Highlight of the Week: GMA-7 stock sizzles amid talk of sale

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

GMA-7 stock sizzles amid talk of sale

MANILA, Philippines - Persistent rumors that the group of TV5 chair Manuel V. Pangilinan and the GMA Network Inc. controlling owners are in talks for a deal have helped boost the stock price of the 2nd biggest television network in the country.

GMA-7's stock was only trading at P6.50 a share on December 27, 2011 when the newest set of deal talks commenced and picked up by social media users, making it one of the top trending topics on Twitter in the Philippines.

Peza approves P104 billion fresh investments in H1

Fresh investments approved by the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) in the first half of the year reached P104.745 billion, or 12 percent higher compared to new projects registered in the same period last year amounting to P90.135 billion.

Elmer San Pascual, head of Peza’s promotions group, said the agency is on track of meeting its full-year target of generating P300 billion in fresh investments as more big-ticket projects are expected to register this second semester.


5 foreign banks shut down Philippine offices

Manila (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - American Express Bank and four other foreign institutions have shut down their offices in the Philippines as the financial woes in the United States and Europe prompted them to sell off their offshore assets.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP or Central Bank of the Philippines) said the asset sale was meant to help the financially troubled parent firms generate liquidity.

In a circular notifying the local banking industry, the BSP said the five foreign banks have already packed up and left. Apart from American Express Bank, the others were Societe General, Union Bank of California N.A., First International Bank and Fortis Bank.

Societe Generale is based in Paris, while First International Bank is based in North Dakota. Fortis Bank is a subsidiary of BNP Paribas, which operates mainly out of Belgium.

Highlight of the Week: Peso Rises to Highest Level in 4 Years

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

Peso rises to highest level in 4 years

Manila (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - The peso strengthened further to its highest level in about four years, ending yesterday's trading day in the 41-to-a-dollar territory.

PSEi climbs to new peak on easing hopes

STOCKS hit a fresh peak yesterday on market hopes of easing by European and US central banks after fresh data showed the global economy hitting a new bump

The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rallied by 1.23% or 65.46 points to close at 5,365.70, piercing the 5,360 resistance, while the broader all-share index gained 0.89% or 30.81 points to 3,506.34.

PLDT to pay out dividends on preferred stock

INDEX HEAVYWEIGHT Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) has moved to distribute cash dividends for holders of its preferred stock, a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange showed yesterday.

“We disclose that at the meeting of the board of directors of PLDT held on July 3, the board declared a final dividend of P0.0027 per day per outstanding share of Series GG 10% Cumulative Convertible Preferred Stock covering the period March 1 to Aug. 30,” the disclosure read.

BSP watching peso’s surge

THE BANGKO Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) yesterday said the peso’s appreciation was not yet worrisome but it was watchful of its impact on inflation.

The country’s exporters, meanwhile, said the peso’s appreciation to the P41-per-dollar level has started to hurt, dashing hopes of a recovery from the slump last year.

Highlight of the Week: PH is World’s 5th Most Improved Country, According to A Study

Stock Market News - Philippines

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

PH is world’s 5th most improved country, says study

The Philippines was cited as the fifth most improved country in the world, rising two notches to rank 133 from 135th last year, in the 2012 Global Peace Index (GPI).

Pilipinas Shell plans to build LNG facility in Philippines

PILIPINAS Shell Petroleum Corp., the local arm of Royal Dutch Shell Plc., is planning to set up a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import facility in the Philippines, the first in Southeast Asia.

San Miguel power subsidiary strengthens hold on Meralco

DIVERSIFIED CONGLOMERATE San Miguel Corp. has strengthened its hold over Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) after its subsidiary finalized an earlier purchase of P56.67 billion worth of shares previously held by the Social Security System (SSS).

San Miguel, through SMC Global Power Holdings Corp., has thus hiked its stake in the utility to 32.39% from a previous 21.46% as of end-March, keeping the conglomerate as the second largest shareholder after Pangilinan-led Beacon Electric Asset Holdings, Inc. which holds 42.25%, based on data from the local bourse.

