Chapter 21: Chapter 21

after a perfect weekend with Sophie, Tom Barton found himself alone in

Paris; just two hours from London by Eurostar. The idea of heading for the

Gare du Nord tempted him, but once again he hesitated, remembering the

many explanations he may or may not have owed to certain people.

Although he had fallen into the habit of jumping on a plane at the slightest

pretext, bound for some far-flung destination, he still baulked at the idea of

returning to London. His year-long odyssey had led him to places he would have

had neither the occasion nor the inclination to visit ― even for a vacation: Dubai,

India, Thailand, and barely known Caribbean islands. A curious turn of fate

considering his past stay-at-home lifestyle.

During the boom years he had frequently travelled to Spain; flying potential

buyers to Marbella on weekends to visit villas and apartments built Grupo

Martínez, for whom Barton’s brokerage arranged mortgages. Things had changed

since those happy go lucky days. Through his own making he had become a

frequent business traveller, falling into the trap of thinking he was only doing

something useful when he boarded a plane to somewhere…anywhere. A perverse

but real sentiment, a feeling that many politicians and business travellers

developed, a justification for their addiction.

The trouble was travelling cost money, a lot of money, especially after he had

become used to first class travel and five star hotels. He had made some fairly

serious money speculating on oil, but the gains derived from his venture into

commodities and Forex markets were less exciting. Given the bleak business

climate the thought of dilapidating his capital persistently nagged him. Past

experience, together with the eye opening discoveries of his odyssey, had reminded

him fortune could suddenly deal him a bad card. Slowly Barton was becoming

aware he had much to lose.

It was time to put his considerable knowledge and experience to gainful use.

Fitzwilliams was a good starting point; the banker had even intimated he could use

Tom’s experience. What Barton needed was to transform the nascent idea of an

investment service into something concrete.

In other circumstances his experience as a City mortgage broker alone would

A

have limited his options. But the world had suddenly changed. With foresight, he

had made the decision to get out at the right moment; by cashing in on his

investments in late 2007, banking the capital necessary to restart his life. However,

the idea of setting himself up as an independent investment advisor was still

indistinct. Now, from his newly established base in the Caribbean, he could,

without the need of a nameplate, or a conventional workplace, transform his idea

into reality.

The previous day, Sophie had chided him, gently mocking his fears of returning

to the UK as unfounded. Now almost twenty four hours later, after idling the

morning away in his Paris hotel room, he was forced to admit it was time to

confront his past. Picking up his phone he scrolled down the numbers, stopped at

Steve Howard’s name and pressed ‘call’.

‘Hi Steve, it’s Tom Barton.’

‘Tom, I was just thinking about you. Where are you?’

‘In Paris.’

‘Great. Travelling on that Dominican passport,’ Howard said making a friendly

jibe.

‘How’d you guess, said Barton uncomfortably. ‘Where are you?’

‘I’m in London.’

‘Great, let’s get together. Can you come over to Paris?’ he asked half-heartedly.

‘Still nervous about coming to London?’

‘No…,’ he replied, without conviction.

‘Where’s Sophie?’

‘'Gone to Strasbourg...business.’

‘Then do it! Now!’

‘Now?’

‘Take the Eurostar, I’ll meet you at St Pancras, then we’ll stay in town.’

‘Sounds good,’ he replied more positively. ‘How are things over there?’

‘A bit slow, you know Spain and all that.’

‘I met a couple of Chinese investors in Bangkok who were interested in European

property. What do you think?’

‘They’re the only ones who have any money to spend today. We can talk about

it.’

‘Great.’

‘Call me back when you know the time of your train.’

Early that afternoon, as Barton slipped his travel documents into his pocket, he

started to worry about his Dominican passport; would it raise eyebrows at

immigration in the UK? Then, on second thoughts, he figured there was no reason

why it should. There were plenty of expat Brits living in Dominica who regularly

used their local passports when travelling home. In any case, he thought consoling

himself, nobody was looking for him ― with the possible exception of the Irish.

At Gare du Nord he produced his Dominican passport, stamped with a multiple

69

entry Schengen visa, to the French police controller. He then presented his British

passport to Her Majesty’s official who with barely a glance waved him through

with a cheerful ‘Good morning Sir.’

