Peking — Duck!!
I just got done jawboning with an old friend up north, Java Jeff, who told me a little about a capitalist venture he’d had in China. He’d agreed to build what was the largest coffee enterprise in the world with their government. Yah … bigger than Starbucks. Think about that for a South End minute.
About the time they were ready to Launch, he gets notice the good Chinese are filing a securities fraud suit against him. You know, just prior to putting the corporation on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. Java Jeff, who had bet practically everything he owned on this deal, hired some high powered international attorneys to defend himself. After plenty of ‘billable’ hours, they basically advised him to get ready for bankruptcy. You know, after they got paid. Shortly before the stock debut, the Maoists offered him a plea bargain: drop his 5% interest in the company and they would drop their interest in prosecuting him. His lawyers advised him to take the deal and walk away. How do you beat the Chinese government in a courtroom on their turf on trumped up charges?
Java Jeff could see the pictographs on the wall, all right, all those years and that investment stolen from him and nothing he could do. So he signed away his 5% and sure enough, the company made $15 billion when it opened first day on Shanghai’s exchange. Anyway you cut it, Jeff lost a lot of yuan.
I’m not thinking of expanding my glass empire to China anymore, that’s for sure. Hard enough dealing with architects here in America who see me basically as a Graffiti Artist who needs police intervention and remedial treatment. But I feel bad for Java Jeff. As he said, justice isn’t a word some places believe in. Not in their jungle. And capitalism isn’t necessarily a panacea for the world’s ills, is what I say. Jeff will be all right. He knows he built the biggest coffee conglomerate on earth. Now — at least I’m betting — he hopes they’ll gag on it.
And those stories about the Premier cleaning up corruption … tell it to the gullible.
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