China's Government Seventh Largest Stockholder Of Honda
The Honda share is edging closer and closer to its 2009 carmageddon lows. And guess who knows a good bargain when they see one? The Chinese. The Nikkei [sub] reports that a “stealth” Chinese fund has emerged as a major shareholder in Honda.
The shadowy investment fund named OD05 Omnibus, which that Nikkei believes “to have ties to the Chinese government,” owned a 2.12 percent stake as of the end of September, and was Honda’s seventh largest stockholder. That fund is snapping up Japanese companies like a Shanghai nouveau riche on a Ginza shopping spree. The Nikkei sees OD05 Omnibus listed as a major shareholder in 123 Japanese firms at the end of March. It already owns 1.17 percent of Nissan.
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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If shiite car builders like GM and Chrysler can come back with better products, so can Honda. Once Honda gets its mojo back, watch out suckas.
Its generally believed that once the US moves its army base out of Japan, China and or N. Korea would turn the entire country into a sheet of glass. Maybe China is prepping for the day by taking over a few important companies while saving their tech and R&D expertise from being wiped out. Honda has done a lot of innovations in engine technology, would be shame to lose them.
Hardly need to nuke them to take them over and subjugate them. Deprive them of their raw materials and they will eventually be begging for food support... In this way, china would not need a long-term equity participation in any company for long term dominance, just a short-term smallish participation to keep access and look neighborly as it continues to build its ability to dominate. This is the road that we find ourselves on if we continue to rely too heavily on China as a huge source of what we expatriate our wealth for...
I think we will see more of this and it is probably more widespread than we think. China needs to recycle other country's currencies to keep their currency weak. The first priority would be to use these surplus currencies to purchase commodities. Then with the excess currency surplus buying non-Yuan company stock is probably getting more desireable than buying the debt of underwater countries.