BusinessMirror July 28, 2020

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SONA OUTLINES COVID RECOVERY MEASURES www.businessmirror.com.ph

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Tuesday, July 28, 2020 Vol. 15 No. 292

P25.00 nationwide | 2 sections 16 pages | 7 DAYS A WEEK

PRESIDENT Duterte delivers his State of the Nation Address (Sona) at the Batasang Pambansa Complex on Monday afternoon, in rites unprecedented for their strict health protocols owing to Covid-19. Only 50 people were allowed inside. ROBINSON NINAL JR./MALACAÑANG PRESIDENTIAL PHOTOGRAPHERS DIVISION VIA AP

PNP personnel are deployed on Commonwealth Avenue near the Batasang Pambansa Complex in Quezon City on Monday. NONOY LACZA

MEMBERS of cause-oriented groups stage a rally while wearing face masks at UP Diliman in Quezon City, before the Sona of President Duterte. BERNARD TESTA/NONOY LACZA

THE second regular session of the 18th Senate opens Monday morning, hours before the Sona of President Duterte, with 17 senators physically present and six virtually. SENATE PRIB

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By Samuel P. Medenilla

RESIDENT Duterte laid out during his fifth State of the Nation Address (Sona) on Monday the details of the government’s recovery plan for the novel coronavirus disease (Covid-19), including the passage of legislation for the economic stimulus package.

In his almost two-hour speech at the Batasang Pambansa, he called on lawmakers to finalize the Bayanihan II Act to finance the programs of government agencies which will help businesses, workers and marginalized members of society cope with the impact of the pandemic.

At the start of his speech, however, Duterte digressed from his prepared speech and took a swipe at Senate Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon for criticizing his statement on going after the local oligarchy, calling the lawmaker a “hypocrite”

in his alleged attempt to shield the Lopezes, key owners of the broadcast giant ABS-CBN, shuttered after the lapse of its franchise and the refusal of a House committee to grant its application for a new one.

The President also issued an ominous warning against some businesses, particularly telecommunications firms, which he threatened with confiscations unless they improve their services by December.

Related story at right, “Duterte warns of telco takeovers, hits Lopezes anew.”

Continued on A3

Small firms, hit by 80% sales dip, cashless soon

By Cai U. Ordinario

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MALL firms surveyed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Department of Finance (DOF) nationwide warned that they will run out of cash in the next few months after recording an 80-percent drop in sales during the lockdown period.

Based on the key findings from the enterprise survey conducted

by ADB and DOF, with a decline in April sales, a third of the firms who responded to the survey said they will run out of cash in 1 to 3 months, while nearly 20 percent said they would run out of cash in 3

to 6 months.

With this, the primary request of the firms to the government is wage support for them to continue paying their employees; deferment of their tax payments; low-interest or subsidized loans; and reduction in taxes.

“Enterprises are facing serious working capital constraints,” the report stated. “Additional finance in the form of loans and overdraft facilities should be a high priority for government assistance.”

The survey also found that more than half or 53 percent of firms could not arrange to borrow even P50,000 within one week

PESO EXCHANGE RATES n US 49.3500

and 57 percent said it was more difficult to borrow that amount now than in 2019.

With the lack of resources, around 49.3 percent of enterprises did not pay wages to employees temporarily after March 15, as the lockdowns began, while 28.9 percent reduced the total amount of wage payments.

The data showed that only 19.9 percent of the firms reported no change in payment conditions to employees.

The survey results showed that only 2 percent of enterprises reported an increase in total wage payments to employees after the

pandemic began. The ADB said this suggested special needs identified by specific industries.

The data also showed that nearly half or 41.4 percent cut their working hours and a third or 32 percent of firms surveyed said they reduced the salaries and benefits of their employees. Only 14.7 percent of the firms resorted to layoffs.

In April, the survey results showed 47.8 percent of small firms and 45.3 percent of large firms reducing working hours of regular employees.

The data also showed that 45.9 percent of small firms and See “Cashless,” A2

DUTERTE WARNS OF TELCO TAKEOVERS, HITS LOPEZES ANEW

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RESIDENT Duterte’s fifth State of the Nation Address (Sona) took an ominous turn twice when he lashed out anew at the “oligarchs” controlling vital industries, and gave telecom businesses a thinly veiled warning of a takeover if they cannot improve service.

“Improve your service or we will take it away from you,” he said as he called out the leading players Smart and Globe and imposed a “deadline” of “by December.”

This prompted an infrastructure-oriented think tank to conclude that “Duterte is leading the regulatory capture of the country’s major public firms,” after blasting the shuttered ABS-CBN and telco companies, all of which are listed.

“There is no more going around this: The President himself is leading the attack on regulated sectors on the flimsiest reasons.

This does not in anyway advance the public interest: it impinges economic growth, undermines confidence in the economy and violates the sanctity of contracts. Improving telco services without government support will not happen by December 2020,” asserted Terry Ridon, Infrawatch PH convenor and Duterte’s former urban poor chief.

Duterte had told both Smart Communications Inc. and Globe Telecom Inc. that should they fail to “improve” their services by December, he will ask Congress to step in to address the telco issues in the country.

Continued on A2

n JAPAN 0.4654 n UK 63.1483 n HK 6.3664 n CHINA 7.0329 n SINGAPORE 35.6859 n AUSTRALIA 35.0188 n EU 57.4730 n SAUDI ARABIA 13.1582

Source: BSP (July 27, 2020)

News BusinessMirror

A2 Tuesday, July 28, 2020

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Ban on unregistered online sale of ‘sin’ items gets DOH, FDA okay

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By Claudeth Mocon-Ciriaco

TRESSING that the State must exercise its duty to protect the health of the people especially of teenagers, the Department of Health and the Food and Drug Administration have backed the Department of Finance’s (DOF) proposal to ban unregistered online selling of sin products, such as alcohol, cigarettes, electronic cigarettes and other novel tobacco products.

This initiative, according to the DOH, is consistent with their effort toward a comprehensive prohibition on all forms of advertising, promotions and sponsorships by the alcohol and tobacco industries.

“The State must exercise its duty to protect the health of the

BIR tells Pagcor: 5% POGO franchise tax not a new rule Continued from A8

The BIR chief likewise pointed out that the legal opinion issued by the OSG on the issue “is not binding” because under “Section 4 of the NIRC [National Internal Revenue Code] as amended, the power to interpret provisions of the Tax Code and other tax laws shall be under the exclusive and original jurisdiction of the BIR Commissioner subject to review by the Secretary of Finance.”

In his comment to Pagcor’s memo, Dulay also corrected the erroneous claim that POGO operators are being assessed and are paying their corporate income taxes and value-added tax (VAT), DOF said.

He explained that POGO licensees or operators are not being assessed nor paying income tax and other taxes because the BIR’s RMC 102-2017 clearly states that in lieu of such taxes, they are only subject to the franchise tax.

“Only POGO service providers are subject to the regular taxes, such as income and VAT. However, both POGO operators and service providers whose employees earn compensation income need to withhold and remit the taxes due from them,” Dulay said.

Revenue rules provide that the foreign nationals compensation income shall be withheld 25 percent final withholding tax (WF), according to BIR.

“However, instead of remitting the 25 percent final withholding tax (WF), majority are only remitting the withholding tax on compensation (WC), which is based on lower rates depending on each employee’s total amount of income,” Dulay said.

Meanwhile, BIR also doubted Pagcor’s claim that Malaysia has opened its doors to offshore gaming licensees and is offering a 10-year tax moratorium on condition that 30 percent of the licensees’ total workforce are Malaysian citizens.

However, based on the BIR’s research, all forms of gambling— whether online or offline—are illegal in Malaysia, a predominantly Muslim country and bound by Shari’a law.

Sought by this paper for a copy of Pagcor’s memo to OP, Domingo said: “All correspondences to the President are confidential and may only be released by his office.”

Domingo also refused to give further details about their supposed memo to OP.

people, especially of teenagers who can potentially use online platforms to freely access these products and pick up the habit of smoking and/or alcohol drinking in the long term,” the DOH said in a statement. It added that consumer safeguards, such as seller regis-

tration, product quality and safety mechanisms to validate recipients of the products, are essential in preventing transactions to minors.

The agency also said expanding such regulatory purview to cover the online selling of these sin products is a progressive step in

protecting the health of Filipinos.

To protect the “vulnerable” age groups, the DOH and the FDA will collaborate with the DOF, Department of Trade and Industry, and other government agencies to develop a comprehensive regulatory framework to allow only legitimate

and registered sellers and place appropriate safeguards.

“The Philippines has come a long way in safeguarding the public from the dangers of tobacco and alcohol consumption through its taxation policies and stringent regulatory measures.

“With wider and easier access to sin products through technology, regulatory purview should be expanded to ensure that online selling is similarly covered,” the statement added.

It cannot be overstated that in this time of pandemic, “health should be of utmost priority,” it added.

Products that increase the risk of contracting and developing a more severe form of Covid-19 and its comorbidities should be avoided, if not totally eliminated, the health regulators said.

The DOH and the FDA further reminded the public that now is the time to quit; and for the youth to take a strong stand not to take up this habit.

Another doc dies–from bullets, not Covid-19

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SSASSINS shot dead on Monday the chief of the National Center for Mental Health (NCMH), drawing outrage from Sen. Richard J. Gordon, sworn enemy of ridingin-tandem crimes, who said the ambush-killing is the last thing the country needs when dozens of doctors have been felled by the Covid-19 pandemic.

“I strongly condemn the killing by riding-in-tandem assassins of NCMH chief Dr. Roland Cortez, who was also former medical director of the East Avenue Medical Center, and his

driver Ernesto dela Cruz,” Gordon said in a statement.

The Department of Health also denounced the murders of Cortez and Cruz.

Police said that gunmen onboard a motorcycle knocked on the parked car of Cortez along Tandang Sora Avenue before shooting. Cortez sustained multiple gunshot wounds.

The suspects fled toward Commonwealth Avenue.

“The DOH is coordinating with authorities and the PNPCIDU [Philippine National Police-Criminal Investigation and

Detective Unit] to ensure that the perpetrators are prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” the agency said.

The DOH also denounced all violent acts committed against health-care workers, “especially during this difficult time.”

For his part, Gordon said: “These heinous activities have been going on for so long and only a small number of these killings have so far been solved.

It is high time that we shed our apathy and put a stop to these killings with impunity by criminals using motorcycles as easy

getaway vehicles. Hence, I reiterate my call for the implementation of Republic Act 11235 or the Motorcycle Crime Prevention Act of 2019. These criminals should no longer be allowed to escape easily from their accountability.”

He noted that as the country is fighting a tough war against Covid-19, “killing doctors and other frontliners would weaken our army against the contagion.

Thus, I also call on the authorities to immediately solve this killing.”

Claudeth Mocon-Ciriaco

Small firms, hit by 80% sales dip, cashless soon Continued from A1

43.6 percent of large firms granted leaves, while 34.9 percent of small and 30.4 percent of large firms reduced salaries and benefits.

However, there were fewer small firms who laid off workers at 14.2 percent than larger firms at 17.7 percent.

Work from home

MEANWHILE, the survey also asked respondents regarding workfrom-home (WFH) arrangements.

Data showed WFH arrangements were not feasible for most enterprises.

Data showed that 57 percent of enterprises reported that it was not possible to adopt WFH for any workers. Less than 50 percent of workers could resort to WFH without major operational disruptions in 32.2 percent of the enterprises surveyed.

The survey showed that WFH was only feasible for 10.8 percent of the firms surveyed. They were the ones who reported that more than 50 percent of workers could WFH without major disruptions.

“After the ECQ began, many enterprises were forced to close their businesses, and WFH became an oft-used alternative approach to maintain business activity. However, the survey findings revealed that WFH was not necessarily feasible or ideal,” the report said.

By sector, the report showed that wholesale and retail trade had the greatest difficulty practicing WFH. Firms in wholesale and retail trade accounted for 22.4 percent of total enterprises that reported WFH was not possible for any workers, followed by those in accommodation and food services at 18.9 percent and other services at 15.1 percent.

Firms in information and communication accounted for 29.1 percent of enterprises that reported WFH was possible for more than 50 percent of employees, followed by those in wholesale and retail trade at 16.4 percent and professional services at 11.6 percent.

Duterte warns of telco takeovers, hits Lopezes anew Continued from A1

The President, who in the past had threatened to jail big businessmen for alleged regulatory lapses, said, “I call on our telecommunications companies to improve their services lest we will be forced to take drastic steps to address the lessthan-ideal services that the public is taking from you.”

Duterte added: “If it is just a question of added capitalization or the infusion of money, go look for it. Find a way because if you are not ready to improve, I might just as well close all of you and we revert back to the line telephone, and I will expropriate that for the government.”

The President said he is articulating the “anger” of the Filipino people, whom, he said, have been experiencing subpar telco services for years now.

“If that’s the case, give it to us, we are a republic sovereign country, bear that it in mind, because the patience of the Filipino is reaching its limit, and I will be the one to articulate the anger of the Filipino people, and you might not want what I intend to do with you.

Kindly improve the services before December, I want to call Jesus Christ in Bethlehem, better have that line cleared,” he said.

“I have two years, the next two years will be spent improving the telecommunications of this country without you. I will find a way. I will talk to Congress and find a way to do it,” he said.

