Word: backrooms
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...History is against the independents. Family-run companies in Asia have a lengthy record of lining the pockets of relatives and friends at the expense of ordinary investors through sometimes murky backroom deals. Last year, for example, a family controlling Hong Kong-listed leather trader Dah Hwa International awarded itself an unsecured, interest-free loan of $6.3 million. There was nothing illegal about it, nor is there anything illegal about the proposed Boto deal. But it's hard to argue that directors have minority shareholders' interests at heart...
...Hong Kong, a series of questionable backroom transactions?including the proposed Boto deal?has so raised the ire of stock owners that Andrew Sheng, chairman of the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission, was forced to respond. His open letter to investors offered no succor. Sheng wrote ". . . if it is purely an issue of competence or a history of bad decision making impacting on value, and the rules have not been violated, the ultimate practical remedy for investors may be to sell...
Along the way, the company was acquired by Disney for $60 million, which gave the Weinsteins the clout (and the wallet) to hustle, bully and outspend the competition. Hit Man Harvey and Backroom Bob became as notorious as any WWF tag-team champions. For Harvey, a fearsome tank of a man with the temper and competitive streak of Bobby Knight, screams, threats and smears were simply standard operating procedure. Miramax executives, says a producer, "are like victims of abuse." Harvey became famous for his office tantrums, along with his combative intrusiveness during contract negotiations and his micromanaging of production...
...parts customers can't see or touch, like electronics. Says Harry Roegner, PAG spokesman: "Electronic architecture makes up a third of the cost of a car, and in the future it will be 50%. Do you see that cabling and wiring?" In another economy move, Ford is consolidating the backroom operations of Land Rover, Jaguar and Aston Martin...
...dark of night. "Everybody's afraid because we know we are getting poorer, day by day," says Yoshiharu Nakashima, who ought to know: he's a pawn-shop owner in Tokyo's Ueno district. When U.S. President George W. Bush visits next week, he'll undoubtedly spend some backroom time telling the Japanese to get their acts together. His host will be Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, who achieved rock-star popularity by promising to do just that, but whose public support vanished this month when he caved in to Japan's troglodytic Old Guard - the bureaucrats and Liberal Democratic Party...