Good News and Bad News for the Philippines This Week

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

Good News and Bad News for the Philippines This Week

There had been a mix of good news and bad news for the Philippine economy and politics this week. For the good news, the UK government assures Philippines of more investments. British Prime Minister David Cameron yesterday assured Philippine President Benigno Aquino of his government's continued support for the Philippines' public-private partnership program (PPP) and said he looked forward to more British companies investing in the country.

Another good news is that Moody's unit raises Philippines growth forecast. The research arm of Moody's Investors Services has raised its economic growth forecast for the Philippines this year to 4.7 per cent from 4 per cent, citing the government's ant-corruption drive and big push for infrastructure development that will aid efforts to attract investors.

However, the bad news is that the Philippines risks joining money-laundering blacklist. The Philippines faces the risk of joining a global money-laundering blacklist after it failed to approve all required amendments to legislation on illegal movement of money, threatening its ability to attract foreign investment.

Ending up on the Financial Action Task Force blacklist would also make it difficult for Filipinos abroad to send money home and for local banks to transact business overseas.

Thoughts About the News

It's a good thing that our government and our country in general is getting more investments, better forecasts and good ratings. It means more investors would be encouraged to invest in our country. However, it bothers me that our current administration has focused too much on putting its now former Chief Justice Renato Corona on an exhausting and somewhat politically vindictive trial.

Our policy makers could have spent more time, effort and our nation's resources on much more pressing and rather important issues such as trying as much as we can not to be at risk of joining the money-laundering blacklist.

Or maybe passing necessary bills to improve our educational system or maybe focus on making it easier for local entrepreneurs to setup businesses which could eventually help in pumping more investments on our local market thus would result into creating more jobs. It's not that I feel the issue about Corona shouldn't have been resolved or be avoided, I just felt that there are many other pressing issues that could have been given more focus and attention to. 

Highlight of the Week: Philippines bags US$1b investment deals with Europe

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

Philippines bags US$1b investment deals with Europe

London (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - Philippine President Benigno Aquino III on Tuesday crowned the first full day of his visit to the United Kingdom by attending business meetings between Filipino and European companies, resulting in deals that would raise around US$1 billion in investments for the Philippines.

Country posts 6.4% GPD for the 1st Quarter

After four quarters of lackluster performance, the Philippine Economy is off to a rousing start in the year of the water dragon as GDP grew by 6.4 percent in the first quarter of 2012 compared to an upwardly revised growth of 4.9 percent last year.  The above expectations growth benefitted from a regime of benign inflation and drew from the revitalized Services sector, particularly from Trade and Other Services.  It also got a big boost from manufacturing which has recovered some grounds that got eroded during the third and fourth quarters last year.

Shocking Facts About Filipinos Household Saving and Investing [INFOGRAPHIC]

An infographic released by Money Summit & Wealth Expo revealed some of the shocking facts about the saving and investing habits of Filipinos.

Key takeaways

- 2 out 8 Filipino households have a bank deposit

- 7 in 10 own their home while 1 in 6 own real property other than their home

- 1 in 5 households receives financial assistance abroad

- 43.8% spent more than their income

- 51.5% spent as much as their income

- 4.6% spent less than their income

SSS may surpass goal for investments

SOCIAL Security System (SSS) may exceed the target it set for its investments on expectations that economic growth will remain robust, a top official said last week.

Edgar Solilapsi, SSS executive vice president for investments, told reporters in an interview that the state-run pension fund for the private sector exceeded expectations in the first quarter in terms of earnings of its equity and fixed-income placements.

Highlight of the Week: Economist: Philippines Is Number One

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

Economist: Philippines Is Number One

MANILA, Philippines --- The Philippines is the most attractive global provider of IT-BPO services in Asia, followed by China and India — in that order — according to the results of a survey by the Economist Corporate Network (Economist). Forty-five percent of respondents said the Philippines was an attractive services provider, while 35% said the same for China. Only 25% of respondents said India was an attractive provider of IT-BPO services, in general.

Stock market climbs back into 5,000-pt territory

MANILA, Philippines - Local stocks climbed for the third straight day due to continuous bargain hunting, propelling the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) past the 5,000 mark for the first time since mid-May.

SEC Approves URC Plans To Go Into Fuel Ethanol Production

MANILA, Philippines --- The Securities and Exchange Commission has approved the amendment of the Articles of Incorporation of Universal Robina Corporation (URC) to allow the firm to engage in the business of production of fuel ethanol.