Globe: We invested billions

SOUGHT for comment, Globe Spokesperson Yolanda C. Crisanto

PRESIDENT Duterte delivers his State of the Nation Address while Senate President Vicente Sotto III and House Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano applaud at the House of Representatives in Quezon City, July 27, 2020. SIMEON CELI JR./MALACAÑANG PRESIDENTIAL PHOTOGRAPHERS DIVISION VIA AP

said her group has been investing billions of dollars per year to develop its network. In fact, for 2020, she said Globe will be spending $1.2 billion in capital expenditures for capacity builds.

“These substantial investments are paying off as we experience marked service improvements. Today, the Globe network is running at 4G/LTE. Last year, we launched 5G for Globe At Home and soon we will be launching mobile 5G services in the country. Globally, we are being cited for having improved internet experience,” Crisanto said.

She cited, however, some “challenges” that telcos have been facing for many years now. These include red tape in securing permits from local government units, home owners associations, and national govern-

ment agencies, such as the Department of Health and the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines.

Crisanto explained that these “have hampered cellsite builds and laying down of fiber to homes.”

She noted, however, that the recent policy on common towers will be able to help fast-track the network builds of tower companies and telco operators, paving way to “a more robust connectivity in the country and provide internet services to every Filipino.”

Smart representatives were unresponsive to the BusinessMirror’s queries.

Red tape, not underinvestment

INFRAWATCH leader Ridon, who was a former House ICT member, said poor telco services are not due to underin-

vestment by telcos alone.

If Duterte were “serious about improving telco services, he should order national agencies and local governments to expedite the approval of at least 25 regulatory permits for the building of a single cell tower,” Ridon said, noting that these permits have stood as significant roadblocks in improving telco services around the country.

“The current backlog stands at 30,000 cell towers. Doing the math, it does not take a rocket scientist to understand that the target will not be reached by December 2020.”

Ridon said the President’s unrealistic pronouncement in the guise of public interest will only subject telcos to further regulatory vulnerabilities.

“All it takes is for one permit to get delayed for whatever reason in the world. By December, if 30,000 towers are not built, the predicate for franchise cancellation shall have been reached. And for what?

Similar to ABS-CBN, services will not have been improved. Worse, there will be no telco services.”

A week before its now rescheduled technical launch, third telco player Dito Telecommunity had said the company only has 300 operational cell sites out of the 1,300 sites currently being built, Ridon pointed out.

“Dito’s 1,000 new cell towers is certainly a tall order in a few months.

Imagine, Mr. President, you are now asking the telco sector to build a significant number of towers until December. You are setting the telco sector for failure. You are setting the telco sector for capture.”

Drilon: Not Lopezes, but workers

MEANWHILE, Duterte’s attack on oligarchs focused also on Senate Minority Leader Franklin M. Drilon, saying he resented the reference to his politician-children in the debate over whether the absence of an antidynasty law also abets oligarchy.

While the Palace had insisted that Duterte was hands off in the July 10 voting of the House franchises panel that denied ABS-CBN’s application for a franchise, Duterte dug up his old hurts against the Lopez-led network, saying he was its “victim” in the 2016 elections.

Sought for comment on Duterte’s open attacks on him for his alleged defense of the “oligarch Lopezes,” Drilon told the BusinessMirror: “I was defending freedom of the press, not the Lopezes. The closure of the ABS-CBN sent a chilling effect.

“As I said before, for democracy to thrive we need free press and to allow journalists to exercise complete freedom to do their mandate of reporting facts without fear.”

Drilon pointed out that, “in the face of a pandemic, we need more access to information. I aired my support for the renewal of franchise on ABS-CBN because undeniably the network complements other stations in providing timely and accurate reportage even in the farthest locality unreachable to others, even to the government.”

The senator said he was “defending the 11,000 people and their families who would lose jobs amid the pandemic, not the Lopezes.”

Lorenz S. Marasigan, Butch Fernandez

The Nation BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug • Tuesday, July 28, 2020 A3

12M more SAP beneficiaries await cash aid

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By Samuel P. Medenilla

@sam_medenilla

NLY around 5.1 million beneficiaries have received their cash aid under the second tranche of the social amelioration program (SAP) of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD).

In an interview over PTV on Monday, DSWD Undersecretary

Rene Paje said they have already released P32.05 billion for the

said beneficiaries.

Of the said beneficiaries, 1.3 million are beneficiaries of the Pantaw id Pami lyang Pi lipino Program (4Ps); 2.4 mil lion are low-income families, who are not 4Ps beneficiar ies; 1.2 million are among the wait-listed SA P beneficiar ies; and 37,000 are dr ivers of transpor t network vehicles ser v ices (TN VS) a n d p u b l i c - u t i l it y j e e p n e y s (PUJ).

Paje ad m it ted t he y a re st i l l l a g g i n g b e h i nd t he i r t a r ge t of prov id ing SA P benef its to 12 mi l lion benef iciar ies for t he second rou nd of t he

S A P d e s p it e t he i r a d o p t io n of c a sh less de l iver y sc heme, wh ic h w a s i n it i a l ly e x pec ted to s peed up t he d i st r ibut ion of c a sh a id .

However, he noted t hat on ly 4 . 3 m i l l ion people h ave reg i s tered i n t he i r R e l ief A gad ap pl ic at ion , wh ic h wou ld h ave f ac i l it ated t he c a sh less d i s t r ibut ion.

A nother cause for the del ayed d istr ibut ion, Paje sa id was the manua l pay outs they have to do in isolated areas and their limited mobilit y capabilit y during the communit y quarantine.

DSWD is targeting to complete the distribution of the second tranche of SAP before the end of the month.

Ongoing evaluation

IN a related development, Paje also reported that they have yet to get the liquidation report from all of the local government units (LGU), which helped in the distribution of the first tranche of SAP. “For now, 1,591 out of 1,634 LGUs have submitted their partial or complete liquidation reports,” Paje said.

He said they had already sent

Sona outlines Covid recovery measures

Covid response

DUTERTE’S recovery road map for Covid-19 will prioritize extending financial support to businesses, particularly pandemic-stricken micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME), through the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).

It will also cover the over 100,000 overseas Filipino workers (OFW) now back in the country after being displaced from their work abroad by Covid-19.

Duterte ordered relevant agencies to give the repatriates not only reskilling assistance, but also opportunities to start their own businesses.

Since addressing the pandemic will involve a strong healthcare system, Duterte said he will also push for the effective implementation of the Universal Healthcare Law, particularly in rural areas, with the deployment of additional government healthcare workers.

This is in preparation for delivering the vaccine for Covid-19 once it becomes available.

Duterte disclosed he is now in talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping for the country to be among those given first crack at purchasing the vaccine currently being developed in China.

Last, Duterte is also looking to prepare the country for future pandemics by urging Congress to pass the law creating the National Disease Prevention Authority.

Bayanihan II

DUTERTE urged lawmakers to fasttrack passage of Bayanihan II, “which will supplement funds for recovery and response against the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.”

This comes at a time that the government expects the economy to contract as much as 3.4 percent this year and the unemployment rate to rise to a staggering 17.7 percent in April.

Both leaders of Senate and the House of Representatives have said they will prioritize the passage of the stimulus packages as they opened the second regular session of the 18th Congress on Monday.

House Spea ker A lan Peter Cayetano recently said economic managers and House leaders had agreed that Bayanihan II will be the first priority, but they are still negotiating to increase the current P140 billion allocation to P200 billion.

Apart from this, Cayetano said they will still pursue separate stimulus measures such as the P1.3-trillion Accelerated Recovery and Investments Stimulus for the Economy (ARISE) and the P1.5trillion Covid-19 Unemployment Reduction Economic Stimulus (CURES) Act of 2020.

These stimulus bills being proposed by the House are way bigger than the version being proposed by the Senate at P140 billion.

Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez earlier said the House

stimulus bills are “fiscally unsustainable” and will lead to a significant rise in the country’s budget deficit.

Economic managers have set a deficit target of up to 9 percent this year.

In 2019, the country posted a fiscal deficit of P660.2 billion or 3.4 percent of GDP.

CREATE

ASIDE from Bayanihan II, Duterte also pushed for the passage of the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises Act (CREATE), dubbed by the DOF as the “largest fiscal stimulus program” for enterprises in the country’s history.

Finance Assistant Secretary and Spokesman Tony Lambino earlier said they are still hoping that all the remaining tax reform packages, including CREATE, will be passed by year-end to boost economic rebound.

CREATE, if passed, will trigger an immediate 5 -percentage point cut in the cor porate income ta x (CIT) rate from the current 30 percent—the highest in the region—to 25 percent this year fol lowed by a one-percentage point reduction starting 2023 until it reaches 20 percent by 2027.

With that, government will forgo at least P667 billion in revenues from the CIT reduction.

DOF said CREATE will also benefit non-large taxpayers with the extension of the applicability of the net operating loss carryover (Nolco) for losses incurred this year from the current three years to five years.

Lacks clarity

BUSINESS leaders on Monday said they back Duterte’s economic recovery plan as stated in his Sona, but admitted the Chief Executive lacked clarity in explaining the path forward after the pandemic.

Philippine Exporters Confederation Inc. President Sergio R. Ortiz-Luis Jr. told the BusinessMirror his group was waiting for Duterte to discuss how he plans to reopen the economy. He said exporters would have appreciated if the President opted to include the business sector in the government’s team crafting policies for the pandemic aftermath.

“We are satisfied with the President admitting the government really lacked foresight in addressing the virus, but his Sona did not mention the corrective measures that have to be put in place,” OrtizLuis said.

“For one, he should have instructed the economic managers to take the lead in the reopening of the economy. The problem with the government now is that its policies for the virus are solely crafted by health experts, the military and executive leaders,” he added.

For Ortiz-Luis, the Sona should have provided some clarity on how the economy should be in the postpandemic scenario given that millions have already lost their jobs

and businesses here and there are closing down shops.

George T. Barcelon, private sector representative at the Legislative Executive Development Advisory Council, told this newspaper he admired the President’s focus on the need for readiness and capacity for future disasters.

He agreed with the executive assessment that the country’s public health function is inadequate.

However, on the business side, Barcelon disclosed many business owners are waiting for the Chief Executive’s policy thrust on how to deal with declining capitalization.

“From the business sector, we were hoping that some numbers might even be discussed in the Sona to give us a picture of the economy and the needed recovery. One area we were hoping that would be taken up is the assistance for the unemployed, and at least to affected companies to get some for of wage subsidy,” Barcelon explained.

He said the government has to put on paper the President’s plea to landlords to extend another grace period for tenants on the payment of both residential and commercial rents.

“He reminded the bigger business establishments to give assistance to the smaller stakeholders on rents. I think he is not asking for total waiving, but just a sort of an extension with regard to the payment,” Barcelon said.

House ready

FOLLOWING Duterte’s appeal for passage of priority measures, the leadership of the House of Representatives on Monday vowed to finish these bills during this 18th Congress.

House Committee on Ways and Means Chairman Joey Sarte Salceda said the economic team is now working with the Executive’s economic managers for the passage of the economic stimulus to help industries amid the pandemic.

According to Salceda, the economic cluster will continue to work with other lawmakers as well as the Senate “to get these measures [Bayanihan II and CREATE] enacted as soon as possible, by this week if they agree.”

Also, Salceda backed the President’s for immediate passage of the Financial Institutions Strategic Transfer (FIST). The House has endorsed the proposed FIST to the Senate.

Coco levy

MEANWHILE, House Committee on Agriculture Chairman Mark Enverga said his panel is about to approve the substitute bill on Coco Levy Trust Fund, outlining the management and utilization of the levy assets as a trust fund for the benefit of the coco farmers and industry.

He commended the President for the inclusion of agricultural development on his development and governance agenda through

implementing programs for agriculture development.

“I am elated to hear about the P66-billion Agriculture Stimulus Package. Actually this package is contained in the approved [Accelerated Recovery and Investments Stimulus for the Economy or ARISE] that we vigorously defended in the plenary before its adjournment last month,” he said.

“The President deserves to be recognized for his thoughts that along his ‘Build, Build, Build ’ program, we must also focus on ‘Plant, Plant, Plant,’ in agriculture.

Indeed, with improved infrastructure, we have to ensure our agri growth through production and marketing,” he said.

Majority Leader Martin Romualdez said the House will face the challenges spelled out by the President. “In his Sona, the President made it very clear what his administration’s priorities are in the next few days, weeks and months. As I see it, his mission is threefold. First, to protect the Filipino nation from hunger and poverty caused by the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said.

“Second, to save precious human lives and minimize t he number of population infected by the coronavirus. And third, to ramp up budgetary measures needed to fully implement a responsive and sustainable recovery plan,” he added.

Economists weigh in

THE economic team may become hard-pressed to boost confidence in the economy after the Sona, according to local economists.

Foundation for Economic Freedom President Calixto V. Chikiamco described the President’s Sona as “underwhelming” and said it failed to offer a detailed plan on the pandemic.

Chikiamco noted no “bold and dynamic response” to the increase in Covid-19 cases as well as efforts to boost the country’s hospital capacity.

“Neither did he give out a bold plan to address the most severe economic recession in 35 years with millions of unemployed and a big percentage of MSMEs closing down. Furthermore, there was no vision for public transport, which affects mobility and therefore economic activity,” Chikiamco said.

De La Salle University economist Maria Ella C. Oplas told BusinessMirror that the Philippines would have a better chance of recovering from the pandemic if businesses were confident about government’s efforts.

Oplas said certain statements made by the President—apparently referring to his veiled threat to telcos and revival of issues against the shuttered ABS-CBN—would discourage businesses from investing in the country. She said recovering from the pandemic requires the help of the private sector.

These statements, she said, should not have been made given a demand for investments not only in the Philippines but also

continued from a1

in other countries suffering from the pandemic.