Relieved Barton made his way down to the waiting Eurostar. Soon, as the flat

landscape of northern France flashed past, his mind slowly drifted back to his still

embryonic business plans. A persistent doubt lingered. Just as things were

beginning to look better new clouds had appeared on the horizon in the form of a

sovereign debt crisis. Barton wondered whether it was simply another passing

storm, or was there something more menacing behind it? It was impossible to say,

few now dared make predictions. Those who had recently announced the imminent

collapse of the euro had been forced to eat their hats.

In spite of the huge sums of taxpayers’ money that had been thrown at the crisis,

things had not improved and huge debts were being accumulated by governments.

The US alone needed to raise a couple of trillion dollars, and then there were

Europe’s needs, not forgetting the rest of the world, some feared there would be

insufficient money to go around.

As the Fed allowed the dollar to slide, in a not too subtle form of devaluation,

China was caught between two stools. On the one hand the value of its dollar

reserves fell in real terms, and on the other, its artificially undervalued dollar

pegged currency, the RMB, made Chinese exports even more competitive in other

markets.

This dismal outlook left little hope the world would return any time soon to the

prosperity of recent years. Barton comforted himself with the idea that even in the

worse crisis there was always a niche for the wise investor. The question was

where. Asia seemed an obvious choice, the future seemed to be there, but he was

forced to admit, apart from his very recent experience in South East Asia, he knew

very little of that vast region. As to Japan it was a no-go, mired in the same kind of

debt problem as the West, but for already more than twenty years.

China seemed a good option. The Chinese were becoming more adventurous,

arriving in places like Dominica bearing gifts, perhaps there was business to be

done there.

That morning, the main headline news speculated over the possible bankruptcy of

General Motors and the fate of GM Europe, owner of Opel in Germany and

Vauxhall in the UK. What surprised Barton most, a company he had never heard

of, the Beijing Automotive Industry Corporation, was listed amongst the potential

bidders at the carve-up of the troubled firm.

As far back as he could remember Vauxhall had always been a household name

in British cars. In the same way Opel was in Germany. Looking back it would have

seemed totally inconceivable that such iconic names could be bought-out by the

heirs of Mao’s China. It was like being told Rolls Royce had been bought by

Martians he thought, before remembering the legendary firm was now owned by

BMW.

Barton was aware China, as the holder of vast quantities of US dollars and

70

treasury bonds, was increasingly concerned about the risk of having all its eggs in

the one basket. If the US was seized by an inflationary spiral their investment

would be become worthless. Their best hedge would always be fixed assets, bricks

and mortar, and that was a business Barton knew. What better an asset for a

Chinese investor than a piece of prime property in Belgravia or Mayfair? He

remembered Tom Kavanagh having sold a run down, but well located property in

Bloomsbury to a Singapore businessman in the mid-nineties, at what had then

seemed like a vastly exaggerated price. In retrospective, it was an excellent

investment despite the prevailing depressed market. There was a lot of prime

property in London for foreign investors and if the Russians had retreated then why

not look for Chinese investors.

A little over an hour later the familiar pleasant Kent countryside, showing all the

signs of spring, zipped by, and soon London’s sprawling 19th century brick

suburbs appeared. Nothing had physically changed during his absence. There was a

certain permanence. People changed, economics changed, politicians changed, but

physical attributes changed so much more slowly.

In all, the journey to London had given him just enough time to take a snack and

glance through the English newspapers. Once arrived, he had little time to admire

the recently opened St Pancras Eurostar terminal. He joined the line of

disembarking passengers, uneasily filing past the keen eyed customs and stern

faced police officials. He let out an involuntary sigh of relief as he exited through

the sliding glass doors out onto the main concourse. There he spotted Steve, a

newspaper tucked under his arm, smiling and as usual boasting a healthy tan.

‘How’re you doing Tom? Nice to see you again,’ he said pointing the way to the

exit where they joined the line for a taxi. ‘We’re booked into the Churchill, it’s on

Portman Square, it’s where I normally stay when I’m in London.’

‘Still living out of a suitcase?’ remarked Barton.

‘Yep, home is up North. Rarely get up there these days, not since my parents

passed away. It’s not worth having a fixed place here, too much trouble, too

expensive for what I need—not that money matters, though I don’t believe in

throwing it away,’ he said with a wry smile. ‘At Churchill’s I’ve got everything at

my fingertips.’

