Forget Lotto, just bank at Westpac NZ for a jackpot

AUCKLAND: THE Westpac bank in New Zealand, which last month mistakenly transferred $NZ10 million ($8.06 million) into the account of a man who is still on the run, has been involved in another big-figure error.

The administration manager at computer firm Elite Business Systems, Graeme Richer, couldn’t believe his eyes when he received a Westpac fax last week telling him $NZ4.3 million had been transferred into the firm’s account by a client paying a bill. But the sum owed was just $NZ43,000. Mr Richer said the correct amount was transferred into the firm’s bank account.

“We were hopeful, almost had our tickets booked to fly out to Hong Kong,” he told The Waikato Times newspaper.

A Westpac spokesman, Craig Dowling, said the mistake was “a typing error” on the fax. He said the most important thing was that the correct amount was transferred and that controls, including a verification process, were in place to ensure accuracy.

Last month, Rotorua couple Leo Gao and Kara Hurring skipped the country for Hong Kong after Westpac mistakenly put $NZ10 million into Mr Gao’s account.

Mr Gao had asked for a $NZ100,000 overdraft. Westpac said most of the money had been recovered but $NZ3.8 million was still outstanding.

Forget Lotto, just bank at Westpac NZ for a jackpot

NORTH KOREA HAS TEST-FIRED A SHORT-RANGE MISSILE AFTER CONDUCTING AN UNDERGROUND NUCLEAR TEST, SOUTH KOREAN MEDIA REPORT

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REPORT: NORTH KOREA MAY HAVE CONDUCTED NUCLEAR TEST

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What financial crisis? Portrait of a Chinese millionaire

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One of China’s growing number of millionaires - for whom the financial crisis barely registers - Chen Yilong has just bought a private plane to add to his many luxury homes.

Lighting a cigarette in a teahouse in Xi’an, in northern Shaanxi province, the 49-year-old pauses when asked how much money he has, before saying in a conspiratorial voice: “You can safely say I’m a multi-millionaire (in yuan).”

Research by the Hurun Report, a magazine that tracks China’s wealthiest, revealed in April that 825,000 people had personal wealth of over 10 million yuan (US$1.5 million), or 0.06 percent of the population.

And at a time when the financial crisis has left 25 million migrant workers out of a job in China, the vast majority of these millionaires said the meltdown had not had any impact on their lifestyle, the research said.

Sipping his tea contentedly, Chen, a rotund, jovial man sporting a striped shirt with red braces, agreed.

The real estate company owner talked animatedly of the Cirrus SR22 private plane he was having shipped over from the United States to satisfy a childhood dream.

“This plane is essentially the BMW of the air,” he said smugly of the aircraft he paid five million yuan for, describing an elaborate parachute system that would bring him safely back to earth if there was a problem.

Chen says he is one of the first in this part of China to have bought a private plane - a luxury purchase that is still very rare in the country even among the group of multi-millionaires.

It is all a far cry from a decade ago, he said, his rags to riches story mirroring China’s own rapid economic growth over about the same period.

In the late 1990s, he had just delisted from the army, been given a demobilisation fee of 50,000 yuan and had decided to buy a second-hand truck to transport goods.

“I rented a driver and it went for more than a year, but it got into two road accidents, and it hit a person - I realised it was just too dangerous, and not profitable,” he said.

That is when Chen discovered real estate and decided to set up a company with some of his own funds and borrowed money.

A lawyer by training, he had spent most of his working life in the army but had gained some business experience in the late 1980s while in a tank division, where he oversaw a unit that produced and sold oxygen.

At the time, he said, the government allowed army personnel to do business on the side as a way to supplement their income.

“But then the government said we couldn’t do this anymore - the army had got messy, everyone was earning money, they weren’t training,” he said.

That experience helped his first foray into real estate, and soon he had built up Weinan Changlong Real Estate Development Company - a firm of over 20 staff members with a turnover of several million yuan a year.

He now has “many houses,” he says, without being drawn into the exact number, and proudly talks about his caravan - a rarity in China and a purchase that drew a questioning look from his wife, who co-owns the company. Laughing, Chen recalled her saying: “What are you going to get next, a plane?”

What financial crisis? Portrait of a Chinese millionaire - Taiwan News Online

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Bank of America to raise stake in China Construction Bank to 19.13 pct

BEIJING (XFN-ASIA) - Bank of America Corp has decided to exercise a call option to buy an additional 19.58 bln H-shares in China Construction Bank Corp (CCB) (SHA 601939; HK 0939) from Central Huijin, the investment arm of sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corp, CCB said.

-Forbes.com

• Why China Won’t Come to the Rescue