“Businesses should be our government’s ally in this trying time.

The President’s message can either encourage businesses to step up or to fly out,” Oplas said. “This is not an ordinary time where the President can just be hard on them because everyone is challenged right now.”

Chikiamco agreed and said Duterte’s statements against telecommunication firms and other utilities send a “chilling effect on investments.”

Instead, the President should have backed the amendment of the Public Service Act, which would improve competition in the telecommunications and transport sector, he said.

Chikiamco added: “He’s wrong to threaten a government takeover because government is incompetent to run businesses.”

University of the Philippines economist Toby Melissa Monsod agreed that the Sona did not help boost confidence in the economy.

She said the Sona was “not enough” to help the economy recovery from this crisis.

UnionBank Chief Economist Ruben Carlo O. Asuncion was expecting Duterte to give forward-looking statements, particularly in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

But he was still encouraged by Duterte’s pitch for fast-tracking passage of the CREATE bill which, Asuncion said, would help distressed small businesses and jobless OFWs. In his Sona, the President also said the Build, Build, Build Program will be an integral part of the country’s economic recovery. It will be a springboard to a swift recovery from the pandemic.

He said the government resumed the construction of the North Luzon Expressway Harbor Link, the Nlex-Slex Connector, the Cavite-Laguna Expressway, the Metro Manila Skyway Stage 3, the R-1 Bridge Project, the TarlacPangasinan-La Union Expressway Project, and the Subic Freeport Expressway Project.

The President said the government is also helping small businesses through the P1 billion Covid-19 Assistance to Restart Enterprises or CARES Program under the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

Extending loan deadline

some personnel to help w ith the LGUs, which still have no liquidation reports, to help in the encoding of the concerned beneficiaries.

“DSWD continues to do its best to speed up the distribution of the cash aid,” Paje said.

Base on their evaluation of the said reports, he said 300 local officials were charged for alleged irregularities in the SAP distribution.

DSW D was able to prov ide cash a id wor th P99.7 bi l lion to 17.6 mi l lion benef iciar ies during t he f irst t ra nc he of t heir SA P d ist r ibut ion.

DUTERTE had also urged banks to extend the deadline for loan payments amid the financial crisis during the coronavirus pandemic, but this call may not be answered by all financial institutions.

The President called on the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and banking institutions to extend the loan payment deadline without charging penalties and charges. This, as he enjoined them to provide regulatory relief for the micro, small and medium enterprises.

“We need your help to prevent the collapse of companies saddled with accumulated amor-

tizations and payables caused by the closure of their businesses at the height of the strict quarantine periods,” Duterte said.

However, RCBC Chief Economist Michael L. Ricafort explained that extension of debt moratorium is a “case-to-case basis,” given that many factors must be considered.

Among them are borrower’s credit fundamentals, credit track record, business/economic recovery prospects and other prudent measures, Ricafort cited.

UnionBank’s Asuncion agreed, saying that it is “up to the institutions if they choose to extend their payment deadlines.”

Still, Ricafort said that the financial system is robust enough to overcome the struggles brought about by the pandemic, noting that its capitalization is above regulatory standards. He said the sector has been preparing contingency plans and business continuity plans, as well as conducting stress test exercises, to prepare for different economic scenarios. “[W]hat I have seen in the past four years is that the BSP has been very focused in helping banks be prepared and be appropriately capitalized according to global standards especially after the 2008-2009 global financial crisis,” Asuncion said.

The grace period on loan payment was lifted in June as Metro Manila and other areas transitioned to general community quarantine. The government earlier passed a law mandating the moratorium on debt payment during enhanced community quarantine to lessen the burden of the public.

Agri road map

THE President also urged Congress to pass the Department of Agriculture's (DA) P66-billion stimulus package boosting local food production and helping farmers overcome the challenges brought by the pandemic.

Duterte said this stimulus package “will help the agriculture and fisheries sector to recover” from the detrimental impact of the ongoing health crisis, referring to the P66-billion proposed agricultural stimulus package, or the Plant Plant Plant program, “I think this [Plant, Plant, Plant] program is easier to achieve than the Build, Build, Build,” the Chief Executive said.

T he prop ose d P6 6 - bi l l ion stimulus package for the agriculture sector will include P31 billion for Alpas Kontra sa Covid-19, P20 billion for food logistic/food markets and other interventions and P15 billion for the cash for work program in the agriculture sector.

Economist Pablito M. Villegas said Duterte’s endorsement of the agricultural stimulus package is a “big step in the right direction because it will help the sector to rise up and for sure it will be boosted.”

With reports by Elijah Felice E. Rosales, Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas, Tyrone Jasper C. Piad, Jovee Marie N. Dela Cruz, Cai U. Ordinario and Bernadette D. Nicolas

A4 Tuesday, July 28, 2020 • Editor: Vittorio V. Vitug

Economy BusinessMirror

ESO seen leading PHL’s post-pandemic recovery

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By Elijah Felice E. Rosales

@alyasjah

HE government and the private sector are looking at construction as one sector that will lead the economy’s post-Covid recovery, as the country is emerges as a strong player in overseas projects and engineering service outsourcing (ESO).

In a recent webinar, Trade Undersecretary Abdulgani M. Macatoman said construction keeps on pumping the economy with revenue, notwithstanding a noted decrease in the number of players.

“As we all know, construction services sector is one of the major revenue generating sectors of the country whether in local or foreign business dealings,” Macatoman said.

“Despite a major decrease in the number of Philippine construction services exporters from over a hundred in the 1980s to 37 at present, the overseas construction industry still contributed its share to the economy: a total amount of $116.08 million,” he added.

Norman Macapagal, president of EEI Corp., said construction is set to rebound once the coronavirus pandemic is through.

As industry players await for the dust to settle, Macapagal recommended they should prepare to speed up their business transformation and explore opportunities to work on foreign projects.

“In our company, we have been talking about changing our procedures, because they are too long, with too many signatures involved,” he disclosed.

“When the pandemic came in and we were on lockdown, the procedures that we were discussing for over a year were suddenly simpli-

fied. We were forced to look at new construction techniques and methods because of the need to survive,” Macapagal added.

As for firms wanting to bid for projects abroad, Macapagal said they should focus on studying the fiscal and labor regimes of the foreign country, as well as its regulations.

On the other hand, Ernesto de Castro, president of Esca Inc., said he considers ESO as a high-value service that the Philippines can host in its business-process outsourcing (BPO) operations.

In 2016, ESO in the country contributed 1 percent of the total outsourcing revenue and 0.5 percent of the global accounts at $250 million.

“We are already number one in voice services, but the challenge is to move from voice to non-voice, in particular, to go into the high valueadded activities under KPO [knowledge process outsourcing] and link these services embedded to manufacturing, such as finance, design, and engineering,” de Castro explained.

To develop the industry, de Castro proposed training local engineers on building information modeling, which crafts intelligent models to be used in construction and is replacing CAD in many countries, such as in Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia.

Creative hubs vs remote work

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By Henry J. Schumacher

OUR months ago, managers and employees at many companies went home and did something incredible: They got their work done, seemingly without missing a beat. Executives were amazed at how well their workers performed remotely, even while juggling childcare and the distractions of home.

Twitter Inc. and Facebook Inc., among others, quickly said they would embrace remote work long term. Some companies even vowed to give up their physical office spaces entirely.

Now, as the work-from-home (WFH) experiment stretches on, some cracks are starting. Companies begin to think that remote work is not so great after all. Projects take longer, collaboration is harder, and training and integrating new employees is more complicated.

And I would like to share with you the negative side of remote work. There may be no richer creative hub story than this: It was 2004, Mark Zuckerberg’s summer of craziness. At 20, he and five buddies had rented a Palo Alto home, where they partied and wrote code for Facebook.

One day, as Zuckerberg and the guys were strolling the neighborhood, he saw a familiar face. It was Sean Parker, the cofounder of Napster, the music sharing service. By coincidence, Parker, at loose ends and contemplating his next move, was staying at his girlfriend’s parents’ house, just up the street from the Facebook pad. The very next week, the big-thinking, smooth-talking Parker moved in with Zuckerberg and began introducing him around Silicon Valley. By the end of the summer, he had paved the way to Facebook’s first big investment—$500,000 from Peter Thiel.

Thiel met 23-year-old Ukrainian immigrant named Max Levchin a few years earlier. After a bit of chatting, Thiel asked why the young man was in town. “Probably gonna start a company,” Levchin said. “Oh, great,” Thiel replied, and suggested the two meet up the next day and talk more over smoothies. And the consequence?

In 2002, eBay paid $1.5 billion for the resulting startup—PayPal, making the two men and several partners rich.

Over the subsequent years, PayPal vets including Thiel, Elon Musk, and Reid Hoffman went on to found YouTube, Tesla, SpaceX, LinkedIn, Yelp, and Palantir.

Perhaps no phenomenon is more studied, marveled, and desired in the world of high tech and science than the mystery of serendipity. My Oxford Dictionary explains serendipity as, “The faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident.”

But now Silicon Valley seems to be under a little-noticed threat. Amid Covid-19, the deep recession, and renewed antitrust pressure from Congress and regulators, the Valley faces a very different challenge—the disruption of its very essence, the serendipitous encounter. The culprit is a rush by many of the Valley’s leading companies to permanently lock in the coronavirus-led shift to remote work.

If engineers, designers, and venture capitalists are geographically disbanding, working via the cloud instead of walking Google’s halls, surfacing at Buck’s Restaurant, or the cafes on University Avenue, how will future serendipity happen?

If the founders, engineers, and designers in such startups are laboring entirely or largely from their own homes, and miss their moment, doesn’t Big Tech potentially lose its next big growth engine?

Entrepreneurs say that, at least currently, the answer is yes—the WFH mandate has probably put classic serendipity out of reach for Silicon Valley’s budding companies, and for companies in other tech centers/start-up villages.

No one knows exactly what such a new system might look like. If a demise of serendipity leads to Silicon Valley’s decline, the world is unlikely to get an equal substitute. We may simply lose our engine of technological advancement.

If the past is instructive, the pandemic will pass and many daily routines will return. Hordes of people will return to the office, but large numbers won’t. Some will pick up and move. At that point, today’s effort to digitalize serendipity will pick up more urgency. Videoconferencing and other software will get better, and some companies will claim their product fosters the unscripted moment in truly innovative ways, blind to demographics.

The message I am trying to get across with these examples is that in the Philippines we need to culture serendipity in our creative enclaves in Cebu, Makati, Pasig, Quezon City, Iloilo, Baguio, Cagayan de Oro, and a few more. We will have to find a smart balance between people working from home and people to “bump” into each other to discuss “crazy” ideas and developments. And we need to save the start-up ecosystem.

However, while we protect and preserve the opportunities for social interaction, being the key to group creativity and innovation, we wish to see government to find the right balance between public health and economic and social health.

Let me have your views on this; e-mail me at schumacher@ eitsc.com

www.businessmirror.com.ph

7,200 workers lose jobs last week as displacement climbs to 135,162

By Samuel P. Medenilla @sam_medenilla

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NOTHER batch of 7,200 workers lost their jobs last week amid the Covid-19 pandemic, according to the latest job displacement report of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE).

From July 20 to July 26, 2020, DOLE said the number of permanently displaced workers rose to 135,162 from 127,962 from the week prior.

Of the recently displaced workers, 122,588 were retrenched by 5,867 establishments, while the remaining 12,574 became jobless with the closure of 633 other establishments.

Broken dow n in ter ms of months, June still posted the highest number of displaced workers

with 50,589 and was followed by February with 30,712.

The preliminary displacement figures this month came in third with 30,444.

DOLE attributed the surge in the number of displacement this year to the business disruptions caused by Covid-19 in the last four months.

Latest trends

IN its latest displacement report, DOLE said the National Capital Region (NCR) still posted the highest number of displaced workers with 57,241 and was followed by Calabarzon (31,541) and Region 3 (16,477).

Such trend bore similarities from previous weeks.

The top industries, which have the most displacement, are also still the administrative and sup-

port service activities (32,578); other service activities (20,038); and manufacturing (18,423).

However, the updated displacement report showed a significant spike in displacement in the water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities industry.

The number of displaced workers in the said industry rose to 3,817 workers, from just 27 the week before.

In a related development, DOLE also reported over 3 million workers from 107,152 companies were affected with flexible work arrangements (FWA) and temporary closures (TC).

DOLE has yet to determine how many of the said workers have returned to work after the government relaxed quarantine restrictions last month.

Groups urge Duterte to prioritize RE policy reforms

By Lenie Lectura

@llectura

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LEAN energy advocates led by the Power for People Coalition (P4P) and the Withdraw from Coal (WFC) network wants the Duterte administration to prioritize reforms in the power sector, particularly on renewable energy (RE).

The groups said Monday that President Duterte highlighted the need to fast-track the development of RE sources and reduce dependence on coal during his 2019StateoftheNationAddress(SONA).

This task, they said, was entrusted to the Department of Energy (DOE).

Gerry Arances, convener of P4P, is hoping that the government would prioritize the RE sector.

“We welcomed the President’s pledge in 2019 in the hope that it would finally spark change in a power sector that, for so long, has been highly polluting and systematically anti-consumer.

It indeed was followed by advances in the implementation of the remaining mechanisms of the Renewable Energy Law, over a decade after it was enacted.

“But the 21 coal projects still in the pipeline are telling of the administration’s failure to really advance renewables and end reliance on coal and other fossil fuels,” said Arances.

