When Barron met with Brown before, the two also discussed another issue, which was joining the euro zone.
In fact, until the UK finally left the EU in the original time and space, they never joined the Eurozone and maintained the free currency of the British pound...
Brown played an important role in this.
Since 1999, the British government under Blair's leadership has promised to eventually join the eurozone, but this has been rejected by Brown, the chancellor of the exchequer, who has been delaying the matter.
Don't think that as prime minister, Blair can decide everything, especially since Brown is the second-in-command in the Labour Party. After taking the position of chancellor of the exchequer, he has gradually managed this department and other related departments into an ironclad whole. For such economic affairs, especially joining the euro zone, Blair must get Brown's support.
There are even rumors that in 2003, in order for Britain to join the eurozone, Blair promised Brown that he would give up the position of prime minister in order to obtain Brown's consent for Britain to join the eurozone, but this was also rejected by Brown.
There are many reasons why Brown is cautious about joining the eurozone.
First of all, it is well known that the monetary system of each country has the function of regulating its imports and exports. If Britain abandons the pound and joins the euro zone, it will lose this independent monetary policy, and the consequences also need to be evaluated. Although, as a "big country" in the European Union, Britain will have the same right to issue the euro as France and Germany, but after all, in this case, the formulation of the euro's exchange rate policy still needs to be discussed and decided, and it may not be suitable for Britain's own economic development. In the final analysis, it will still be subject to certain restrictions.
In addition, many people believe that the big countries will benefit from joining the Eurozone, mainly because Germany and France, strong exporting economies, benefit from various tax-free and free preferential treatments within the Eurozone, and their economic development remains high; while weak economies with a high proportion of agriculture have gradually fallen into a fiscal crisis due to the increase in trade deficits and the loss of their own currency barriers...
But in fact, what worries Brown and the people who oppose joining the eurozone is that after the European economic integration, the strong countries will often pay for the economic downturn of the weak countries...
Take Greece as an example. Before entering the euro zone, the yield on their government bonds was once over 10%. After joining the euro zone, it plummeted to 4% of the level of German government bonds, greatly reducing borrowing costs and actually easing their fiscal burden.
However, because these European governments pursued a high welfare system, after obtaining fiscal dividends, they not only did not actively reduce their fiscal deficits, but instead have been reducing taxes while increasing spending from 2001 until now.
The Stability and Growth Pact, which the European Union used to control fiscal deficits in various countries, has become a dead letter because major countries such as France and Germany were the first to violate it.
Take Greece as an example. In order to meet various conditions of the euro zone, it hired Goldman Sachs to make changes to its balance sheet.
It was not until the new Greek government came to power and exposed the off-balance sheet risks and increased its debt ratio that the government bond yields soared and the crisis began to emerge.
Therefore, the Eurozone itself did not increase the financial burden of poor countries. It was the short-term political interests that influenced the long-term economic interests, which ultimately brought about the crisis.
But these crises will ultimately have to be overcome with the help of the stronger countries in the eurozone...If Britain joins the eurozone, they will certainly need to take on this responsibility.
Finally, since 1940, Britain has determined its foreign policy of alliance with the United States. If this is the case, it will inevitably hesitate about joining the euro zone.
After all, at this time, the EU was not as impatient as it would be later when it was controlled by the United States. They were still quite ambitious about the euro. Just like when Saddam was overthrown by the United States, it was not simply for "anti-terrorism". He proposed to use the euro instead of the US dollar for oil settlement, which was also a very important reason - the United States would not tolerate its dollar hegemony being broken.
During the Iraq War, most EU countries, including the leaders France and Germany, criticized the United States for sending troops.
To put it bluntly, these are all choices based on interests.
Britain's position is very awkward. It must choose between Europe and America. As we all know, they ultimately chose America.
Therefore, after the Iraq War, Blair was not as eager to join the Eurozone as before...
Having understood this, Barron and Brown agree on the issue of joining the euro zone, that is, it is necessary to maintain Britain's independent monetary policy.
"Although we are allies of the United States, we also need to guard against our important industries, including the media and livelihood industries, being eroded by American capital..."
This is also the point that Barron emphasized to Brown.
Brown heard this, looked at Barron and nodded.
…
Based on the Zeuss Fund in cooperation with Goldman Sachs Group, after one year of experience, DS Investment Company established a similar high-frequency trading fund in London, named Hera Fund.
This is also a move made after the Global Industrial Investment Fund acquired the London Stock Exchange and gained certain conveniences.
The main trading market of the Hera Fund is the London Stock Exchange, but initially, it also invested US$1 billion in trading.
Of the $1 billion fund, Global Industrial Investment (GII) Fund and Caesar Fund each contributed $500 million.
In addition, Caesar Funds is targeting the acquisition of Northern Gas. They have issued a partial takeover offer for the company, intending to acquire 88% of Northern Gas' shares for £2 billion.
In the original time and space, Li Chaoren's Cheung Kong Infrastructure acquired 88% of the company's shares for 2.4 billion pounds, but this acquisition was completed in two installments in 2004 and 2009, so the total amount would be higher.
The current total market value of Northern Gas is around 2 billion pounds. Acquiring 88% of its shares for 2 billion pounds is equivalent to a premium of more than 13.6%. This premium is quite satisfactory for a company with relatively stable operations.
Therefore, this acquisition is also going smoothly.
In addition, Caesar Fund also announced together with O2 Telecom that it will form a consortium with it to participate in the acquisition of Czech Telecom.
As mentioned before, as the economic situation improves, global telecommunications companies are also recovering from the impact of the previous Internet bubble crisis.
So during this period, mergers and acquisitions among telecommunications companies in Europe alone began to become active.
For example, just this month, British Telecom (BT) completed the acquisition of Albacom, Italy's second largest enterprise-class fixed service provider.
At the same time, the British mobile communications giant Vodafone Group is also seeking to acquire control of two companies in Romania and the Czech Republic...
In response to this, O2 Telecom, one of the top three telecommunications companies in the UK, not only consolidated its markets in France and Germany, but its CEO Barry Trelles also proposed to Barron's the idea of expanding through acquisitions.
His target was Czech Telecom, which was in the process of privatizing its telecommunications business.
Czech Telecom is the largest fixed and mobile phone operator in the Czech Republic. Prior to this, the telecommunications company was 51% owned by the government and was a state-owned enterprise.
As early as last year, a spokesman for the Czech IT Ministry announced that the Czech government intended to sell its 51% stake in Czech Telecom, the country's largest operator, before March 2005, at which time the company would be completely privatized.
This is a good opportunity for many telecom giants to enter the Czech market.
Telecom companies currently interested in Czech Telecom include Swisscom and Telefonica, and now O2 Telecom is also preparing to join the game.
However, it is obvious that the acquisition of Czech Telecom requires huge funds - currently, Swisscom and Telefonica's bids for the Czech government's 51% stake in Czech Telecom are both around US$3 billion.
As O2 Telecom continues to invest heavily in mobile communications and broadband network deployment, even though it has had considerable revenue this year, it certainly cannot come up with so much money at once.
Therefore, in the end, Caesar Fund, which still has a large amount of funds, formed a consortium with O2 Telecom to carry out this acquisition, and they will provide financial support for O2 Telecom.