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Top salary man Canning Fok may have hard act to follow
Hutchison Whampoa managing director Canning Fok Kin-ning has long topped the list of salaried men with the highest pay.
Mr Fok's compensation is to be made public today. He made HK$130.9 million in 2006. But last year, someone else might have overtaken him.
It came to light that the chairman and chief investment officer of Value Partners, which was listed  in November, made HK$253.59 million last year, up 65 per cent, or HK$100 million from 2006. Unless Mr Fok's pay was doubled last year,  Cheah Cheng Hye's package would have been a hard act to follow.
Last year was good for investment firms, including Value Partners, given the strong bull run  in equities. At the time of the asset management house's listing, the Hang Seng Index was trading above 30,000 points.
As such, five Value Partners fund managers got compensations similar to HSBC chairman Stephen Green - all above HK$41 million.
As with other fund management firms that charged a 2 per cent management fee and 20 per cent of performance reward (on gains), Value Partners awarded its directors a total of HK$478 million, up 62 per cent.
Last year, Value Partners enjoyed a 66 per cent profit growth of HK$1.41 billion while its funds under management expanded 62 per cent to near HK$57 billion.
This year, the golden age of billionaire fund managers may have passed, as evidenced by the tone in the chairman's statement.
'We think it prudent to be prepared for a period of depressed investor psychology and diminished appetite for investment risk ... We would see any major setback in the region's stock markets as a buying opportunity, since rapid economic growth will overcome poor investment sentiment, sooner or later.
'What cannot be predicted is whether 'sooner or later' refers to 2008, 2009 or even a later date.'
Changing fortunes
Almost a year ago, Premier Wen Jiabao said he was so thrilled about the PetroChina oilfield discovery in Bohai that he could not sleep after learning about it.
What happened in the course of a year? PetroChina became the world's largest company by market capitalisation after  listing on the A-share market in November. But  since then, its share price in both markets  have gone downhill, with its H-share value reduced by  half and its A-share price trading below its issue price.
Now, things may be looking up. Shares of PetroChina, which had as many as 1.88 million mainland shareholders, staged a strong comeback yesterday on a 6.5 per cent rebound, closing at HK$10.78, a six-week  high.
Is this a signal for frustrated mainland shareholders that market-rescue measures are finally on the way from the likes of Mr Wen or others in Beijing's corridors of power?
Not a bad penny
Thanks to  the many careless shareholders, Hong Kong Exchanges  and Clearing recorded a windfall profit of almost HK$2 million.
The bourse yesterday said shareholders had forfeited HK$1.94 million in unclaimed  dividends of 25 cents per share back in 2001.
As it turned out, 0.7 per cent of shareholders entitled did not claim the dividends for seven years.  The cumulative amount  is hardly  small change.
Trading places
Standard Chartered Bank lost a  marathon director, but  got a weightlifter in return.
The bank yesterday appointed General Electric North East Asia chairman Stefano Bertamini as executive director, replacing Michael Denoma, who will step down by June.
Mr Denoma was credited with promoting the bank's marathon in the region, as he has been running a full-marathon race almost every year since joining in 1999.
We are not sure if Mr Bertamini can top that record. But we found out from his biography that he enjoyed weightlifting.
He does not come cheap. According to the bank's disclosed terms of appointment, Mr Bertamini was given a one-off deferred share award of US$2 million, and a deferred cash payment of up to US$6.5 million in tranches until 2014.
That was on top of his annual salary of US$900,000, plus a 150 per cent bonus on his basic.



Lai See