The groups said the pandemic revealed deep-seated problems in a power sector characterized by privatization, competition, and deregulation as enabled by the Electric Power Industry Reform Act, for which government

interventions are already long overdue.

“This old normal, which harms our environment with the proliferation of coal and other fossil fuels and leaves our marginalized sectors at the mercy of private corporations, cannot continue.

Our government may have gotten away from responsibility before by simply backing promises for better energy with more pledges or excuses, but the time we are in is different. The gravity of the crisis as experienced by the poor and vulnerable must be reflected in the administration’s ways forward,” said Bishop Gerardo Alminaza, convener of WFC. The advocates called on the government to provide immediate relief packages for the people and work toward the betterment of the power sector.

“The millions of suffering electricity consumers would surely benefit from payment exemptions, suspension of taxes, and immediate return of refunds owed by companies...all of which are solutions that President Duterte and his Cabinet can and must advance.

“Existing power contracts detrimental to consumers, especially those of coal that pass on hidden costs to endusers while locking them to decades of unreliable electricity, also need to be stopped. With the decline of electricity demand, an audit of all power supply agreements, starting with Meralco’s, must also be done to protect consumers from price hikes due to stranded costs,” said Ian Rivera, national coordinator of the Philippine Movement

for Climate Justice (PMCJ).

WWF Philippines, meanwhile, said that advancing RE to replace the old normal, as urged by the President himself last year, is crucial to national recovery.

“Recovery plans must seek to rebuild the economy and strengthen its resilience to future crises. At the same time, they need to address the people’s pressing dilemmas of rising costs of living and widespread loss of jobs,” he added.

“Renewable energy, especially in the form of microgrids, and energy efficiency measures offer solutions to these. In urban centers, it could provide cheap electricity while creating more job opportunities than fossil fuel industries can ever offer. Because it can be designed to adapt to any terrain, microgrids can also power far-flung communities and address the decadesold problem of 100 percent electrification,” explained Atty. Gia Ibay, Climate Change and energy program head of WWF Philippines.

The clean energy advocates carried the said calls as they joined the many groups mobilizing under the “SONAgkaisa” banner on Monday.

“We do not have the time for the President to go back and forth with his directives, or for the government to ignore the many blemishes of the power sector that were made obvious by Covid-19. The immediate survival of our people and their quality of life in the long term are at stake. The government must plan and act with this in mind,” said Arances.

House Speaker vows support to govt Pasig Landers’ efforts to rebuild and retool industries temporary

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HE leader of the House of Representatives on Monday vowed to support government efforts to rebuild and retool industries affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

In his speech at the opening of the second regular session of the 18th Congress, Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano said the lower chamber will aim to strengthen agriculture, tourism, and manufacturing sectors by providing investments through infrastructure.

“Right now, our greatest and most difficult task is to keep Filipinos safe and healthy while getting back to work.

We need to rebuild and retool those industries that have been gutted by this pandemic,” Cayetano added.

“And in this endeavor, the government will be playing a significant role. I propose that we strengthen the agriculture, tourism, and manufacturing sectors, augmented by robust investments in infrastructure, to be the primary source of employment and growth,” he declared.

Cayetano earlier said Congress will pursue separate stimulus measures such as the Accelerated Recovery and Investments Stimulus for the Economy (ARISE) and the Covid-19 Unemployment Reduction Economic Stimulus (CURES) Act of 2020.

Cayetano said the ARISE measure has proposed P1.3 trillion to finance various programs that will provide assistance and wage subsidies to micro, small, and mediumsized enterprises and the tourism and transport sectors.

The CURES bill, meanwhile, proposes a total of P1.5 trillion to step up infrastructure development programs that will create more jobs in the rural areas affected by the pandemic. The program will be implemented for three years with a P500billion budget allocated for each year.

Moreover, the Speaker said House will also look into the provinces as the new centers of development.

Cayetano said development in the countryside will bring opportunities to returning overseas Filipino workers.

“Let us look to the provinces as the new centers of development.

Covid-19 has shown us the weak underbelly of our big cities. How easily they can be brought to their knees —and with it the whole nation—by disease and infection. We should never allow ourselves to be caught off guard again. This is a clarion call for our urban planners, engineers, and architects—the government needs your ideas,” he said. Jovee Marie N. Dela Cruz

suspension of ops lifted

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ANDERS Arcovia City in Barangay Ugong, Pasig City has been allowed to resume operations days earlier than the initially imposed seven-day suspension by the local government of Pasig City.

The suspension covered the supermarket operations only in respect to the social distancing policies imposed by the government.

In a letter dated July 24 addressed to the management of Landers Superstore, the Office of the City Administrator of Pasig acknowledged the action plan submitted by Landers to the city government.

The city government immediately acted to recognize the protocols and safety measures that are in accordance to its General and Work Guidelines which allowed the stores to open after only two days.

Landers has now further improved the store policies to ensure the safety of its members. The swift action was established through its careful consultation with stakeholders and health and safety experts, and now becomes a new standard in all of its retail branches.

Editor: Angel R. Calso

The World BusinessMirror

U.S. closes Chengdu consulate in China, after Houston order

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HENGDU, China—The US closed its consulate in the southwestern Chinese city of Chengdu on Monday, a victim of the rising tensions between the global powers.

China ordered the mission closed late last week in retaliation for a US order to shut down the Chinese Consulate in Houston earlier the same week.

The tit-for-tat closings marked a significant escalation in the multiple disputes between the two countries over a range of issues, including trade, technology, security and human rights.

A statement from the State Department said that the Chengdu consulate suspended operations at 10 a.m.

“The consulate has stood at the center of our relations with the people in Western China, including Tibet, for 35 years,” the statement said. “We are disappointed by the Chinese Communist Party’s decision and will strive to continue our outreach to the people in this important region through our other posts in China.”

The US has four other consulates in China and an embassy in Beijing.

The American flag was taken down at the Chengdu mission at 6:18 a.m., China’s state broadcaster CCTV said on its social media account.

Police closed off a two- to three-block area around the consulate, cutting off virtually any view of the property including the flag. A few vehicles were allowed through after police checks, and others could be seen moving in the distance.

Moving trucks arrived at the US consulate the previous day and left a few hours later.

Late Sunday night, flatbed trailers entered the complex. One later emerged carrying a large shipping container and a crane.

Before the area was closed, the impending

closure of the consulate drew a steady stream of onlookers over the weekend as Chengdu, like Houston, found itself in the limelight of international politics.

People stopped to take selfies and photos, jamming a sidewalk busy with shoppers and families with strollers on a sunny day in the city of Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province. A little boy posed with a small Chinese flag before plainclothes police shooed him away as foreign media cameras zoomed in.

Police had shut the street and sidewalk in front of the consulate and set up metal barriers along the sidewalk on the other side of the tree-lined road.

Uniformed and plainclothes officers kept watch on both sides of the barriers after scattered incidents following the Chengdu announcement on Friday, including a man who set off firecrackers and hecklers who cursed at foreign media shooting video and photos of the scene.

A man who tried to unfurl a large placard late Sunday that he called an open letter to the Chinese government was quickly taken away.

Earlier, a bus left the consulate grounds and what appeared to be embassy staff spoke with plainclothes police before retreating back behind the property’s solid black gates. It wasn’t clear who or what was on the bus.

Three medium-size trucks arrived and left a few hours later, and cars with diplomatic plates departed in between.

The US alleged that the Houston consulate was a nest of Chinese spies who tried to steal data from facilities in Texas, including the Texas A&M medical system and the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. China said the allegations were “malicious slander.” AP

Vietnam sees illegal entry risk amid 1st local cases since April

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ietnamese authorities are warning of new novel coronavirus risks from illegal entries into the country as the nation reported its first local cases over the weekend after more than three months of no new community infections.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said the country has let its guard down against the novel coronavirus after authorities reported four Vietnamese citizens—from a 17-year-old male to a 71-year-old woman—in the country’s central coast region had contracted the virus. Phuc said Vietnamese have become negligent and are failing to properly implement anti-virus recommendations from the government after the country successfully controlled the outbreak, according to a statement posted on the government’s web site.

The prime minister also ordered authorities to tighten border and immigration controls to prevent foreigners from illegally entering the country, according to a government statement on Saturday.

Many people have crossed into Vietnam illegally recently, posing a risk of spreading the virus, VnExpress news web site reported on Sunday, citing Do Xuan Tuyen, deputy health minister. Police in the coastal city of Danang have arrested four people in recent days—two Chinese and two Vietnamese—on charges of organizing the illegal entry into the country of Chinese nationals, according to a statement on the government’s web site.

Police in Quang Ninh province, north-east of Hanoi, recently began legal proceedings against six people on charges of bringing Chinese into the country illegally, Thanh Nien newspaper reported on Saturday. More than 300 people have been arrested for entering the country illegally in the past two months, according to the newspaper, which cited the province’s border defense force.

The first reported new patient on Saturday, a 57-year-old man, had been in Danang City for about a month and hadn’t traveled to other

provinces, the government said in a statement. He had no communication with strangers, and was mostly in contact with family members and neighbors. He sought treatment at a hospital on July 20 for fever and cough.

On Sunday, officials said a 61-year-old man also tested positive, without saying how he got the virus or if he had been in contact with the first case. The man had also been in Danang for about a month and hadn’t traveled to other provinces, according to the health ministry. He went for treatment at a hospital on July 18.

Authorities on Sunday also reported a 71-year-old female, who had been in Ho Chi Minh City from the end of June until July 8, experienced a fever and chest pains July 12 and traveled around Danang before eventually testing positive for the virus. And a 17-year-old male tested positive after traveling on a bus back to Quang Ngai province from Danang on July 17 with passengers who had been at the hospital where the first new patient was initially treated.

Danang’s authorities locked down the hospitals where the two victims visited and ordered their patients, medical staff, caregivers and family members—about 7,000 people in total—to be quarantined for 14 days, local media reported.

Authorities in Danang also requested people to adhere to socialdistancing measures and not gather in public spaces where there are more than 30 people, apart from workplaces, schools and hospitals.

There will also be a temporary suspension of festivals, religious ceremonies and operations of beauty spas, bars, massage parlors and dancing halls.

Danang will also stop tourists from entering the city for 14 days starting Sunday, according to the city’s authorities.

Vietnam had 420 Covid-19 infections and no deaths as of Monday morning. The case confirmed on Saturday was the first local transmission since April 16. Bloomberg News

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

A5

Global second waves emerge; new cases in China, Spain jump

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ealth officials across the globe are grappling with second waves of the coronavirus pandemic, with outbreaks from China to Spain serving as reminders of the difficulty in permanently stamping out the pathogen.

China reported the most domestic cases since it brought an initial outbreak in Wuhan under control, amid flareups in the north and northeast. Australia’s Victoria state confirmed a record 532 new infections, Vietnam saw its first cases in more than three months, and North Korea locked down a city after it found a person who may be infected.

In Europe, Spain is scrambling to stay ahead of new outbreaks that prompted the U.K. to impose quarantine on travelers returning from the country. Cases and fatalities fell in many US states hit hard by the coronavirus, including Florida, Arizona, California and Texas -- though reported numbers are often incomplete on weekends.

Key developments:

China local cases jump

China reported 61 new coronavirus cases, with local infections jumping by 57, the most since it brought an initial outbreak that emerged in Wuhan under control in mid-March.

The far west province of Xinjiang, which last week suspended buses and subways in its capital city Urumqi, reported 41 local coronavirus cases.

The coastal city of Dalian in northeast China is also seeing a jump in infections. The port city

is taking a targeted approach similar to what Beijing employed to tame the outbreak. It has escalated the risk levels of infected neighborhoods to high and medium and barred residents there from leaving the city. Dalian has also launched mass testing to track down infections, and is tracking seafood products processed by the Dalian Kaiyang World Seafood Co., where the first infection was reported.

Australia’s 532 new cases

ing to health officials.

The Latin American nation said in 20 out of 32 states alone, fatalities from Covid-19 and other causes increased by 71,315 to a total of 202,077 from March 15 to June 27. That compares with the 130,763 earlier expected, according to a report by the health ministry on Saturday.

A total of 43,374 have died in Mexico from coronavirus, the fourth-highest number of fatalities globally. The total number of cases has risen to 385,036.

Brazil’s virus numbers drop

Brazil, which has the world’s worst virus outbreak after the US, registered 24,578 new cases and 555 deaths, the Health ministry said. That’s half of the 51,147 cases and 1,211 deaths reported the previous day.

Total cases are now 2.4 million, with 87,004 deaths as the infection curve continues to show an increasing overall trend. Most cities are relaxing social isolation measures and reopening for business after the economy plunged in the beginning of the second quarter.

Australia’s Victoria state recorded 532 new Covid-19 cases as authorities struggle to bring a second wave of infections under control.

The daily tally announced on Monday follows the 459 new cases reported the previous day in Victoria, and is a new national record.

There were six additional fatalities, State Premier Daniel Andrews said at a press conference.

Authorities are battling to contain a fresh wave of infections after about 5 million people in Melbourne were plunged back into lockdown more than two weeks ago.

The UK will pause reporting on coronavirus deaths while it reviews how they are counted.

Last week, the government said deaths in England were attributed to coronavirus if the deceased had the disease at any time. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland would only record deaths as virus-related if the patient had a positive test within the preceding 28 days.

The U.K. has reported the most Covid-19 deaths in Europe. The toll rose to 45,752 on Sunday.

Mexico is raising its estimate for the death toll for about two-thirds of the country by 55% between mid-March and late June, accord-

Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike said not many coronavirus cases were confirmed on Monday due to fewer tests, according to remarks

Mexico raises death toll estimate

UK to pause death toll count

Tokyo cases down

Police and demonstrators clash in violent weekend across the U.S.

