Li Wenzheng

Li Wenzheng

Li Wenzheng, a Chinese businessman from Indonesia, studied at the National Central University. Later, he went to Indonesia to make a living. After more than 30 years of struggle, he became the chairman of Lippo group in Indonesia. His enterprises are all over Southeast Asia and the United States. Its experience of creating wealth and its way of management are full of legend. The famous "Asian finance" magazine once selected him as the creator of the miracle. According to Forbes magazine, its personal assets exceed $2.5 billion.

In 2019, Forbes ranked 1008 on the world's billionaires list.

Early study

Li Wenzheng was born in Malang Town, East Java, Indonesia in 1929. His ancestral home is Putian, Fujian Province, China. In middle school, he served as the president of the student union of East Java overseas Chinese school. He was arrested and jailed by the Dutch colonial government for organizing students to participate in the struggle against the Dutch colonists and helping to carry out propaganda and deliver drugs. After being deported in 1947, he returned to his native land and was admitted to the Department of philosophy of National Central University. He came to Hong Kong in 1949. In the early 1950s, as the Indonesian government became more stable, it returned to Indonesia and settled in Jakarta. Li Wenzheng was chairman of the Asian Bankers Association. Li Wen is enthusiastic about education and is the chairman of the National University of Indonesia.

Hesitation and hesitation

At this time, his father opened a batik shop in Jakarta, and the business was OK. His father wanted him to inherit the family business, so he taught him the knack of running the batik business. However, Li Wenzheng, a young man, is not interested in this, and even less interested in business. It turns out that although he has gone through vicissitudes and tribulations, he has a belief that remains unchanged. This belief began to sprout from the age of 10, that is, to be a banker. After Li Wenzheng got married, he left his father's home to work in the department store opened by his father-in-law's. A few years later, he found another job as a shipping agent. After a few years, his performance was mediocre and boring, but he saved 2000 dollars.

Seize the opportunity

Just as Li Wen was hesitating and didn't know how to start a new business, opportunities fell from the sky.

2000 US dollars was not a small sum for Indonesians at that time. Li Wenzheng was also a "big money". News of Li Wenzheng's wealth spread from ten to one. Somehow, his $2000 savings were misinterpreted as $200000. This misinformation made a joke on Li Wenzheng, but it provided him with an opportunity to realize his childhood dream.

One night in 1960, pirama Shari, the manager of Kee mcmurren bank, which was on the verge of collapse due to poor operation, was affected by misinformation. He visited Li Wenzheng and asked Li Wenzheng to invest 200000 US dollars to rescue the bank. Judging from the situation at that time, the vitality of mcmurren bank seemed very slim. Li Wenzheng had only $2000 in his pocket, but he took the challenge boldly and promised to raise the fund. In his view, this is a good time to join the banking industry. This is where Li Wenzheng is extraordinary. Seizing the opportunity means seizing the pulse of career success and development, which is equal to laying the foundation for entrepreneurship.

Where to raise this huge sum of $200000? Li Wenzheng thought of his fellow countrymen in Fujian who had close contacts with him. These fellow countrymen are very successful in the bicycle manufacturing and repair industry in Jakarta, occupying a monopoly position. Li Wen is using this relationship to raise the funds in time. This allowed him not only to give priority to a 20% stake in the bank, but also to work in it. At this point, he finally entered the financial palace.

Save the bank

Li Wenzheng will never forget the day when he joined the industry. Wearing a brand-new suit and carrying a leather bag, he stepped into the bank door for the first time as a master. Suddenly, he felt like a new man.

However, for Li Wenzheng, who is a monk on the way, everything is strange. He can't even tell the difference between the left column and the right column of his balance sheet. But when he didn't understand, he asked. From his own home to the general staff, he respected him as a teacher and was diligent in asking for advice. Within six months, he was convincingly elected to the board of directors of mcmurren bank, and then took the first seat.

Although he has not received any professional training in banking business, he has two outstanding abilities as a banker: alert and keen market mind and the ability of super salesman. Relying on his own intuition and experience in small business, he concluded that in order to revive the bank, he had to break into the market that other banks had not yet thought of. With his unique vision, he fell in love with the huge bicycle industry in Jakarta, a virgin land that others have not reclaimed. As an investor, he came to the bicycle industry to win customers.

