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Ben Kwok

Stock exchange filing reveals juicy detail in low-key wedding
The marriage between Shanghai billionaire Vincent Lo Hong-sui and former Miss Hong Kong Loletta Chu Ling-ling last week was such a low-key affair that no photographs have appeared in the media.
But the 'merger' couldn't escape the attention of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing.
According to disclosure of interest notices published by HKEx, Ms  Chu has become a substantial shareholder of four listed companies - Shui On Construction and Materials, Shui On Land, Imagi International and CIG Ports.
The stock disclosures were filed on November 27, the same date the couple tied the knot at the Four Seasons Hotel in Singapore.
The four holdings are worth HK$5.1 billion. Not a bad wedding present.
Height of folly
The rivalry between Beijing and Shanghai has descended to toilet humour level ... literally.
The imposing new CCTV headquarters building in Beijing (above), which is due for completion this month, has come in for some stick from a Shanghai newspaper which says it looks like the lower half of a man sitting on the toilet with his trousers round his ankles. The article is backed up with photographs of different angles of the 230-metre building and accompanying cartoons to prove the point. It's sure to cause a stink in the capital.
Rare disclosure
It took Citic Pacific six weeks to come clean about its exposure to unauthorised foreign currency accumulator contracts and now, a further six weeks on, it has gone to the trouble of actually publishing them on its website.
The 24 contracts with 13 banks, complete with signatures, are there for all to see in an act of disclosure that surprised some of the bankers we spoke to.
The signatures, especially that of executive director Vernon Moore, have caused a few raised eyebrows as he was not mentioned when former directors Leslie Chang Li-hsien and Chau Chi-yin were fired and Frances Yung Ming-fong, daughter of chairman Larry Yung Chi-kin, was demoted for their involvement in the debacle.
Sleepless in Hong Kong
Former US president Bill Clinton was 25 minutes late for the first 8.30am meeting on the second day of his Global Initiative forum yesterday.
No official reason was given, but the whisper among staff at the Grand Hyatt where the event is being held is that he slept in.
That's understandable as he was probably up much of the night relaying congratulatory messages to his wife Hillary back in the  United States who has been named as Barack Obama's Secretary of State.
Even gambling is not spared
The financial meltdown is having an effect on the world's largest horse and soccer gambling turnover.
Hong Kong Jockey Club chief executive Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges told Canadian Chamber of Commerce members at a lunch yesterday that betting figures had fallen  6 to 7 per cent in the last two months.
He noted that the club experienced a similar rate of decline during Sars in 2003, but that only lasted a few months. This time, it could drag on for another 12 to 18 months, said the man known as EB.
Accordingly, the club is forecasting a full-year decline in revenue of between  5 to 10 per cent. Coupled with the guaranteed tax top-up plan to the government, its profit for the current financial year would probably fall between HK$400 million and HK$960 million, compared to a net surplus of HK$3.1 billion the previous year.
It looks like we're under starter's orders for yet another round of the outspoken chief executive calling on the government for betting tax cuts.
Playing the part
Last month, General Motors Corp, Ford Motor and Chrysler were criticised when their executives used corporate jets to get to Washington to put the US Congress in the picture about the fast deteriorating financial state of the country's  car industry.
This week, as they returned to Capitol Hill to plead their cases for cash bailouts, the only mention the big three made of corporate jets was their intention to sell them. GM chief executive Rick Wagoner even drove to the hearings in a hybrid car.
If things get any worse, they could all soon be turning up on bicycles.



Lai See