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TLANTA—Protests took a violent turn in several US cities over the weekend with demonstrators squaring off against federal agents outside a courthouse in Portland, Oregon, forcing police in Seattle to retreat into a station house and setting fire to vehicles in California and Virginia.

A protest against police violence in Austin, Texas, turned deadly when police said a protester was shot and killed by a person who drove through a crowd of marchers. And someone was shot and wounded in Aurora, Colorado, after a car drove through a protest there, authorities said.

The unrest on Saturday and early Sunday stemmed from the weeks of protests over racial injustice and the police treatment of people of color that flared up after the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Floyd, who was Black and handcuffed, died after a white police officer used his knee to pin down Floyd’s neck for nearly eight minutes while Floyd begged for air.

In Seattle, police officers retreated into a precinct station early Sunday, hours after large demonstrations in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. Some demonstrators lingered after officers filed into the department’s East Precinct around 1 a.m., but most cleared out a short time later, according to video posted online.

At a late-night news conference, Seattle police Chief Carmen Best called for peace. Rocks, bottles, fireworks and mortars were fired at police during the weekend unrest, and police said they arrested at least 45 people for assaults on officers, obstruction and failure to disperse. Twenty-one officers were hurt, with most of their injuries considered minor, police said.

In Portland, thousands of people gathered Saturday evening for another night of protests over George Floyd’s killing and the presence of federal agents recently sent to the city by President Donald Trump. Protesters breached a fence surrounding the city’s federal courthouse building where the agents have been stationed.

Police declared the situation to be a riot and at around 1:20 a.m., they began ordering people to leave the area surrounding the courthouse or risk arrest, saying on Twitter that the violence had created “a grave risk” to

streamed by broadcaster NHK. The government plans to convene a virus panel meeting this week to analyze the epidemic and draft responses. Tokyo found 239 new cases on Sunday, marking the sixth straight day in which the number topped 200.

The government plans to ask businesses to have 70% of their work force adopt telecommuting as the coronavirus epidemic widens, Japanese Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura said at a news conference Sunday, Jiji reported.

Morocco locks down cities

Moroccan authorities imposed lockdowns on the country’s biggest cities, including Casablanca, Fez, Tangier and Marrakesh, to counter a “considerable increase” in Covid-19 cases across the country, according to the Health Ministry. Exemptions apply, including for deliveries of essential supplies and urgent medical care.

Iraq to impose 10-day curfew

Iraq plans to impose a 10-day curfew from the end of this month in an effort to prevent the spread of the coronavirus during the Islamic Eid holidays. The curfew will start on July 30 and the government will review the situation at the end of the holidays. Iraq has been reporting coronavirus cases of over 2,000 a day and the country’s total number of infections is above 100,000 so far.

Iran on red alert

Iran reported 216 fatalities and 2,333 new cases of coronavirus in the past 24 hours, raising the death toll to 15,700 from 291,172 known cases.

The level of infection is “red” over most of Iran, as one in five deaths in the country is linked to Covid-19, Deputy Health Minister Iraj Harirchi said on state TV. Bloomberg News

‘SCMP’ to put up paywall amid Hong Kong slump

S

Federal officers launch tear gas at a group of demonstrators during a Black Lives Matter protest at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse on Sunday, July 26, 2020, in Portland, Oregon. AP/Marcio Jose Sanchez the public. About 20 minutes later, federal officers and local police could be seen attempting to clear the area and deploying tear gas, however protesters remained past 2:30 a.m., forming lines across intersections and holding makeshift shields as police patrolled and closed blocks abutting the area. Multiple arrests were made, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many.

In theTexas capital of Austin, 28-year-old Garrett Foster was shot and killed Saturday night by a person who had driven through the march against police violence.

Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said a car turned onto the block where protesters stood and honked its horn. The driver and several witnesses told police that Foster approached the driver and pointed an assault rifle at them.

In video streamed live on Facebook, a car can be heard honking before several shots ring out and protesters start screaming and scattering for cover.

Police could then be seen tending to someone lying in the street.

Manley said the driver called 911 to report the incident and was later taken into custody and released.

Police didn’t immediately identify the driver.

Sheila Foster, Garrett’s mother, said she was told her son was pushing his fiancée, who uses a wheelchair, through an intersection when the suspect was driving

“erratically” through the crowd. She said she was told the driver shot her son three times.

In the Denver suburb of Aurora, Colorado, meanwhile, a protester shot and wounded someone after a car drove through a crowd marching on an interstate highway, police said. The wounded person was taken to a hospital in stable condition. Police didn’t release many details about the shooting, including whether the person who was shot had been in the car.

Police said on Twitter that demonstrators also caused “major damage” to a courthouse.

Protesters in Oakland, California, set fire to a courthouse, damaged a police station, broke windows, spray-painted graffiti, shot fireworks and pointed lasers at officers after a peaceful demonstration Saturday evening turned to unrest, police said.

In Virginia’s capital, Richmond, a dump truck was torched as several hundred protesters and police faced off late Saturday during a demonstration of support for the protesters in Portland. Police declared it to be an “unlawful assembly” at around 11 p.m. and used what appeared to be tear gas to disperse the group. Five people were arrested in the incident and charged with unlawful assembly. A sixth person was also arrested and charged with rioting and assault on a law enforcement officer. AP

outh China Morning Post is dropping its free online model after months of political unrest and the coronavirus pandemic hit advertising revenue at the Hong Kong newspaper backed by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. Starting next month, the financial hub’s largest English-language newspaper will ask its readers to pay for content online, limiting free articles to a few per month, Editor-in-Chief Tammy Tam said Monday on the newspaper’s web site.

Hong Kong’s media industry has been reeling from the Covid-19 pandemic and months of political protests against Beijing’s tightening grip over the city. In April, with much of the city’s retail and tourism industries grinding to a halt, the South China Morning Post cut executive salaries and asked some workers to take unpaid leave.

“Comprehensive reporting is costly and the century-old advertising model is no longer enough to sustain high-quality news,” Tam said in the message on Monday.

The newspaper had 50 million active users on its online platforms as of March and about 347,000 print readers as of the fourth quarter, according to its website. In January 2019, Joseph Tsai, vice chairman at tech giant Alibaba, said at a business conference that the South China Morning Post need not worry about profit and loss for five years.

The newspaper’s revenue plunged by half in the first quarter, Chief Executive Officer Gary Liu said in an interview last month. The paper began offering free news online after Alibaba agreed to buy the 117-year-old paper in 2015 from Malaysian billionaire Robert Kuok for HK$2.06 billion ($266 million).

Newspapers in Hong Kong are also having to adapt to a new national security law that democracy activists say will strengthen Beijing’s role in suppressing dissent. Bloomberg News

A6 Tuesday, July 28, 2020 • Editor: Angel R. Calso

Opinion BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

editorial

WFH

M

ore than a few companies have continued to let their staff work-from-home (WFH) even after quarantine measures have been relaxed in Metro Manila and other areas. Some businesses are even thinking of adopting this arrangement for good or at least for some time, a commendable policy as the number of Covid-19 cases continues to surge in the country.

Ayala Corp. Chief Executive Officer Jaime Zobel de Ayala told congressmen during a virtual hearing of the House of Representatives Committee on Economic Affairs last week that some 35 percent to 38 percent of the Ayala Group’s work force are now on WFH arrangements.

“I think we’re going to have to shift and take health issues into account and particularly, if a vaccine is not found in the near future, we will have to take people’s health much more formally into account,” Zobel said. “We’re gonna think it through. Definitely, I can say that there will be a shift in the way we work, and working from home will become far more acceptable and much more of the norm than in the past.”

“One can say that the shift is there. We should accept it, we should embrace it, and all of us in the sectors that can provide services particularly on technology to make life easier for everyone should really ramp up our investments in those areas and be able to give the Filipino consumer and employer the tools that they need to be able to do that,” he said.

A law institutionalizing work-from-home arrangements in the private sector was enacted back in December 2018, officially known as the Telecommuting Act or Republic Act 11165.

The law says WFH employees should have compensable work hours and workloads, a minimum number of work hours, overtime pay and night shift differential, rest days and holidays, leave entitlements and career development opportunities similar to those who work in offices or in the traditional setup.

The Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry recently asked the government to allow the full operations of firms nationwide. While easing restrictions on businesses will help rev up our nation’s economic engine, a top priority of employers should always be the health and safety of their employees, as well as their customers, partners and the communities where they operate.

As we slowly reopen the economy, and workers who are not able to do their jobs remotely are asked to return to work, it is also important to stress that employers are required to make sure that workplaces are safe and they should do everything to help their workers feel safe coming back to work.

Senate President Vicente Sotto III last week filed a bill seeking to protect employers from being sued by workers who would contract Covid-19 while on duty. This measure, however, even if enacted, does not excuse them from implementing the safety protocols that are mandated by the government to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in workplaces.

The safety of workers cannot be overemphasized enough since it is entirely possible that many workers have already contracted the virus while doing their duties and many have also died.

Last week, we wrote an editorial about our nurses and health-care personnel who have contracted Covid-19, comprising about 14 percent of the total cases in the country, which is fast approaching 85,000. In a nutshell, we said that without adequate and appropriate PPEs for frontline health-care workers, they will get sick.

Even in Sotto’s home turf in the Senate, at least 20 cases of Covid-19 infection have already been recorded among Senate employees, and three have died—four if you include the unreported death of the staff of a senator who is currently in hot water for breaching quarantine protocols. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives last week confirmed the third Covid-19 death among its 18 infected employees.

The government and private employers should exert a lot more effort to protect their workers. They need stronger policies targeting zero infections and deaths in workplaces. If they cannot ensure the safety of their workers then they should at least explore and embrace flexible workplace arrangements in their day-to-day operations, allowing as many of their employees as possible to work from home to prevent the virus from spreading at workplaces.

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THE Entrepreneur

M

etro Manila as one big region remains the “epicenter” of Covid-19 cases because of its dense population. A thorough examination of the cases, however, shows that only a small fraction of the National Capital Region is infected.

I do not see enough reasons why businesses can’t fully reopen in Metro Manila and in the industrial and commercial region of Calabarzon.

Covid-19 cases in the capital region, Calabarzon (Cavite, Laguna, Batangas, Rizal and Quezon provinces) and elsewhere, especially in Cebu province, are not that widespread as newspaper headlines suggest.

As it is, only a few places posted infections that local government units can effectively control. I do not see the logic in shutting down or putting back the whole of Metro Manila, or one province, under more restrictive quarantine rules when only a few cases are concentrated in few barangays. We should not lump the cities and towns of Metro Manila or one region and declare them as hot spots of Covid-19.

We will not be able to fully re-open the economy and restore the jobs of workers if we generally classify

Metro Manila or one city as a virus epicenter. I personally believe that we can reopen the economy and slow down the virus spread at the same time by focusing the lockdown on a few isolated areas.

In Quezon City, for instance, which is by far registering the highest Covid-19 cases among the urban centers, local authorities can segregate those few barangays that are lately reporting a spike in infections and put them on a lockdown. The rest of Quezon City can function more normally if those infected areas are clustered or segregated from the entire city. The same can be done in Cebu province where the hot spots are limited to a few barangays.

I believe monitoring specific areas is more effective than shutting down the entire district or city as the solution to the prevention of the pandemic. We should also start differentiating those areas with

relatively high Covid-19 cases against those with low prevalence.

In this regard, the national government can perhaps challenge our mayors and governors to contain the spread of the virus. Fostering competition among the local officials in limiting the spread or flattening the virus curve will be a wise approach.

Local officials, mayors and governors should be more aware of their achievements and targets in battling the disease. I believe no mayor or governor wants himself to be perceived by his constituents, or by President Duterte himself, as a laggard in the fight against Covid-19.

Both the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Federation of Philippine Industries, meanwhile, are backing the call of the Department of Finance to ease the quarantine measures in Metro Manila and other major urban centers to speed up the reopening of the economy after a long lockdown period.

I agree with the business groups.

I support their call for the lifting of restrictions in Metro Manila, Calabarzon and other urban centers “with the precaution that those factories and barangays with Covid-19 cases be dealt with more strictly.”

Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III earlier said that while the people’s health and safety remained the government’s top priority, Filipinos cannot be retreating forever from the virus at the cost of their livelihoods, especially in Metro

Manila and Calabarzon, which account for 67 percent of the gross domestic product.

Nearly five months of lockdown, as the PCCI correctly noted, has restricted business operations and put more companies at greater danger of permanent closures.

Business closures will not help the government’s cause in battling the disease. They will translate into lower tax collections and put the sustainability of public finances and the ability to fund public services, including health and education, at risk.

We should follow the footsteps of other countries in reopening the economy and keeping the virus in check at the same time. The rest of Europe and Asian nations like China, Vietnam, Thailand, South Korea and Taiwan have reopened their economies while implementing basic health protocols, like social distancing, frequent washing of hands and wearing of face masks.

The Philippines should continue widespread testing and contact tracing to curtail virus transmission. We can stop the virus and fully reopen the economy at the same time. We don’t want the ranks of the unemployed to increase. We can’t win the fight against Covid-19 if we keep retreating from it and shutting down businesses.

For comments, e-mail mbv.secretariat@gmail. com or visit www.mannyvillar.com.ph.

