Philippine stocks: Gainers, losers, market-moving news – January 2022

The Philippine Stock Exchange will revert to shortened trading hours from January 14 to 31 due to the surge in COVID-19 cases, which is believed to be driven by the highly transmissible Omicron variant.

Market close will be at 1 pm.

Villar-led AllHome on Monday, January 10, said the following stores have shut down after a fire broke out at Starmall Alabang in Muntinlupa City last Saturday, January 8:

● AllHome (Main Branch)
● AllHome Appliances
● AllHome C

The total cost of damage is still being assessed.

Due to the incident, AllHome has transferred some of its operations, particularly its receiving unit, to Bicutan, Parañaque City. It also temporarily transferred its merchandising and accounting office to Vista Mall Las Piñas.

Century Pacific Food (CNPF) launched its new range of plant-based products under the unMEAT brand.

CNPF entered the dairy-free category with a cheese alternative called unCHEESE, made with starches and plant-derived oils to closely match dairy cheese.

UnMEAT also launched a plant-based heat-and-eat pizza, as well as a luncheon meat product.

“The plant-based category has a huge potential, and essential to unlocking that value is through continuous innovation. As the category develops and awareness spreads, consumers will start to look for more,” CNPF said.

BDO Unibank on Monday, January 10, started the public offering of P5 billion worth of peso-denominated fixed-rate ASEAN sustainability bonds.

This is BDO’s third issuance under its P365-billion bond program, proceeds of which are intended to diversify the bank’s funding sources.

The bonds have a tenor of two years and a fixed rate of 2.9% per annum. Interest is payable quarterly. The minimum investment amount is P500,000 with increments of P100,000.

The offer period will run from January 10 to January 21, while the issue, settlement, and listing date is set for January 28.

Solar Philippines Nueva Ecija Corporation (SPNEC) is increasing its authorized capital stock from 10 billion shares to 50 billion shares, as it prepares for asset-for-share swaps with Solar Philippines.

The deal would help its capital raising and expand its solar project portfolio.

This comes in light of strong investor interest in SPNEC’s stock, which had over P5 billion in trading over the past month and became the local bourse’s best-performing debut of 2021, closing the year up 28%.

“We are thankful for the level of interest in SPNEC, even as a single pre-operating project. At the same time, we note the feedback that adding our already operating or contracted projects would make SPNEC even more attractive. We wish to take this opportunity to give our public shareholders this option, in the interest of advancing SPNEC’s value and profitability,” said Solar Philippines founder Leandro Leviste.

Manila Electric Company (Meralco) reduced power rates for January, as lower generation charges dragged down overall costs.

Power rates will go down by P0.0746 per kilowatt hour to P9.7027 per kWh. This is equivalent to a reduction of around P15 in the total bill of residential customers consuming 200 kWh.

Here is that story.

After recently exiting Chapter 11 bankruptcy, Philippine Airlines (PAL) is embarking on its recovery journey, still with the turbulence brought by the coronavirus pandemic.

There had been many hard pills to swallow for Lucio Tan’s crown jewel. It had to streamline its operations, reduce its fleet, scrap some routes, lay off workers, slash salaries, and restructure debt, all to survive the uncertainties.

Check out a clip of our Business Sense interview with PAL president and chief operating officer Gilbert Santa Maria here.