何善衡

繁體中文

何善衡（1900–1997），生於澳門，籍貫廣東番禺石溪村，恒生銀行創辦人之一、新世界發展首任主席。他幼年在澳門半飢半飽中度過，約十歲時被送回番禺讀私塾，十四歲因家境變故到廣州鹽倉做雜工，其後轉到金鋪當學徒，憑自學苦讀在二十二歲升任司理。二十四歲他辭職與人合股在廣州開設匯隆銀號，1933年3月同林炳炎等在中環永樂街開設恒生銀號，他當時出資最少，只佔一千元。1941年日軍入侵香港，他把資金調往澳門避過浩劫，戰後返港，1952年成功申請銀行牌照，1960年恒生正名為恒生銀行，1964年成為香港最大的華資銀行。1965年銀行擠提風潮中，他忍痛把五成一控股權售予滙豐銀行，其後仍長期出任董事長至1983年改任名譽董事長；他領導編製的恒生指數，至今仍係香港股市最重要的升跌指標。他亦與郭得勝、鄭裕彤於1970年創辦新世界發展並出任首任主席，1997年12月4日逝世。

English

Ho Sin Hang (1900–1997) was born in Macau to a family from Shixi village in Panyu, Guangdong, and was a co-founder of Hang Seng Bank and the first chairman of New World Development. He spent a hungry childhood in Macau, was sent back to Panyu for a traditional schooling at about ten, and at fourteen left to work as a labourer in a Guangzhou salt warehouse and then as an apprentice in a gold shop, teaching himself economics, law and marketing and being promoted to manager's assistant at twenty-two. At twenty-four he left to open the Wui Lung money shop in Guangzhou, and in March 1933 he and Lam Ping-yin and others opened the Hang Seng money shop at 70 Wing Lok Street, Central, Ho putting in the least — just HK$1,000. When Japan invaded Hong Kong in 1941 he moved the firm's funds to Macau and saved it; back in Hong Kong after the war he obtained a banking licence in 1952, and in 1960 Hang Seng became a public company. By 1964 it was the largest Chinese-owned bank in Hong Kong. In the 1965 bank runs he painfully sold a 51% controlling stake to HSBC, after which he remained chairman until 1983, when he became honorary chairman; the Hang Seng Index, compiled under his leadership, is still Hong Kong's key market barometer. In 1970 he founded New World Development with Kwok Tak-seng and Cheng Yu-tung and served as its first chairman. He died on 4 December 1997.