The global economic recovery is still dead

Jennifer A. Ng Vittorio V. Vitug Lorenzo M. Lomibao Jr., Gerard S. Ramos Lyn B. Resurreccion, Dennis D. Estopace Angel R. Calso

Chairman of the Board & Ombudsman President VP-Finance VP Advertising Sales Advertising Sales Manager Group Circulation Manager

Manny B. Villar

Lourdes M. Fernandez

Senior Editors

Creative Director Chief Photographer

We can fully reopen by clustering infected areas

John Mangun

OUTSIDE THE BOX

I

N the good old days—even before the “Taal Eruption of 2020” —the virus was simply known as “2019-nCoV.” Fortunately, the World Health Organization was right on top of the situation.

On January 5, 2020, World Health Organization released a “Disease outbreak news” bulletin with the title Pneumonia of unknown cause—China.

“On December 31, 2019, the WHO China Country Office was informed of cases of pneumonia of unknown cause detected in Wuhan City, China. As of January 3, 2020, a total of 44 patients have been reported to WHO by the national authorities in China.” There was obviously nothing to worry about.

“The causal agent has not yet been identified or confirmed. Based on the preliminary information from the Chinese investigation team, there is no evidence of significant humanto-human transmission.” There were

only “44 cases reported” and the Chinese government said, “one hundred and twenty-one close contacts have been identified and are under medical observation.”

Of course that is exactly the time when governments should have known better and immediately acted, according to all the 2020 graduates of the “Social Media University of Epidemiology.” Actually, governments did react.

Bloomberg News reported on January 4: “A mysterious pneumonia outbreak that’s sickened dozens of people in China has prompted airports in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan to introduce fever screening.”

CNN Philippines, January 7: “The

Department of Health has instructed the Bureau of Quarantine to intensify surveillance amid a mysterious virus that has infected dozens of people in China.”

However, more should have been done. But as ABS-CBN.com reported on January 11: “The virus in question does not transmit readily between people,” WHO noted. For this reason, the Philippine Department of Health is not that worried. “There is no cause for immediate concern at this time. From the information that we’re receiving, it’s not something that can be easily transmitted from one person to another.”

Lesson learned. Do not listen to WHO if their source of information is the Chinese government. Lesson not learned from the 2002-2003 SARS epidemic: do not trust Chinese authorities to be truthful in situations of disease outbreaks.

By February 2, the “first confirmed nCoV death outside China is in the Philippines.” By the end of that week, the Philippines and Spain had two cases each and Italy and the UK had three each. On February 11, WHO announced “Covid-19” as the name of this new disease. Three weeks later, Italy had over 1,000

cases. As we move into August—the Ghost Month—and 16 million cases and 650,000 deaths later, the global economy is a smoldering dung heap.

According to some, China will lead the global economic recovery.

Maybe so. Last month the Chinese invested more in real estate—condos and apartments—than in any other month on record. Good thing there has never been a real estate bubble before—except for 2011 when prices fell 40 percent from the high.

In spite of US spending more than $6 trillion on the coronavirus crisis, another 1.4 million Americans filed new claims for unemployment benefits last week with 52 million claims for unemployment benefits over the past 18 weeks. Currently, 24 percent of small businesses in the US are still closed, worse than June with 19 percent.

The European Union just borrowed one trillion dollars. Where is the economic recovery going to come from?

E-mail me at mangun@gmail.com. Visit my web site at www.mangunonmarkets.com. Follow me on Twitter @mangunonmarkets. PSE stock-market information and technical analysis tools provided by the COL Financial Group Inc.

Opinion BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Tuesday, July 28, 2020 A7

Applicability of ‘payment The First Lady of the world under protest’ rule Manny F. Dooc

TELLTALES

Atty. Rodel C. Unciano

Tax Law for Business

T

he requirement of payment under protest has become almost always an issue in protesting local tax assessments.

This requirement is laid down under Section 252 of the Local Government Code (LGC) of 1991. It provides that no protest shall be entertained unless the taxpayer first pays the tax, where the words “paid under protest” shall be annotated on the tax receipts. The protest in writing must be filed within 30 days from payment of the tax.

Apparently, the provision on payment of tax under protest as provided in Section 252 of the LGC applies only to cases involving Real Property Tax (RPT) assessments. There is no similar provision in the LGC as regards protesting of local business tax assessments. Thus, the rule on payment under protest should not apply on local business tax assessments. However, some local tax ordinances impose the same requirement on protesting local business tax assessments. Thus, the controversy has arisen as to whether prior payment under protest is a mandatory requirement in protesting local business tax assessments.

In resolving the applicability of the requirement of payment under protest on local business tax assessments, a survey of decisions would show that even the courts are not in unison. In one case involving assessments made by the City Treasurer of Davao City, whose tax ordinance contains a provision requiring the payment of assessment under protest as a requirement for filing a protest, the Court of Tax Appeals agreed that the assessment has to be paid under protest, since until the provision in the ordinance is declared void, the city treasurer has to follow it. In another case, though, involving the applicability of the same provision, the CTA has said that the payment under protest is not required since the local government code under which the local tax ordinance is based does not require it. That requirement is only for real property tax assessments but not for local business taxes.

As to the applicability of the requirement of payment under protest in protesting RPT assessments, it has been ruled that the provision applies only when the issue involved is purely factual in nature such as when the issues are the reasonableness and correctness of the assessments.

However, when the issue involved is a pure question of law, the requirement of payment under protest does not apply.

If the issue involved is factual, the taxpayer must pay the RPT assessed under protest. If the protest is denied or not acted upon within 60 days from filing of the protest, the taxpayer may file an appeal with the Local Board of Assessment Appeals, which has 120 days from date of receipt of the appeal to render a decision. On the other hand, if the issue is a pure question of law, the requirement of payment under protest does not apply and the taxpayer may appeal directly to the regular courts (CTA EB 1930). When the issue is both factual and legal in nature, it

is the LBAA, not the regular courts, which has jurisdiction over the case (CTA AC 202). Hence, payment under protest is likewise a requirement in protesting the assessment.

In a recent case (CTA AC 202), the taxpayer was assessed for RPT. In defense against the assessments, the taxpayer argued that it is a government instrumentality exempt from paying RPT under Presidential Decree No. 4, as amended. The taxpayer did not pay the tax under protest. The CTA ruled that the taxpayer’s claim for exemption from payment of RPT is factual being in the nature of questioning the reasonableness or correctness of the assessment. Thus, it should have first complied with the requirement of payment under protest under the rules on exhaustion of administrative remedies. In another case (CTA EB 1392), the taxpayer likewise questioned the correctness of the assessment claiming as defense exemption from real property tax allegedly provided under its franchise. The taxpayer did not likewise pay the tax under protest. The CTA dismissed the case due to the taxpayer’s failure to first pay under protest the questioned assessment.

In GR 117577, the taxpayer questioned the authority and power of the assessor in imposing the assessment and of the treasurer in collecting the tax. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that the issues are not questions merely of amounts of the increase in the tax but attacks on the very validity of the increase. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that payment under protest is not necessary since the issues involved are not factual.

Thus, in protesting RPT assessments and in determining the necessity of paying the assessment under protest, it is significant to evaluate what issue is being questioned. When the issues are factual, payment under protest is a requirement. However, when a pure question of law is involved, payment under protest is not necessary and the taxpayer may appeal directly to the regular courts.

The author is a partner of Du-Baladad and Associates Law Offices (BDB Law), a member-firm of WTS Global.

The article is for general information only and is not intended, nor should be construed as a substitute for tax, legal or financial advice on any specific matter. Applicability of this article to any actual or particular tax or legal issue should be supported therefore by a professional study or advice. If you have any comments or questions concerning the article, you may e-mail the author at rodel.unciano@ bdblaw.com.ph or call 8403-2001 local 140.

B

efore Princess Diana, there was Jackie Bouvier Kennedy, the People’s Princess. She would be celebrating her 91st birthday anniversary today if she’s still alive. She was born on July 28, 1929 in Long Island, New York. Her parents were John “Black Jack” Bouvier III and Janet Lee Bouvier. Her parents divorced and she was raised by her mother and her stepfather, Hugh Auchincloss, a rich lawyer and stockbroker. Jackie was a precocious child and she loved horses. Before she attended kindergarten, she was a regular competitor in horse shows where she won many prizes.

When she was about four years old, while strolling in Central Park, she was separated from her younger sister Lee and their nanny. A police officer found her aimlessly walking around. She told the police officer: “My nurse and my baby sister seem to be lost.” She met the debonair, dashing and most eligible bachelor in town, Congressman John F. Kennedy, at a mutual friend’s house in Georgetown, Washington. JFK was then contesting the Senate seat of Senator Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts and his romance with Jackie took a back seat. After his victory, the relationship took a more serious turn although JFK was also in a relationship with the famous actress Audrey Hepburn. Jackie on the other hand had just broken her engagement with John Husted, a tall and handsome investment banker who graduated from Yale.

The crème de la crème of US politics and society were in full force dur-

ing their wedding at the St. Mary’s Church in New Port, Rhode Islands.

At age 31, she was the First Lady of the most powerful nation in the world being married to the 35th President of the United States, JFK, who was the youngest ever elected president of the US. JFK was 12 years Jackie’s senior and a certified womanizer.

Even her own father, John “Black Jack” Bouvier III, an acknowledged man of this world, had warned her about the immutable law of nature “that men are congenitally prone to infidelity.” Referring to their marriage, Jackie once said: “We are like two icebergs—the public life above water, the private life is submerged.

It is a bond between us.”

Before her death at age 64, she was a successful book editor of Doubleday Publishing and was immensely wealthy. She had been the wife of the most powerful president, and later the pampered spouse of Aristotle Onassis, one of the world’s richest

Bloomberg Opinion

W

hen the European Union first suggested a tax on financial transactions a decade ago, the idea was savaged by banking lobbyists and nixed by many of the bloc’s members. The UK said it was “madness.” The initial ambition to raise up to €35 billion ($40.6 billion) a year was reduced to a mere €3.5 billion, with only 10 countries agreeing to take part. As of

last year, the project was barely alive.

But the pressure of how to pay for the Covid-19 pandemic has resurrected the scheme, and the absence of the Brexiting Brits has helped. As the EU’s 27 members move forward with a €750-billion recovery fund to prop up those nations worst affected by the virus, they’ve given their blessing “in principle” to new EU-wide tax powers to beef up Brussels’s finances.

A levy on financial transactions—as well as ones on digital services, carbon and plastic be considered.

her marriage to Aristotle Onassis, they attended an Orthodox church since there was no Roman Catholic Church nearby. In his book, “Farewell, Jackie,” author Edward Klein wrote: “She did not live life without a deep belief in God. She believes in a providential plan.”

In January 1994, Jackie started her chemotherapy treatment for lymphoma. Her condition quickly deteriorated and she got sicker and sicker by the day. On the evening of May 19, 1994, shortly before Jackie went into a coma and died, her brother-in-law, Senator Ted Kennedy, knelt by her bedside and told the semi-conscious Jackie: “I know there have been times you’ve been disappointed in me…,” Jackie held up her hand and stopped Ted saying: “Ted, you always did your best to hold this family together, and I’ve always respected you for that. What I want you to do is to enjoy the rest of your life with your wife, Victoria.”

Ted, choked with emotion, hugged her lovingly and left in tears. That’s Jackie—always an epitome of empathy and class even on her deathbed.

Their union was the most celebrated marriage on the planet.

Everyone followed their every move and hardly any day passed without their goings-on, public or private, reported in the media. And as the writer Christopher Andersen, author of the book “Jack and Jackie: Portrait of an American Marriage,” had exclaimed: “(B)y the time it ended with gunshots in Dallas, John Fitzgerald Kennedy and his wife, Jacqueline, were indisputably the First Couple of the World.” And long after her husband’s death, she remained the First Lady in their hearts.

The gig economy compromised our immune system

By David Fickling | Bloomberg Opinion

T

here’s nothing arbitrary about an epidemic.

While each disease is the product of a chain of accidental genetic shifts, the process that turns a novel infection into a devastating outbreak is as much social as biological. The vast majority of new conditions will die out before they spread beyond a handful of people. Only rarely will one exploit the fault lines of our social order to rampage through the entire human population.

“Epidemic diseases are not random events that afflict societies capriciously and without warning.

On the contrary, every society produces its own specific vulnerabilities,” medical historian Frank M. Snowden wrote in his recent book, “Epidemics and Society.” As a result, studying disease is a way of understanding “society’s structure, its standard of living and its political priorities,” he wrote.

AIDS found a fertile environment to spread thanks to the homophobia and puritanism of 1980s America, and in medical conspiracy theories that later swept parts of Africa. Cholera in the 19th century seized on cities whose populations had boomed without building the basic sanitation needed to provide safe drinking water. Smallpox from the 16th to the 19th centuries laid waste to Indigenous populations in the New World, giving colonial powers the chance to take control of vast tracts of land with only limited warfare.

W hat does the devastation wrought by Covid-19 tell us about the underlying pathologies of our own culture and time? It’s hard to es-

cape one common factor in multiple outbreaks. Again and again, clusters of infection have been associated with those whose work is low-paid, insecure and contingent.

In a database of major spreading events compiled by researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, nearly 80 percent of infections can be traced to food processing plants, ships, aged care homes, bars, restaurants, shops, and worker dormitories. All of those are places notoriously associated with low pay and poor job security. Office workers are almost absent from the records, except for 148 cases associated with a business conference.

The same pattern has shown up in country after country. In the US, many of the largest outbreaks were associated with meatpacking plants, which gained infamy for poor working conditions more than a century ago. Singapore’s early success in suppressing the virus was undermined by huge outbreaks in the dormitories where foreign workers are housed out of sight.