URC president Lance Gokongwei said URC is investing about $27 million for the construction of an ethanol plant in Mahhuyod, Negros Oriental as part of the firm’s URSUMCO sugar mill.

Pangilinan Assumes As Meralco Chairman

MANILA, Philippines --- With the decision of Ambassador Manuel M. Lopez to step down from his post at the country’s largest power distribution utility, management changes formally paved the way for the installation of Manuel V. Pangilinan as chairman of the Manila Electric Company (Meralco), following yesterday’s stockholders meeting.

SM Prime Issuing P7.5-B Notes

MANILA, Philippines --- SM Prime Holdings, Inc. (SM Prime) has signed a P7.5 billion notes facility agreement for the refinancing of existing obligations, to partially fund capital expenditures and/or other general corporate requirements.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, SM Prime said the notes facility consists of five- and ten-year floating rate notes and five- and ten-year fixed rate notes.

Highlight of the Week: Wall St gains Boost Local Share Prices

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

Wall St gains boost local share prices 

MANILA, Philippines - Local share prices barely rose yesterday, posting minimal gains to end higher for the second straight day.

The bellwether Philippine Stock Exchange index slightly rose 0.09 percent or 4.43 points to close at 4,958.43 while the broader all-shares index gained 0.2 percent or 6.45 points to 3,314.49.

San Miguel Corp. sees $20-billion revenues this year

MANILA, Philippines - Diversified conglomerate San Miguel Corp. (SMC) said it expects to hit its $20-billion revenue target for 2015 this year on increased contributions from new acquisitions.

“We believe by end of 2012, we will have $20-billion sales revenue,” SMC president Ramon Ang told reporters yesterday.

MVP, Ang unveil expressway link project 

MANILA, Philippines - Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC)’s Manuel Pangilinan and San Miguel Corp. (SMC) president Ramon Ang unveiled before President Aquino yesterday the proposed P45-billion project to connect the North and South Luzon Expressways (NLEX and SLEX).

Construction is set to begin late this year.

Credit card receivables up 9.9% to P132.2B

MANILA, Philippines - More and more consumers are using their credit cards to finance the purchase of goods and services as receivables of banks almost posted a double-digit growth last year, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported yesterday.

Gov't eyes P30 B from PSALM bond issuance

MANILA, Philippines - The government is aiming to tap the cash-rich domestic market by mid-June for up to P30 billion in 10-year bonds for the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM), the state agency tasked to manage and dispose the government’s power assets, officials said yesterday.

Finance Undersecretary Rosalia de Leon told The STAR yesterday that the government is considering borrowing an initial tranche of PSALM’s estimated P85-billion funding requirement through the issuance of bonds and continue with the second tranche in the latter part of the year

Highlight of the Week: OFW remittances up 5.4% to $4.8 billion in Q1

Highlights of the Week: News, events and updates that are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines stock market.

OFW remittances up 5.4% to $4.8 billion in Q1

MANILA, Philippines - Remittances from overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) climbed by 5.4 percent in the first quarter of the year on the back of the sustained demand for skilled Filipino workers overseas, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) reported yesterday.

SE Asia Stocks-Shares fall amid Greek political turmoil

Shares in Philippines and Malaysia suffered their biggest daily loss in seven months on Wednesday as equity markets in southeast Asia followed a broad global selloff, touched off by worries that the euro zone's debt crisis would worsen. The Philippine index finished down 2.3 percent at 4,864.23 while Malaysia's main share index ended down 1.6 percent at 1,536.04.

PHL and the euro crisis by John Mangun 

WITH the local stock market heading south at a fast rate, it might be more appropriate to look at the internals of the listed companies and the macroeconomic picture of the Philippines to understand the “why” behind the drop.

Highlight News of the Week: Ramon Ang vows to Turn PAL around in 1 year

For our second part of our Weekly Highlights. These are the news which are likely to affect your investments and trades in the Philippines.

Stocks breach 5,300, hit new record high

PHILIPPINE STOCKS soared to a new historic high yesterday, piercing the psychological 5,300 mark as rosy economic expectations fueled broad investor buying.