After checking-in and dropping off Barton’s affairs they stopped for a coffee in

the hotel’s comfortable lounge and exchanged news. Howard’s business in South

East Asia had slowed, but it was more buoyant than that in the UK or continental

Europe. He had little to complain about, which seemed to confirm Barton

impressions, if Asian investors were still making money, then they would be

interested in prime property in London. It would be a safe haven for them and

prices were beginning to look attractive.

There was a mountain of loose cash swilling about in China, where wealthy

Chinese families and businessmen were looking for secure offshore investments.

The Chinese had become wary of stocks and bonds and even more mistrustful of

71

their government’s strategy, especially if their economy was to stall. There was

however a stumbling block for would be buyers; apart from Singaporean and Hong

Kong investors, the Chinese knew little of property in London, or in any other

Europe capital for that matter. Their only options were to work with top end of the

market property agencies, such as Guthrie Plimpton, which was daunting for a

Chinese investor given the culture gap, or to use their own close circle of trusted

overseas relations and business acquaintances.

‘I can certainly help you with a few introductions. Chinese investors are

definitely are looking for solid offshore investments. They’re very clannish and

almost always use personal relationships to do business, they call it guanxi.’

‘Guan…’

‘It’s like a social network, but it goes much deeper, business and political

links…same village, same town, same province and especially their extended

family links, something we don’t have.’

‘Oh.’

‘A family in China can include hundreds, even thousands of relatives, from the

same place with the same family name.’

‘Interesting.’

‘I have a couple of Chinese business friends from Shanghai who have invested in

property in Bangkok. Things are a bit shaky in Thailand with the political situation.

So it could be a good moment to suggest they diversifying their investments. UK

property could be a good option, you know a shelter, especially prime properties

― residential and business.’

‘I’d like to meet them.’

‘No problem. We’ll try to set that up. It needs patience, although we’d have to

move fairly quickly before the market recovers.’

‘That’s no problem.’

‘I’m returning to Bangkok in a week’s time, why don’t you join me?’

‘Are things alright there now?’

‘Not really. It’s a tangle of political in-fighting. It’s almost impossible for the

government to function correctly with all these demonstrations going on.’

‘What about the King.’

‘Well King Bhumibol has enormous influence behind the scenes. Be careful what

you say about him by the way, you could end up in one of those Thai jails, lèse￾majesté and all that,’ Steve said with a laugh.

‘…and the future?’

‘At the moment it’s not looking so good, business and confidence has been badly

affected, and the long-term outlook is not much better. That’s why some of the

Chinese are getting cold feet, which could help you.’

‘That’s what I thought.’

‘You should try to put together a portfolio of the kind of property that’s on the

market to interest them.’

‘I’ll do that,’ Barton said making a note to speak to Sarah Kavanagh.

72

73

‘Don’t get excited too soon Tom. We’re going through the biggest economic

crisis in more than half a century and it won’t just go away just because a few

journalists or politicians are talking about green shoots.’

‘You’ve got a good point.’

‘People are naive to think that this crisis can be solved just by printing money?

It’s not so easy, on the other hand it doesn’t mean the end of the world is here,

there’s still a lot of loose cash around, the world is a bigger place than it was in the

1930s.’

‘I suppose you’re right there.’

‘One other thing, I’ve got some banker friends looking at setting up a new

property fund. I think you should meet them whilst you’re here.’

‘Property fund?’

‘Yeah, you know an investment fund.’

‘A hedge fund?’

‘That’s right.’

‘I thought they had all collapsed,’ Barton joked.

‘No, there’s plenty of them making good money.’

‘Who are they?’

‘The Nederlandsche Nassau Fund.’

‘Of course, they’re part of the Irish Netherlands Bank?’

‘That’s it.’

‘That’s Michael Fitzwilliams outfit.

‘Yes, I was planning on meeting him.’

‘Great.’

‘There’s a lot of opportunities. Forget the crisis, remember, you and I, a hedge

fund, anybody with some cash, can buy and sell anything…currency, shares, gold,

property ― you name it, it’s all out there for the taking. And what’s better you can

even invent your own product, financial or material, if you think you can sell it.’

‘A little cynical.’

‘Not as cynical as politicians like Brown and Blair!