In the UK, the multiplying outbreaks in care homes have been

The European Union’s Tobin tax is being resurrected

By Lionel Laurent

men. She had a steady, faithful and rich companion in Maurice Tempelsman, a successful diamond trader, during the final years of her life. And most of all, she had the love and devotion of two accomplished children, John and Caroline, and three adorable grandchildren, Rose, Tatiana and Jack. And fate was kind to Jackie for sparing her the deepest sorrow of having her only son and rightful heir to the Kennedy’s political legacy figured in a tragedy, which claimed his life five years after her demise.

Incidentally, there was a plan then to field John, Jr. to run as governor of New York, which prompted then incumbent Republican Governor George Pataki to quip that he could handle all potential oppositions except Kennedy Jr.’s challenge. It could have been John’s platform for the presidency.

Jackie was her own woman. She was a successful photojournalist and sought after by countless suitors.

She was a very active first lady who pursued the development of arts and culture in the country. During her husband’s term, Congress approved substantial funding for the arts and culture. Her dream was to make Washington not only the government center but also the cultural and arts capital of the US like London and Paris. She invited poets and other artists to perform in the White House. Norman Mailer gave her the supreme compliment when he said that Jackie is not merely a celebrity, but a legend; not a legend but a myth—no more than a myth: she is now a historic archetype, virtually a demiurge.

She was a deeply religious person. When she and her young kids settled in Skorpios, Greece after

This is a statement of intent from France and Germany, the EU’s dominant powers and backers of the financial levy, on reshaping Europe after Brexit. Tax policy is very much the preserve of national governments, and is jealously guarded as a result.

Back in 2013, the UK was so rattled by the idea of a financial transactions tax—where a fraction of a percent is levied on bank trades—it tried to sue to stop it.

Still, we’re a long way from a truly pan-European “Robin Hood”

or Tobin tax. Brussels can’t snap its fingers and raise money from 27 countries without their unanimous approval, and so far the current coalition of the willing appears limited to those original 10 supporters. While some holdouts object specifically to very notion of transaction taxes—Swedes still remember the self-harm of their own version in the 1980s—there’s deeper resistance from the likes of Luxembourg, Ireland and the Netherlands against any assault on their

linked to temporary staff on zerohours contracts being transferred between facilities. In Australia, a failure of initial suppression efforts was similarly linked to private security guards at quarantine hotels.

Some told Australian Broadcasting Corp. television last week they were recruited via WhatsApp, given no training, and told to bring their own facemasks.

The effects of that show up in the differential risk from coronavirus. In the US, Black people are more than twice as likely to die from coronavirus relative to White and Asian people. They’re also significantly overrepresented in the sorts of workingclass service sector jobs associated with infection clusters.

In England, residents of Newham—a low-income area in east London—died at rates seven times higher than those in Guildford, an affluent part of the semi-rural commuter belt on the other side of the city, according to a government study in May. Remarkably, considering what a large share of previous coronavirus infections from SARS and MERS happened in healthcare settings, hospital workers have been relatively spared in the Covid-19 pandemic, with evidence suggesting that front-line workers are being infected at even lower rates than medics less directly exposed. That shows that tedious but straightforward precautions are enough to significantly reduce the risk of infection.

The question is whether, as a

society, we think it worthwhile to take such steps when those at risk are not medical professionals, but low-paid gig economy workers. In the US, employees who have asked to stay home rather than return to face infection have been fired, and in some states kicked off unemployment benefits. Depressingly, it seems too many would rather risk hundreds of thousands of deaths by reopening businesses and forcing staff back into work, instead of borrowing the funds needed to keep them at home, even temporarily, on a livable income.

With nearly $15 trillion of debt now trading at negative yields, governments in wealthy countries can borrow for next to nothing.

Rather than looking for ways to push workers back into harm’s way and turn them into fresh sources of infection, we should be doing all we can to give them the same protection that we grant the legions of white-collar employees who have been working from home for months. Looked at from the perspective of more than 600,000 dead and 15 million infected, our reluctance to countenance such steps looks like a form of madness.

Diseases are often most deadly when they can seize on a pre-existing condition to overwhelm the body’s natural defenses. The situation is little different when it comes to the body politic. Society’s refusal to grant the underpaid and under-employed the same protection it affords the better off is the co-morbidity that’s killing us.

low-tax economic models.

Even the vanguards of countries leading the charge are pushing a levy that looks more symbolic than severe. The latest proposed incarnation resembles a stamp duty, charging about 0.2 percent for buying shares issued by listed companies with a market capitalization of 1 billion euros and above.

Any lobbying push against this tax might get a sympathetic hearing, given that France and Germany are at the same time softening finan-

cial regulation under the MiFID II scheme to encourage trading and investment.

With a probable low take-up among EU members and not much revenue to expect, there might be better approaches. One is to redesign the tax along more environmentally friendly lines. Exemptions from the levy could be given to those investing in green assets, says Dirk Schoenmaker, Professor of Banking and Finance at Erasmus University.

A8 Tuesday, July 28, 2020

RCBC: ₧16.6B bond offer to boost growth

By Tyrone Jasper C. Piad

R

@Tyronepiad

IZAL Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC) said that its recent bond offering, which it listed with the Philippine Dealing and Exchange Corp.

(PDEx) on Monday, can further support its growth.

The Yuchengco-led bank raised P16.6 billion from offering fixed-rate series B bonds, carrying a coupon rate of 3.25 percent per annum.

“This puts us in a much stronger position to accelerate the growth of the bank and boost our financial services for wider availability,” RCBC Senior Executive Vice President Horacio E. Cebrero III was quoted as saying in a statement the bank released on Monday.

Despite the announcement, RCBC’s shares slid by 4.07 percent, or 68 centavos, to finish at P16.02 apiece amid the 2.37-percent decrease for the main index on Monday.

RCBC concluded the offer period on July 15 after its order book was met with robust demand, recording five times more than its minimum issue size of P3 billion.

Proceeds of the transactions are allocated for asset growth, refinancing of maturing liabilities and other general purposes.

The offering is the fifth tranche to be issued out from the bank’s P100-billion bond and commercial paper program.

Since RCBC launched last year its bond program, which is aimed at diversifying its funding base, the company has already raised over P54.17 billion.

The listed bank said that it was a “record amount for the bank; demonstrating investors’ confidence in the various initiatives RCBC has taken to fuel its growth and support the fixed income capital market.”

The sole lead arranger of the transaction was ING Bank N.V., Manila branch while RCBC Capital Corp. is serving as the financial advisor. Both are selling agents.

BIR tells Pagcor: 5% POGO franchise tax not a new rule

T

By Bernadette D. Nicolas

@BNicolasBM

HE Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) has insisted it is not changing the rules in the middle of the game as it debunked the claim of the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. that the 5-percent franchise tax on foreign-based Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGOs) was not previously imposed.

Citing a copy of the BIR’s comment to the memorandum sent by Pagcor to the Office of the President, the Department of Finance (DOF) said in a statement on Monday that BIR upheld its position that foreign-based POGOs should be paying the

5-percent franchise tax, as clearly stated in a memorandum circular issued by the agency back in 2017.

BIR Commissioner Caesar Dulay said the imposition of the 5-percent franchise tax on POGO licensees is “not a new imposition nor is it being imposed retroactively,” noting that the bureau’s basis is Revenue Memorandum

Circular (RMC) No. 102-2017 dated December 27, 2017, on the “Taxation of Taxpayers Engaged in Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations.”

In his comment to the memorandum sent by the Pagcor to OP regarding the franchise tax imposed on POGOs, Dulay said, “From the beginning, our Bureau has maintained the position that the said tax applies to all POGO Licensees and Operators and there was no change of rules midstream.”

A copy of the BIR’s comment was furnished to Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III. The Finance department said Pagcor pointed out in its memo that the 5-percent franchise tax was not previously imposed by the BIR, citing as basis an opinion issued by the Office of the Solicitor General (OSG) last December 19, 2018.

But Dulay said he already sent a letter to OSG on April 26 last year, reiterating the BIR’s stand and basis for the applicability of the 5-percent franchise tax to offshorebased licenses and operators.

Copies of the letter were also sent to Dominguez and Pagcor Chairman Andrea Domingo.

Continued on A2

Oil firms set new round of price hikes

A

NOTHER round of oil price hikes takes effect this week.

Oil companies said Monday that gasoline prices will go up by P0.30 per liter, kerosene by P0.30 per liter and diesel by P0.25 per liter. The price adjustment will be implemented at 6 a.m. of July 28.

Among the oil firms that announced the price hike are Petron Corp., Pilipinas Shell, Total Philippines, Phoenix Petroleum, PTT Philippines, Seaoil Philippines and Cleanfuel.

Oil firms adjust their pump prices every week to reflect movements in the world oil market.

Oil refiners, meanwhile, are required to keep a 30-day Minimum Inventory Requirement (MIR) of combined crude oil and finished products. Bulk oil importers, meanwhile, are required to maintain an MIR of 15 days supply of finished products.

In December 2019, the country’s inventory of crude oil and petroleum products stood at 51 days, equivalent to 24,263 thousand barrels (MB) or 3,857 million liters.

The inventory consisted of 45 days of in-country stocks and six days of crude oil and petroleum products still in-transit.

As a result of the community quarantines, the inventory level as of July 13 this year grew higher as compared with the December 31, 2019, level due to reduced oil demand from the slowdown in economic activity. The July 2020 inventory consists of 61.9 days worth of crude oil and petroleum products, equivalent to 2,762 million liters (54.4 days onshore in-country stocks, and 7.5 days of crude oil and petroleum products still in transit). Lenie Lectura

AN airport employee reminds passengers to practice social distancing on Monday morning at Naia’s Terminal 1. Over 150 Chinese nationals in full PPE gear line up at the check-in counter on a flight bound for Nanjing, China. Last week, there was also a special flight that left the country with 200 passengers. NONIE REYES

Dar looks to Duterte to support DA’s 2021 budget hike to ₧300B

By Jasper Emmanuel Y. Arcalas @jearcalas

T

HE Department of Agriculture (DA) is banking on President Duterte’s support to increase its budget for next year to nearly P300 billion to ensure that the country has sufficient food supply amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Asked during the Laging Handa briefing what he wanted to hear from the President during his fifth State of the Nation Address (Sona), Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar had a quick reply: higher budgetary support for the department’s banner programs.

“We want to have sufficient stock of food so we can overcome this pandemic.

We all know that the President supports agriculture and our direction for the sector, which is to increase food sufficiency level. So, we hope for higher budget support,” Dar said on Monday morning, a few hours ahead of the Sona.

Dar said they have refocused “our ongoing banner programs...toward ensuring higher levels of food sufficiency and this is our major priority area in pushing for the reboot of Philippine agriculture for 2021.” The DA is proposing a P284.84billion budget for 2021 to “sustain, reboot and grow” the country’s agriculture and fisheries sector. The P284.4 billion is P204.5 billion, or 255.9 percent, higher than its 2020 outlay of P79.9 billion.

Dar said bulk of their proposed fund will boost the sufficiency level of various agriculture commodities and at the same time sustain efforts to expand and improve food markets and food logistics in the country.

For example, the DA said the country’s rice sufficiency level this year is projected to rise to 93 percent from 86 percent due to the additional P8.5-billion fund it received for its rice resiliency project.

“If our current strategy continues with additional budget and use of modern

technology, we will surely be able to hike our food sufficiency level,” he said.

“We will also see to it that there is support for our food markets and food logistics so that even during times of pandemic our farmers have sufficient markets to sell their produce,” he added.

Dar said they hope their 2021 proposed budget would be approved, as the agriculture sector has been deprived of the necessary financial support it needs to grow and sustain the country’s food demand.

“All this time we believe agriculture has not been given the wherewithal in terms of increasing budgetary support. Under the leadership of President Duterte, we believe he will support the increase in budgetary support for our farmers and fishermen,” he said.

“This is the right time to give them the right budgetary support in order for us to realize our plans of having food markets in every major area and Metro cities nationwide,” he added.

Companies BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

SEC revokes accreditation of R and L accounting firm

T

By VG Cabuag

@villygc

he Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has penalized and disqualified accounting firm KL Siy and Associates (KLSA) from securing accreditation as external auditor for gross negligence over a scheme that resulted in the collapse of brokerage firm R and L Investments Inc.

In an order issued on July 21, the Office of the General Accountant barred KLSA, along with its managing partner Kathleen Mary L. Siy and partner Arturo D. Sabino, from acting as external auditor of entities regulated by the SEC. The SEC also revoked Siy’s accreditation, which would have remained effective until September 6, with the expiration of KLSA’s conditional accreditation.

The SEC had accredited KLSA under Group A, allowing the firm to

serve as external auditor of issuers of registered securities, public companies, clearing agencies, exchanges and other self-regulatory organizations, among others.

Siy, the signing partner for the audited financial statements of R and L Investments, had secured a Group B accreditation that allowed her to audit entities such as investment houses, brokers and dealers of securities, government securities eligible dealers, and investment company advisers.

Sabino, meanwhile, served as KLSA’s internal quality audit reviewer for 2018, had been accredited under Group A. Aside from their disqualification, KLSA was ordered to pay P314,570 as penalty for material disclosure deficiencies and misstatements, as well as for violation of independence rules.

The OGA issued the order after finding that KLSA failed to comply with the auditing standards and other rules adopted by the SEC under the Securities Regulation Code, resulting in gross negligence in the audit of R and L Investments’ financial statements for the year 2018.