The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose by 1.37% or 71.57 points to close at 5,300.41, while the broader all-share index advanced 1.08% or 37.32 points to 3,505.62.

Inflation accelerates in April; rates expected to stay steady
INFLATION accelerated to 3% in April, the government reported on Friday, as most commodity groups saw higher price increases from a year ago.

The result, up from March’s 2.6%, topped analysts’ expectations. It also hit the higher end of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (BSP) 2.1-3% forecast, but was still lower than the 4.7% rate logged in April last year.

Month-on-month, prices also rose faster, by 0.8% in April compared with 0.2% in March.

"The uptrend can be attributed to higher annual increments recorded in all the commodity groups except in the transport, communication and education indices," the National Statistics Office (NSO) said.

Ang vows to turn PAL around in 1 year

MANILA, Philippines - Maverick businessman Ramon S. Ang, who heads diversifying conglomerate San Miguel Corp. (SMC) and has now taken over the helm of Philippine Airlines, has vowed to turn Asia’s oldest carrier around in a year and create a new breed of air service.

In an interview following the annual stockholders meeting of SMC’s liquor unit Ginebra San Miguel yesterday, Ang said his goal is to keep the struggling airline flying and turn it into a five-star value carrier.

“PAL is a good airline and brand. We’re confident we can turn PAL and its sister budget carrier Air Philippines around in a year. Give me a year or two, PAL will have the most beautiful FAs (flight attendants) and the best service,” said Ang, who earned a reputation for engineering business turnarounds.

Philippine Airline seen getting back in the black in a year

Manila (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - Flag carrier Philippine Airlines can turn profitable again in just one year, even by just using the existing fleet now under the management control of San Miguel Corp., SMC chief Ramon S. Ang said.

"Based on the existing fleet, we are already confident we can turn it around," Ang told reporters Thursday after the stockholders' meeting of SMC's hard liquor unit, Ginebra San Miguel Inc.
"PAL is a very good company and a very good brand," he said.

PAL's return to profitability one year after SMC's takeover, Ang said, would be achieved through the implementation of a better sales and ticketing system and reduction in cost through higher utilization of aircraft.

Highlight of the Week: Philippines to Showcase Strong Economic Growth

Just like anyone who wants to keep tabs on the local and international news that could affect the stock prices, I like to read online portals and various sources. Therefore, I decided to share with you all the news that may affect you and your trades - directly or indirectly. Thus, the Weekly Highlights.

Philippine economy to grow by 5-6%, say officials

Manila (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - Administration officials are optimistic that the Philippine economy will expand by 5 to 6 per cent in 2012, higher than the 3.7-per cent growth posted in 2011.

Phl to showcase strong eco growth, low inflation

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines is set to showcase the country’s steady economic growth amid a low inflation environment as the sovereign debt crisis continued to batter countries in Europe and as the US continued to face economic uncertainties during the four-day Asian Development Bank (ADB) conference next month.


Asian giants must unite to overcome economic issues—ADB

PASAY CITY, METRO MANILA—The three major regions of Southeast Asia, China, and India, must work together for Asia to overcome economic challenges, according to a top executive from the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Forex reserves up 11% to $75.965B

MANILA, Philippines - The country’s foreign exchange reserves grew 10.9 percent due to higher valuation of the gold holdings of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), as well as robust earnings from the overseas investments of the central bank.

Cheap Thrills: 5 Ways to Save Money at the Amusement Park

A day of fun for the family doesn't come cheap. Between admissions, concessions, and souvenirs, the ultimate thrill ride may be taking place in your pocketbook. However, with a little shrewd planning and research, you can make sure that when you're putting your hands up, it's because you're on a daring rollercoaster -- not because you're being robbed.

Win one of the 20 FREE Slots to Steps to Financial Peace

Win slots to the Steps to Financial Peace Conference by Randell Tiongson. Randell Tiongson, an advocate of Life & Personal Finance, Columnist on Philippine Daily Inquirer and Moneysense Magazine, will speak at the Steps to Financial Peace Conference 2012 on May 18th, 26th and June 2nd in Manila, Cebu and Davao. Guest speakers are Chinkee Tan and Jayson Lo.