barron and Beatrice have not made their relationship public yet, they still received a warm reception when they came to the Borromeo family this time.
Of course, Barron has no shortage of topics to talk to them about. Whether it is his status as a noble, or the petroleum energy and automobile related industries he owns, he can discuss it with other sons-in-law of the Borromeo family. comminicate.
“I heard that United Energy Group is planning to acquire shares in Enel?”
Ugo Braschetti Peretti is Beatrice's eldest brother-in-law. He is also the chairman of the Italian API Petroleum Group. He mentioned this topic during the chat with Barron.
“Yes, they are negotiating with the German energy group Rheinland, but no agreement has been reached yet, mainly in terms of price...”
EnelSpA is the Italian state power company The largest power group, British Distribution Company, a subsidiary of United Energy Group, intends to enter the Italian market by acquiring shares in this company.
The most important thing is that if the acquisition is completed, then the shares they hold in Enel will be second only to the government’s shareholdings...
The reason Rheinenergy's willingness to sell shares in Enel is also related to their previous acquisition intention.
In 2007, Rheinland Energy Group joined the competition to acquire Endesa Electricity, Spain's largest power company. Their original bid of more than 29 billion euros had defeated Spain's local competitor Spanish Gas Company.
But at this time, because the Spanish government did not want the country's largest power company to fall into the hands of foreign companies, it imposed certain restrictions on the conditions - and then competitors of Rheinland Energy Group appeared. , that is, Enel and Acciona, a domestic infrastructure company in Spain, jointly acquired Endesa Electricity and pushed the acquisition price to more than 40 billion euros.
In order to prevent Enel from participating in this bid, Rheinland Energy Group increased their shareholding in Enel to 32% of the shares - this shareholding ratio , only 0.4% lower than the Italian government, the controlling shareholder of Enel...
But in the end, their move did not prevent Rheinland Energy Group from failing in its bid for Spain's Endesa Electricity Company...
So now that they have such a high shareholding in Italian National Electricity, it does not mean that much to Rheinland Energy Group - not to mention that Rheinland Energy Group also recently hopes to agree with Ang Group on the country's natural gas pipeline network. Competition requires capital investment, so it began to consider selling parts of Enel.
This is also an opportunity for United Energy Group to enter the Italian market, so they are preparing to take over Rheinland Energy Group's shares in Enel.
(End of this chapter)