If you are quite active in the market, you might be familiar with
names such as Aburizal Bakrie, Hary Tanoesoedibjo, James T. Riady, Franky Wijaya, Anthoni
Salim, and Edwin Soerjadjaja. Yup, they are the few who dominate the capital
market in Indonesia. Each of them is the owner of Bakrie Group, Bhakti Group,
Lippo Group, Sinarmas Group, Salim Group, and the Astra Group (But Astra has
already sold to Jardine Matheson, the Hong Kong-based investment group). And
they also included in the richest people in Indonesia. Then, where is the
position of Chairul Tanjung?
Chairul Tanjung is the owner of Para Group, that later changed its
name into Chairul Tanjung Corporation (CT Corp.). You may know Mr. Chairul just as the owner
of Bank Mega and Trans TV. But like other major
employers, Mr. Chairul has many companies that engaged in almost all areas and
business sectors. Forbes estimated the assets value of Mr. Chairul reached up
to Rp10 trillion, or around US$1.1 billion, while I personally reckon the asset value
probability is greater than that number, perhaps US$2 billion. Whatever the
number is, it’s certainly a remarkable achievement for an entrepreneur who
started his career just as the campus photocopy stall owner.
Huh? Photocopy entrepreneur? Right! Mr. Chairul have learned to
make money since he was very young, when he was still in junior high school,
and has become a micro-scale entrepreneur since study at the faculty of
dentistry in Universitas Indonesia (UI) in 1981. At that time, he was just 19 years old. Driven by the
desire to live independently and no longer depend on his parent,
he sells T-shirts, key chains, study books, etc. His income began to rise
when he found the idea to utilize the empty space under the campus stairs, to
be used as a place of business. And what occurred to his mind was a photocopy
business. At that time, if the students wanted to copy a note, then they had to
go quite far out of the campus to find a photocopy stall. The young Chairul
think, if there is a photocopy stall on campus, then his fellow college
students do not need to go out again just for copying. It was such a creative idea, and young Chairul started his career as an
entrepreneur.
After college, Mr. Chairul run any business, from selling medical
devices, until become a project contractor for factory building. His business
began to occupy a higher level when he established a
shoe factory for export in 1987. In the same year, Para Group was officially
established.
Until nearly ten years since Mr. Chairul established Para Group,
he was still a no-name entrepreneur. His career
as a ‘serious’ entrepreneur began when he acquired Bank Karman in 1996, and
changed its name to Bank Mega. Where
did the money came from? From the shoe factory sales. Mr. Chairul took a very
bold step by selling shoes factory when it was in its glorious time, and chose
to enter the financial services business that was going down because of the monetary
crisis in 1998. But when the other entrepreneurs began to fall at that time,
Mr. Chairul with his Mega Bank actually capable to stand out alone. In around
1998 to 2000, he entered the real estate business by establishing Bandung
Supermall, and expand its financial services business by acquiring Monument
Bank, that later changed its name into Bank Mega Syariah.
In 2002, Mr. Chairul entered the media business by establishing
TransTV. Thereby, since 2002, Mr. Chairul officially have business in the field
of financial services, property, and the media, that
became the foundation to bring CT Corp played in almost every business sector,
eight years later. Here are some of them:
- PT. Mega Corpora, the holding company of subsidiaries in the financial service sector, which are Bank Mega (bank), Asuransi Jiwa Mega Life (insurance), Mega Capital (stock market), and Para Multifinance (financing service).
- PT. Trans Corporation, the holding companies of the subsidiaries in media sector and other, which are TransTV (television), Anta Express Tour (tour service), Trans Mahagaya (fashion store), The Coffee Bean (food & beverages), Bandung Supermall (property), and Carrefour Indonesia (retail).
- PT. CT Global Resources, the holding company of subsidiaries in natural resources sector, which are Para Inti Energy (oil and gas), and CT Agro (oil palm plantation).
Although CT Corp business scope is very broad, but certainly it
hasn’t as broad as the business of other more senior business groups, such as Bakrie
Group or Sinarmas Group. However, considering that the age of Mr. Chairul is
quite young for a major entrepreneur (48 years), and the group itself has stood
for 23 years only, then
it is worth the wait: Until what extent CT Corp is able to expand its business. It is not
impossible that CT Corp will someday exceed all business of the groups
mentioned above.
