Rebirth: The Ascent of a Socialite-Chapter 542 - 219: The Fallen Heiress’s Resolve (First Update)
Spending money is always easier than making money, but repaying debts involving relationships proved much harder than Su Ziceng had imagined.
When she finally reached the Su Family, intending to get a list of the Su Family’s balance of assets and liabilities from the finance department, she was immediately surrounded by people.
The incessant questioning from the media was not what troubled Su Ziceng the most. What embarrassed her the most were the former employees of the Su Family, each clamoring for the last month’s overdue wages, as well as unemployment benefits, subsidies, and allowances—names Su Ziceng hadn’t figured out even if she had lived two lifetimes.
Zhou Dagen, with his foresight, had already had all the able-bodied employees from the Wine Shop come over to help, but Su Ziceng was still grabbed by some people.
In the chaos, her clothes were torn, and even her shoes were trampled off. Someone cursed, "What kind of damn rich people, all they do is suck people’s blood and gnaw on people’s bones."
It took Zhou Dagen the strength of nine bulls and two tigers to drag Su Ziceng into the Su Family. In the once bustling administrative building, only a few essential employees who helped with the confirmation and liquidation of bankruptcy remained.
The majority of the Su Family’s employees were gathered outside, demanding compensation. Those left inside were the veteran employees who had fought battles with Su Qingzhang. Some had devoted their entire lives to the Su Family and held resentment for its current state. When they saw Su Ziceng, they did not revile her like those outside, and some even came forward to inquire about Su Qingzhang’s situation.
"He is doing well, thank you all," Su Ziceng lowered her head, trying her best to stabilize her emotions.
"Miss, if there’s anything we can help with, just tell us," said the deputy of Secretary Wang, a female secretary who had been working for the Su Family for nearly twenty years.
"I... I want to prepare a repayment list," Su Ziceng knew that excessive sentimentality was redundant, just as she did not need pity now.
When she mentioned her intention to settle the debts for the Su Family, the dozens of employees maintaining the basic operations of various departments were all stunned.
"This is impossible," the female secretary advised, "Miss, every company’s bankruptcy requires a legal procedure."
Su Ziceng had also learned about Z country’s bankruptcy law in advance, according to which bankruptcy must be implemented in a legally prescribed sequence. This includes the costs of the liquidation group, secured debts, employee wages, unsecured debts, and starting from this arrangement, the largest share of debt was bank loans.
"Miss, do you remember the ’Golden Coast’ project?" The female secretary pulled out the tender documentation and project books from when the skyscraper was built, starting to analyze for Su Ziceng.
After the height increase, the ’Golden Coast’ building, with a hundred floors, had a total construction cost of twelve billion, of which the Su Family funded eight billion and the Wen Family funded four billion. Of the funds contributed by the Su Family, nearly seventy percent were loans from the Commercial Bank. After the Su Family went bankrupt, the bank resold it to the Wen Family for five billion, meaning the Su Family still owed the bank a principal and interest of over six hundred fifty million.
"This debt of over six hundred million will mature by the end of the year," the female secretary, indeed a veteran employee of the Su Family, her temperament and analytical ability very much like Secretary Wang, spoke little but very thoroughly, simply clarifying the biggest issue at hand.
"Doesn’t the Su Family have a large amount of mineral and real estate properties?" Su Ziceng was reviewing the total asset situation of the Su Family, according to its operations, it shouldn’t have reached the point of needing bankruptcy. If the real estate properties could be successfully auctioned off, they should be able to repay the bank loans and the owed employee wages.
The female secretary praised Su Ziceng with a glance; compared to her first participation in a financial analysis meeting, Su Ziceng had made significant progress.
"Miss," replied the former manager of the investment operation department, who was also responsible for managing the trust fund left to Su Ziceng by Qiao Chu, "Your analysis is not wrong, but last year, the chairman sold several Su Family’s real estate properties across major cities in one go, totaling to fifteen billion, yet the specific flow of this money has never been disclosed by the chairman, even to this day, we still do not know where this fifteen billion in liquid capital has gone."
It was because of this unclear financial flow that the liquidation group in charge of the Su Family’s bankruptcy had requested to freeze the remaining profitable assets including the Subi Auction House and several other subsidiaries.
