Jim Mellon, Champagne and the book with no name
The book was all researched, written and ready to print. Three years' work, except for a slight problem: the authors couldn't think of a title.
Former Hong Kong fund manager turned investment guru Jim Mellon, who travels the globe in a private jet looking for ideas to make more money, and his Hong Kong business consultant friend and writing partner, Al Chalabi, were at a loss as to what to call their latest work.
Giving the keynote speech to the 2014 Master Investor conference in London, Mellon confessed: "There's a case of Champagne for whoever comes up with a title" for the book, which looks at what they believe to be the main investment opportunities of the future and the companies whose products and services are going to change the way we live, unexpectedly soon.
The plea was heard online by retired former Hong Kong journalist David Thurston, as he sat in the sun at his holiday home in the tiny Maltese island of Gozo. "My wife Angie and I brainstormed for literally five minutes and came up with a title which we emailed to Jim, who immediately declared it the winner," says Thurston.
Mellon was a fund manager with GT Management. With their previous books, Mellon and Chalabi have over the past nine years established a track record for spotting early investment opportunities, which they called "Money Fountains".
With their new book they set out to filter the chaotic landscape being created by exciting but disruptive computer technologies in the fields such as robotics, transport, information technology, life sciences and 3D printing. And the title?
We wrote yesterday about the difficulties with banks and their pickiness over matching signatures on cheques. Richard Witts writes to say that the story reminded him of the days when as a (legendary) stockbroker, his most onerous task of the day was signing the cheques.
Despite enjoying splendid titles like director of broking or managing director when at Jardine Fleming or Schroder Securities or United Mok Ying Kie, he was unable to leave the office until the cheques for the day's trading had been signed. When at JF, HK Land launched a partial bid for HK Electric in early 1982. "I was the sole cheque signatory and the cheque books starting arriving on my desk at around 9pm." When he finished at about 7.30am the following morning it was estimated he had signed about 10,000 cheques. "Do you honestly believe that my signature was the same at 7.30am as it had been at 9pm the previous evening ? Of course it wasn't," says Witts, adding: "I have always given credit to the Hongkong & Shanghai Bank that no cheques were rejected."
Tommy Cheung Yu-yan, who is the legislative councillor representing the catering sector, was unusually forthcoming yesterday about his attendance at Legislative Council meetings.
Speaking to reporters at an event organised by Towngas, he revealed that his friends ribbed him about why he rarely made it to Wednesday Legco meetings. He said this was because he was usually to be found at the race track - not, you understand, because he particularly wanted to be there. It just so happens, he says, that this is where most of his functional constituency members were to be found.
He said that he spent over 80 days of the year there often for 6-10 hours at a stretch. Such are the rigours of meeting and chatting with one's political supporters. Naturally this has nothing to do with his part ownership of a horse called Golden Partners, which he shares with Alvin Li Yuok-lun.
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