The Unique
Chairul Tanjung
Mr. Chairul can be said to be very successful, because even though
he initiated his business from scratch, but he was able to join 'The Billion
Dollar Club', and align himself with other more senior great entrepreneurs. But
if only just that, he is not alone. Some entrepreneurs like Hary Tanoesoedibjo
and Sandiaga S. Uno, also started their business from zero point, and able to
achieve success in a relatively young age.
What makes Mr. Chairul unique and somewhat special compared to
other entrepreneurs is, he often participated in 'helping' the government to
handle the state government particularly in economic problem, a problem that we
know that the government itself is not so serious in handling it. As we know,
there are many entrepreneurs who are looking for something different if their
business has reached its highest level. If Bakrie choose politics, then Chairul
Tanjung choose to participate in the development without taking part in the
circle of power.
A while ago, Mr. Chairul participated in initiating the movement of
'Indonesian Vision 2030', a movement which contains ideals that Indonesia will
be one of the countries with advanced economies in 2030. And recently, Mr.
Chairul also co-founded the National Economic Committee (KEN), where he became
the chairman. KEN helps provide a variety of recommendations to the government
to boost the national economy. On several occasions, Mr. Chairul often said
that Indonesia could advance economically bla bla bla, as long as bla bla bla.
When he purchased Carrefour, the reason is not just for business, but 'As one
of the largest retail company in Indonesia, Carrefour should be held by the Indonesian
people as well. We can’t lose with the foreign in retail sector'.
In Indonesia, not many major enterpreneurs that care enough about
the country and would not bother to take care of the national economy, even
though they in fact able to do so. Usually they are busier to enrich
themselves, and sometimes even have to harm others. The entire activity of Mr.
Chairul in building his business over the years, did not reflect such profile.
Mr. Chairul also not interested to trick the investors’ fund in Stock Market,
as was done by the Bakrie Group and Bhakti Group. So far, there has never even
heard about the business activities that harm other people. Yup, as a whole,
Mr. Chairul Tanjung has an excellent profile and reputation as a businessman.
Chairul Tanjung
and the Stock Market
I have met with Mr. Chairul at an event, some time ago. At that
time, there were a lot of messages and tips by him. One of them was, 'If you
have a business that is in its golden time, then leave the business and go to
another business that hasn’t reached its peak. If not, then you will not get
anything!'.
When Mr. Chairul sell his shoe factory, the performance was very
excellent. The turnover was very large, and the profits were abundant, so it was lure a
number of investors to acquire it. Most
entrepreneurs will most certainly don’t want to let go the company if the
company in a very good state. But Chairul Tanjung had another thought. He
auctioned off his factory until he obtained the highest bid price. As a result,
he managed to sell his
small factory at a sufficient price
to buy a bank! Although at first the bank that he bought was a small bank, but
now Bank Mega has become one of the largest non-government banks in Indonesia.
Well, if the tips from Mr. Chairul is translated for investors on
the capital market (and this is the core of this article), then the sound will
be turned into, 'If the stock you hold
currently at a high prices, then immediately sell those stocks. If not, then
you will not get anything!'. When this article was written, the Jakarta Composite Index (JCI) has exceeded 3,300, and apparently continued to move upwards. All
stocks were suddenly soar and make the investors rich. If you have received a
very large gain from certain stocks that you hold, then why didn’t you sell it,
at least some of them? Do not wait for the JCI to fall again and then you sell
it, or you will not get anything!
Lots of new stock market investors were busy buying a stock when
the price has soared. On the contrary, many investors were in a hurry selling
the stocks when the price has dropped. This is clearly the wrong strategy,
because you should run the strategy of buy
on weakness and sell on strength.
Not the vice versa! So do not be surprised if there are enough investors that
suffered losses in IDX.
Mr. Chairul’s action in selling the shoe factory, can be compared
with selling the penny stocks when the price is high. The money from the sale,
then used to buy the cheap bluchip’s stocks (Bank Mega). Thereby, Mr.Chairul
successfully entered higher stock levels. When the bluchip’s stock then going up and continue to rise, then
that's when Mr. Chairul started using the money from the gain of bluchip stocks
– which is of course greater than the gain of the penny stock – to buy a lot of penny stocks, such as Bandung
Supermall, TransTV, until Carrefour. In the future, there can be even more 'stocks'
that he collect.
So why didn’t you do the same way? Who knows that you will become
a great investor who controls the market, someday?
As already mentioned above, Chairul Tanjung does not seem to be
really interested in the stock market. Of the many companies, only Bank Mega
(MEGA) and Anta Express Tour (ANTA) are listed on the Stock Exchange.
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