“A price of one US cent? Mr. Jiang, are you sure you’re not kidding?”
“Yes,” Jiang Chen. Patiently, he repeated the sentence he said countless times. “A transmission line from Xin to Yoto will be able to solve the entire country’s electricity usage problem.”
The man sitting across from him suddenly smiled and held Jiang Chen’s hand enthusiastically.
“Hey! Hey! We can talk about this!”
After the T virus incident, the former Nippon Prime Minister was forced to step down. Although the re-elected politicians didn’t take as far right of a stance, domestic conservativism remained the dominant ideology.
The stance demonstrated a mistrust of foreign companies.
Celestial Trade could guarantee the supply of electricity within the contract period. But what if the contract expired and Celestial Trade refused to renew the contract, or what if they hiked the price? Compared with the price of one cent, the power plants in Nippon simply weren’t competitive. This would create a gap in which even financial subsidies couldn’t make up the difference. By that time, the Nippon power plants would all be shut down. Even if they were unwilling to accept the price increase of Celestial Trade, they would have to forcefully accept this deal.
Tempting? Of course it was tempting.
After the nuclear power plant incident, the whole country was shrouded in a mood called nuclear panic. It was impossible to start construction of a nuclear power plant. But if the country couldn’t rely on nuclear power, relying on new energy sources without the ability to ramp up couldn’t solve the social contradictions brought about by the growing demand for electricity.
Even if Jiang Chen repeatedly promised that such a thing wouldn’t happen, he wished to dispel the concerns of politicians and it wasn’t so simple.
“I’m sorry I can’t give you a clear answer today. I have to exchange opinions with my cabinet in order to provide a responsible answer.” Sitting on the opposite side, the man got up, shook hands with Jiang Chen and saw him to the door.
They wouldn’t show their hand. That was the most difficult part of negotiating with Nippon people.
It was completely different from India. The Indians invited him into the room with joy and excitement. Negotiations went smoothly, but they dragged on signing for as long as they could…
Jiang Chen was even considering if he should find a North American to represent him in the negotiations. As long as the commission was appropriate, B City Bank or Morgan Stanley should be happy to represent him in negotiations. Someone with a different background should ease the concerns of the Nippon politicians.
After leaving the official residence of the Nippon Prime Minister, Jiang Chen, who was in the car, looked at the time.
It was only three o’clock; he still had some time before the eight o’clock meeting with Liu Yao. He was thinking about what to do during this time when a phone call suddenly hit his watch.
“Hello?”
“It’s me, boss. What you told me has already been done.” David Smith’s voice rang in his ear. Before that, Jiang Chen entrusted the negotiation between Celestial Trade and the Indian Power Company to the Future Bank. There must be some result now.
“Is the original contract still intact?”
“Yes, the Indian state-owned electric utility company made a concession on the submarine transmission cable investment percentage. They promised to bear 70% of the construction
cost.”
A smile appeared on Jiang Chen’s face.
“Good job.”
The construction cost of submarine transmission cable was one of the issues that had been disputed by both sides. Jiang Chen already saved a lot of electricity costs for them, and it was unreasonable to spoon feed them more. The construction cost of nearly one billion US dollars wasn’t a small number. In the beginning, India’s state-owned electric utility company insisted that both sides bear 50% then finally dropped it to 60%, but it was still ten points off from Celestial Trade’s expectations.
“As long as you find the right way to get along with Indians, this is actually very easy.” Smith smiled and accepted Jiang Chen’s praise.
Jiang Chen talked about a few more things with Smith then Smith suddenly remembered something and added, “Right, there’s one more thing.”
“What?”
“The recent exchange rate of the Euro on the international foreign exchange market is very peculiar. According to the analysis of Future Bank’s financial team, there’s likely human intervention. Although we interrupted most of the business in Europe, we still hold a lot of Euros and real estate in Europe.”
Mr. Smith paused and waited for the boss’s decision.
Intuition told Jiang Chen the Freemasonry was likely behind this, but the peculiar exchange rate wasn’t enough to determine any more useful information.
Sitting in the car and pondering for a moment, Jiang Chen, who couldn’t decide, asked, “What is your suggestion?”
“Sell some of the assets in Europe and exchange some of the Euros in the bank with dollars or gold. The Euro has a lot of risks. The best way to avoid missing our expected targets is to reduce our holdings appropriately.”
“Just do what you said.”
“Yes, boss.”
Hanging up the phone, Jiang Chen swiped his finger and closed the holographic screen. The bodyguard sitting in the front turned slightly and respectfully asked Jiang Chen, “Boss, where are we going now?”
His arm was placed against the window, looking at the young girls on the street. Jiang Chen’s index finger tapped the door rhythmically. After thinking for a while, he made up his mind.
“Where in Shinjuku is a suitable place to negotiate? Other than restaurants.”
The bodyguard immediately replied, “There’s a high-end business bar in Shinjuku.”
“Just go there.”
“Yes.”
The car slowly started. Jiang Chen opened the holographic screen of his watch, pulled down the list of business cards, and a row of light blue information appeared in front of him.
In order to help him collect information, each time he received a business card, he scanned the information on the business card to his watch for storage. The artificial intelligence classified the cards according to an algorithm. In this way, he could easily find the phone numbers he needed.
[President of Central Power Company, the second son of Sumitomo Foundation, Sumitomo Kenichi]
After selecting this number, Jiang Chen dialed.
Although he didn’t remember when he met this person, this didn’t stop the two from talking
Sitting there and unilaterally waiting for the Nippon government to reply wasn’t Jiang Chen’s style.
Although the influence of the Nippon consortium wasn’t as evident as Wall Street’s influence on the Capital, it was a force that couldn’t be ignored.
Although Celestial Trade and the Nippon government had yet to reach an agreement on the issue of grid connection, this didn’t stop him from engaging with the power company first or discussing with Sumitomo Finance Group to talk about it. With billions in profits at stake, Jiang Chen knew the Sumitomo Foundation is tempted.
And since they would be tempted, they would presumably also exert their influence in their country’s politics.
