More office spaces to be built within transportation hubs

January 15, 2019 | 12:08 am [ bworldonline.com ]

 

MORE property firms are building office spaces within transportation hubs, as a way to maximize space.

Commercial real estate services company Cushman & Wakefield Philippines said office spaces are now being developed within or near transportation hubs in Metro Manila.

“Another new concept may be how they are building offices near or on top, actually, of transportation hubs that are being built, like for example we have for Ayala, and then we also have the one for Parañaque Integrated Terminal Exchange, so there would be an office component to that as well,” Francis Adrian H. Viernes, manager of research and consultancy of Cushman & Wakefield Philippines, said in an interview with BusinessWorld last month.

In recent years, developers have also allocated office spaces within shopping malls, giving people the convenience of working in a place where they can also shop, eat and relax.

“This has been an arrangement that we’ve seen in few years. There are office portions being added to retail developments, like for example the case for SM, for (Megaworld’s) Uptown, it’s the usual scenario… and it’s not likely to change in the next years,” Mr. Viernes said.

At the same time, Cushman & Wakefield expects demand for office space this year to be driven by business process outsourcing (BPO) companies.

“The information technology and business process management sector, or IT-BPM will continue to take a huge chunk of office demand in 2019,” Mr. Viernes said, after a slowdown in the sector in 2017.

“For 2018, (IT-BPM) has regained a bit of strength, and for 2019 we’re expecting that to continue because all the uncertainties that we had when it comes to like the fiscal incentives, because of the policies that were being laid out, all the uncertainties have not provided anything that could negatively affect the business, so far,” he added.

The Philippines remains one of the top destinations for outsourcing firms. In Tholon’s Top 100 Outsourcing Destination for 2018, Manila and Cebu ranked second and 11^th, respectively.

Aside from the Filipinos’ proficiency in English, outsourcing firms flock to the Philippines since office rental rates are significantly lower than Singapore or Hong Kong.

The government’s massive infrastructure program “Build, Build, Build” has also been a magnet for foreign investors.

“’Yung massive infrastructure spending, it’s actually making some global noise… Those are seen as positive and progressive by foreign investors,” Mr. Viernes said. — Vincent Mariel P. Galang

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PSE implements real-time broker ownership monitoring

January 14, 2019 | 12:01 am [ bworldonline.com ]

PHOTO BY SANTIAGO J. ARNAIZ

THE local bourse has implemented new measures that will keep it within the prescribed broker ownership limit, in line with the single industry rule under the Securities Regulation Code (SRC).

The Philippine Stock Exchange, Inc. (PSE) said in a statement over the weekend that it has included real-time broker ownership monitoring through the trading system. This automatically prevents trading participants from placing a buy order for PSE shares should their accounts exceed the 20% limit for broker industry ownership.

Item C of Section 33.2 of the SRC states that “no person may beneficially own or control, directly or indirectly, more than five percent (5%) of the voting rights of the Exchange and no industry or business group may beneficially own or control, directly or indirectly, more than twenty percent (20%) of the voting rights of the Exchange.”

“We intend to observe the prescribed broker ownership limit in PSE by putting in place safeguards that will help us with this goal,” PSE President and Chief Executive Officer Ramon S. Monzon was quoted as saying in a statement.

Other measures include the regular updating of brokerage firms’ Customer Account Information Form, to disclose the relationship of clients to other trading participants, such as the directors, officers, and principal stockholders.

The PSE will monitor the accounts of related persons of broker dealers, including their subsidiaries and affiliates, directors, officers, principal stockholders, and nominees to the PSE, as well as their spouses and relative up to the fourth civil degree of consanguinity.

The exchange has earlier proposed to amend the PSE Rules Governing Trading Rights and Trading Participants, asking trading participants to abide by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)’s Rules Governing Trading of PSE shares.

This entails penalties of up to P300,000, in addition to suspension of trading operations for at least five days for the third and subsequent offense.

“While we have identified the appropriate measures to ensure that broker ownership remains below 20 percent, we call on our trading participants to help and support us in ensuring that the legal requirements are strictly observed,” Mr. Monzon said.

The PSE initiated efforts to bring down broker ownership in 2017, when it was still working on getting the SEC’s approval for its proposed acquisition of the Philippine Dealing System Holdings Corp. (PDSHC).

The PSE-PDSHC merger, however, is not likely to push, through as the state-run Land Bank of the Philippines also intends to purchase the fixed-income exchange with the backing of the Department of Finance. — Arra B. Francia

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