"To cultivate customers is to strengthen ourselves." This is the creed of running a bank and the secret of his success. At a Chinese restaurant in Jakarta, he held the first investor meeting of the bank. At the meeting, he gave a precise explanation of the definition of bank in his own language: "in my opinion, banking is not a business of buying and selling money, but a business of buying and selling credit. After someone gets credit somewhere, it's given to someone else. " As a result, he said that he would never delay, even if he borrowed money, he would give it to his customers on time. As a result, he gradually built up the reputation of mcmurren bank and its influence was growing. After three years of struggle, the bank has finally turned losses into profits, made huge profits, and embarked on a prosperous road.

Banking experts

Li Wenzheng won the first battle, which made everyone in the bank look at him with new eyes. But he is not satisfied. He should be steady and dare to compete, and take it as the cornerstone to realize his dream of financial empire.

From 1963 to 1971, he rescued the precarious universal bank and prosperity Bank of Indonesia, and then, based on these two banks, he jointly acquired ICBC and Surabaya bank with friends and relatives to form pan Indonesia bank. Li Wenzheng owns 30% of the shares and serves as the CEO. After four years of efforts, the bank has developed into the largest private bank in Indonesia, with a capital of 37.6 billion rupiah.

Like a magician, Li Wenzheng straightened out and enlivened the banks that were on the verge of bankruptcy, and developed them in a rolling way. As a result, he was praised by the press and the banking industry as "an expert in treating banks".

Come to Asia

In 1975, Li Wenzheng resigned as CEO of Pan Indonesia bank due to discord with some shareholders. Previously, because of his frequent success in the financial industry, he had already attracted the attention of his fellow countryman, Indonesia's richest man Lin Shaoliang. As soon as he resigned, Lin Shaoliang invited him to be the director and general manager of the Central Bank of Asia. At that time, the actual scale of the Central Asian bank was much smaller than that of Pan Indonesia bank founded by Li Wenzheng, with assets only 1 / 333 of Pan India bank and deposits only 1% of Pan India bank. However, this bank is the financial pillar of Lin Shaoliang, backed by the huge entity of Lin group, and its business development potential is extremely huge. This provides a place for heroes. Because of this, Li Wenzheng readily accepted the invitation and became the head of the Central Bank of Asia.

Li Wen is taking the Central Bank of Asia as his fist bank. His intelligence, bold decision-making and steady management style have been brought into full play here. With Li Wenzheng's careful operation and Lin Shaoliang's close cooperation and strong support, the bank has grown up like bamboo shoots. In just three years, the Central Bank of Asia has become Indonesia's largest private bank. By 1983, the total assets of the Central Bank of Asia had increased 332 times and the deposit had increased 1253 times. It had 32 branches all over Indonesia, covering all major cities in Indonesia, forming the largest private banking network in the country. It also has branches in Singapore, Taipei, Hong Kong, Macao, Singapore, California, New York and Arkansas. So far, the Central Bank of Asia has become recognized as the largest bank in Southeast Asia.

transnational corporations

With the success of the Central Asian bank, Li Wenzheng has set up his belief to enter the international financial market. He is also planning his own overseas expansion plan. He wants to establish his own multinational financial company

He first extended his tentacles to Hong Kong, Japan and the United States. In Hong Kong, he founded Stephen finance. The company owns the sixth largest investment bank in the United States, and has two major financial institutions attached to it. One of them is in Jakarta, and its name is Stephen international leasing company. Stephen finance company and Commercial Bank of Indonesia each invest half. Through Stephen finance, Mr. Li also acquired a half stake in a Chinese bank in Hong Kong. In the United States, he bought a 30% stake in Bank of Atlanta in the early 1980s. Although the Hebrew Bank of San Francisco is a company owned by Lin Shaoliang, Li Wen is the chairman of the Committee managing the bank and has direct economic ties and interests. In the early 1980s, Indonesia produced a lot of logs and plywood, which were sold to the United States in large quantities. The trade volume reached 4 billion US dollars a year, of which Li Wenzheng accounted for 25%. He became a banker who made a lot of money in logging and timber trade with the United States.

In the late 1980s, Li Wenzheng and Lin Shaoliang cooperated again and founded Libao group company, which mainly expanded overseas business. Li Wenzheng is the chairman of the group. In addition to Li Wenzheng and Lin Shaoliang, the eldest son and daughter of Indonesian President Suharto also own 16% of the shares.

Today, Libao group's assets at home and abroad have exceeded 6 billion US dollars, and it has more than 40 companies. Its business scope is very wide, including finance, real estate, manufacturing and repair industries. Financial business accounts for the total business volume of the group

Chinese PinYin : Li Wen Zheng