Lai See

Internet conjures corporate conspiracy theories over Liu

Liu Xiang may be out of the Olympics, but his main sports sponsors are hanging in there.

Nike China's copywriters were swift out of the blocks to come up with a suitable advert to make the most out of their poster boy's untimely exit from the Games.

Like the story itself, the ad appeared on the front pages of many mainland newspapers yesterday, such as the one pictured here from Guangzhou's Southern Metropolitan Daily.

It translates as:

Love the competition

Love risking your pride

Love winning it back

Love giving it everything you've got

Love the glory

Love the pain

Love sport even when it breaks your heart

Liu's painful exit completely dominated the print media's coverage of the Games yesterday, spilling from the front pages to at least two other pages in every publication.

Inevitably, the story took on a different life in cyberspace where online conspiracy theorists were in their element.

The most popular theory being that Nike had put pressure on Liu to withdraw from the 110-metre hurdles because the sponsors did not think he was capable of defending his Olympic title.

The argument goes that his exit would help save face - and brand value - as well as keeping the public interested in his next appearance on the track.

Skating on thin 3-figure ice

It's not an Olympic sport and there are no medals to be awarded. In fact, it's a game that has few willing participants.

Welcome to the Hong Kong corporates' HK$100 stick-around.

This competition is open to the big boys on the Hong Kong stock exchange whose shares are worth HK$100 or more and involves them trying to avoid being drawn back into double figures.

A month ago, there were six contenders - China Mobile, Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, Hong Kong Aircraft Engineering Co (Haeco), Wing Hang Bank, Cheung Kong (Holdings) and Sun Hung Kai Properties - all in the heavyweight category of between HK$100 and HK$110.

But thanks to the adverse investment climate, only the two top property firms remain in the race, and as brokers downgrade the property sector on a poor outlook for gross domestic product, their chances are looking slim.

Cheung Kong fell 4.32 per cent to HK$102 yesterday, while Sun Hung Kai Properties was down 4.68 per cent at HK$103.80.

We feel pretty confident that the three banks - HSBC (HK$122.20), Hang Seng Bank (HK$148) and Wing Lung Bank (HK$152.50) - are safe for now, but there are concerns about Standard Chartered (HK$203.80) staying in the HK$200 event.

Diving belles

Last week, we pointed out the correlation between the appearance of China's star divers at the Games and plunges in the Hang Seng Index.

We warned about the men's 3-metre springboard final yesterday and what happened? The market fell 446 points to a year low.

So let's just be careful tomorrow when the women's 10-metre platform final gets under way. Also stay alert next week when China's roadshow of triumphant gold medallists, who are sure to include some of the divers, arrives in town.

Games pain

An e-mail from a Lai See acquaintance who was hosting a corporate box at the Bird's Nest stadium expressed the mood of the crowd after seeing Liu Xiang limp from the track.

'My chest felt very constricted and the feeling didn't go away for two hours,' she wrote, adding that it took the world record performance of Russian pole vault diva Yelena Isinbayeva to lift the pall.

It has done little to lift the touts' prices, though. Black market tickets with a face value of 800 yuan (HK$910) were still going for about 1,000 yuan yesterday.