“The failure to flag the misappropriation of securities through the conduct of appropriate audit procedures contributed to the continuation of the illegal acts which resulted to the massive loss of securities in the total amount of P606,641,351 as of December 31, 2018, belonging to numerous number of investors,” the SEC said.

“The misappropriation of the said securities under the custody of R and L Investments did not only cause damage to the concerned investors, but also created a negative impact on

investors’ confidence to the Philippine stock market.”

In its 2018 audited financial statements, R and L Investments booked client securities worth P738.89 million, but the business partner portfolio report provided by the Philippine Depositary and Trust Corp. showed the broker's client portfolio only amounted to P132.25 million.

The valuation of securities shown in R and L Investments’ 2018 statement of financial position and the related disclosures were incorrect and constituted a material disclosure deficiency, according to the OGA. “KLSA’s responsibility is confined to the expression of an opinion on the fairness of the financial statements,” the SEC said. “KLSA’s inability to exhibit impartiality hindered the early detection or prevention of fraud which has caused substantial losses to investors.”

R and L Investments ceased operations last year due to the multimillion peso theft, allegedly stolen by a longtime clerk, the company's settlement officer Marlon Moron by transferring of shares to Venture Securities Inc. using the account name Julieto Sulapas.

Globe tweaks content strategy G

lobe Telecom Inc. said on Monday it is pursuing a content creation strategy to cater to the growing demand for more digital content amid the pandemic.

Nikko Acosta, the company’s SVP for Content, said his group is working to create “better and more relevant content that would suit the different needs of customers,” who are forced to stay at home due to the global health situation.

“The purpose of Globe is really to treat other people right and that has been our consistent foundation ever since. That led us to under-

Mitsubishi Motors sees bigger loss

M

itsubishi Motors Corp. predicted a bigger full-year loss than analysts estimated and unveiled a fresh restructuring plan, as the coronavirus pandemic hinders its efforts to get back on track.

The carmaker’s operating loss for the year ending March 2021 will be 140 billion yen ($1.3 billion), it said in a statement Monday. Analysts predicted a loss of 54.7 billion yen, according to the average of estimates compiled by Bloomberg. The carmaker said it will close a plant in Japan assembling Pajero SUVs in a bid to reduce costs.

Mitsubishi and alliance partners Nissan Motor Co. and Renault SA are struggling to revive demand after the virus outbreak shut factories and showrooms. The automakers were already hit with the shock arrest of former leader Carlos Ghosn in late 2018, and are now forced to reduce costs to support earnings just as a shift into electrification and self-driving cars requires increased investment.

“The impact is more serious this time than during the financial crisis” a dozen years ago, Mitsubishi Chief Executive Officer Takao Kato said on a call with reporters.

Shares of Mitsubishi fell 3.2 percent in Tokyo.

The stock has lost 41 percent this year.

The new recovery plan includes a reduction in fixed expenses of more than 20 percent and a fresh focus on Southeast Asia. The company will slash indirect labor costs by 15 percent through buyouts and salary revisions. It won’t pay a dividend this quarter.

The Pajero factory to be shuttered also makes Delica D:5 vans and Outlander SUVs. It produced about 63,000 vehicles last year, making up approximately 10 percent of Mitsubishi’s domestic output, according to Nikkei. Bloomberg News

stand that to deliver great content regardless of whether it is video, music, games, or eCommerce, it has to be based on what the consumers want and appreciate,” he said.

“In today’s reality, more activities are coming from the home so online streaming becomes an integration point between work and life, in more ways today than before.”

Acosta explained that Globe is “using a two-pronged approach” in providing content to its subscribers: partnership and original content creation.

“The situation today with the global pandemic showed the importance of content creation in terms of addressing the more specific needs of the families and individuals that may not be available outside of our local portfolio.

That is why content creation is coming in more in terms of video and music,” he said.

Globe, Acosta said, will continue to bring more original content to Filipino consumers to help the cope with the effects of the pandemic, when content consumption drastically increased.

“We need to find new ways to create compelling content that engages with the audiences.

We are affirming that content creation is an area that we want to pursue strategically, moving forward.” Lorenz S. Marasigan

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

B1

AllHome to help Vista Residences unit owners maximize condo space

From www.vistaresidences.com.ph.

T

he Villar Group’s AllHome Corp. on Monday said it has collaborated with Vista Residences, the condominium arm of property developer Vista Land and Lifescapes Inc., to give condo unit owners free consultation services on improving their homes.

“We are thrilled to collaborate with Vista Residences to give insights on interior design for condo living.

We see Investment Lab as a valuable source of information as well as a good opportunity for us to share our expertise in enhancing condo living spaces and elevating condo interior style,” Mary Lee S. Sadiasa, AllHome COO, said.

AllHome will provide exclusive services to Vista Residences unit owners, including free interior styling consultation, it said. The Villar retailer said it has a team of professional interior designers that will help unit owners design their units.

This design consultation with AllHome does more than create living spaces, as it allows homeowners and investors to plan these spaces with purpose and in effect, fully utilize the entire condominium space, the company said. The service is free and

available to all participants of Investment Lab, especially individual homeowners, it said.

“We would like to help existing and potential condo unit owners to know more about the latest interior design trends and teach them on how to efficiently design their condo spaces with our wide selection of products to choose from,” Sadiasa said.

The said collaboration between the two Villar companies will also be seen throughout Vista Residences’ Future Ready campaign—a complete look at the future of real estate with the intent of guiding its customers’s investment post-pandemic, encouraging a future-ready mindset through a series of mini-campaigns and brand initiatives that curate thought leadership, partnerships, knowledge-sharing and exclusive deals.

AllHome said its income in the first quarter rose 30 percent to P270.2 million, from last year's P207.1 million, mainly as a result of its expansion.

Revenues for the period rose 41 percent to P3.4 billion, from P2.4 billion in the same period in 2019, the company said. VG Cabuag

B2

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Companies BusinessMirror

Meralco expects core profit to decline due to pandemic

By Lenie Lectura

T

@llectura

he Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) is expecting core profit for the full year to drop 10 to 12 percent from the P23.8 billion posted in 2019, following a 14-percent decline in company’s first half earnings and 43-percent decline in reported net income. “While it is difficult to give a firm indication of 2020 performance, based on our outlook for the rest of the year, we expect our full year 2020 CCNI [consolidated core net income] to be in the area of P21 billion,” said Meralco Chairman Manuel V. Pangilinan in a statement Monday.

During a virtual press conference on the company’s first half financial performance, Pangilinan said Meralco’s earnings for 2020 “will be down by about 10 percent, no more than 12 percent, for the year versus 2019.”

“Compared to other corporates,

we’re not as badly hit as other corporates.” While uncertainty remains as the effects of Covid-19 continue to impact the country, Pangilinan said Meralco moves with caution but remains positive that a recovery will happen soon.

He said Meralco’s first half results still provided “some encouragement” even as “profitability had to take a back seat.”

“Despite various challenges, including lower cash inflows, delayed capital expenditures, and the limitations resulting from the pandemic and lockdown, Meralco performed quite well.”

The utility firm posted a CCNI of P10.6 billion in January to June this year, from P12.3 billion in the same period a year ago. Reported net income was also down to P6.8 billion, from P12 billion, mainly due to losses incurred from its Singapore investment.

In the same period, revenues were

down by 14 percent to P142.3 billion, from P165 billion on account of lower sales volume. Of which, electricity revenues stood at P138.63 billion at end-June this year from P161.27 billion in the same period last year, largely on account of lower volumes and pass-through charges.

Meralco sold 21,139 gigawatt hours (GWh) of electricity in the first six months of the year, 7 percent lower than in 2019.

Peak demand for the first half was 2 percent lower than 2019 at 7,614megawatts (MW), which was registered on March 10. During the lockdown, the highest registered demand was on June 23 at 7,080MW compared with 6,108MW on May 12.

The community quarantine impacted heavily on Meralco’s sales mix consumption shifted to higher lossto-serve residential customers. At end-June, Meralco’s customer base grew to nearly seven million, with

residential, commercial and industrial segments growing at 3 percent, 2 percent, and 1 percent, respectively.

“Covid-19 has disrupted and adversely affected industries, employment, operating procedures and our way of life. The pain brought about by the pandemic is expected to be felt for quite some time,” Meralco President Ray Espinosa said.

As such, Meralco has stepped up and increased its message handlers and, added digital and voice agents to address all customer concerns, while continuing to keep a robust and reliable network.

“We recognized the pain of our customers with the surge of consumption brought about by workfrom-home arrangements and the scorching summer heat, and we have thus initiated ‘customer first’ measures. We have relaxed customer credit, while being mindful of our obligations to suppliers and stakeholders,” Espinosa added.

Emperador income flat in January-June

E

mperador Inc., the liquor unit of businessman Andrew Tan, said its income in the first half was flat at P3.32 billion, compared to the P3.26 billion recorded a year ago.

The company which makes liquor from the cheaper Emperador brandy to the more expensive Fundador and Scotch whisky of the Whyte & Mackay Group said its revenues were also flat at P21.05 billion for the six-month period, from last year’s P21.06 billion.

Revenues from brandy reached P14.9 billion, a 3-percent decline from last year’s P15.34 billion, while sales from Scotch whisky grew 9 percent to P6.64 billion, from last year’s P6.1 billion.

“Indeed, this is a very positive development during a complex year where external factors put huge pressure on some aspects of our business and open opportunity for others. On one side, consumption of spirits has been restricted in countries with liquor bans, with closure of ontrade channels [such as bars, restaurants, hotels],

mutual funds

and a slump in global air travel,” Emperador president Winston Co said.

“On another, business has been resilient in countries without liquor restrictions as consumers sought out our brands in the off-premise and e-commerce channels. By taking advantage of the buoyant grocery and convenience markets, our international business has delivered betterthan-expected performance.”

In April to June, its income rose 24 percent to P1.86 billion, from P1.51 billion. Revenues, however, grew slightly to P10.69 billion, from last year’s P10.3 billion.

The company said its prudent spending allowed it to maintain its profitability in the first half.

“We took the opportunity to manage costs and this helped our bottom line. The company is mitigating risks and capturing opportunities.

We are continuing to grow internationally while fighting to widen our leadership in the Philippines,” Co said. VG Cabuag July 27, 2020

NAV One Year Three Year Five Year Y-T-D per share Return* Return Stock Funds ALFM Growth Fund, Inc. -a 197.51 -27.87% -10.76% -6% -21.57% ATRAM Alpha Opportunity Fund, Inc. -a 1.0088 -39.36% -14.33% -6.88% -27% ATRAM Philippine Equity Opportunity Fund, Inc. -a 2.6511 -37.86% -15.48% -8.56% -27.92% Climbs Share Capital Equity Investment Fund Corp. -a 0.6792 -31.35% n.a. n.a.

-24.37% First Metro Consumer Fund on MSCI Phils. IMI, Inc. -a 0.6534 -28.15% n.a. n.a.

-23.07% First Metro Save and Learn Equity Fund,Inc. -a 4.2328 -25.33% -9.44% -5.77% -20.56% First Metro Save and Learn Philippine Index Fund, Inc. -a,4 0.6663 -27.06% -11.83% n.a.

-21.94% MBG Equity Investment Fund, Inc. -a 79 -34.8% n.a. n.a.

-23.47% PAMI Equity Index Fund, Inc. -a 39.6054 -27.33% -9.39% -5.07% -22.77% Philam Strategic Growth Fund, Inc. -a 425.61 -24.99% -8.64% -5.26% -20.12% Philequity Alpha One Fund, Inc. -a,d,5 0.8626 n.a. n.a. n.a.

-16.26% Philequity Dividend Yield Fund, Inc. -a 1.0041 -27.31% -9% -4.89% -21.98% Philequity Fund, Inc. -a 29.5474 -27.02% -8.51% -4.6% -22.03% Philequity MSCI Philippine Index Fund, Inc. -a 0.783 -28.13% n.a. n.a.

-23.09% Philequity PSE Index Fund Inc. -a 4.0341 -27.08% -8.87% -4.44% -22.77% Philippine Stock Index Fund Corp. -a

675.43 -26.89% -8.83% -4.64% -22.54% Soldivo Strategic Growth Fund, Inc. -a 0.6086 -37.11% -12.91% -8.72% -28.52% Sun Life Prosperity Philippine Equity Fund, Inc. -a 3.1243 -30.77% -10.29% -5.79% -25.77% Sun Life Prosperity Philippine Stock Index Fund, Inc. -a 0.7745 -27.02% -9.01% -4.61% -22.61% United Fund, Inc. -a 2.8273 -27.07% -7.85% -4.16% -22.61% Exchange Traded Fund First Metro Phil. Equity Exchange Traded Fund, Inc. -a,c 90.6891 -26.66% -8.35% -3.82% -22.46% Primarily invested in foreign currency securities ATRAM AsiaPlus Equity Fund, Inc. -b $1.0258 2.79% -0.07% 0.64% -0.25% Sun Life Prosperity World Voyager Fund, Inc. -a $1.4624 10.26% 7.22% n.a.

6.07% Balanced Funds Primarily invested in Peso securities ATRAM Dynamic Allocation Fund, Inc. -a 1.5615 -12.96% -4.52% -3.73% -0.08% ATRAM Philippine Balanced Fund, Inc. -a 2.0505 -14.06% -5% -2.24% -5.99% First Metro Save and Learn Balanced Fund Inc. -a 2.4024 -12.06% -3.58% -3.42% -8.71% First Metro Save and Learn F.O.C.C.U.S. Dynamic Fund, Inc. -a,1 0.1844 n.a. n.a. n.a.

-19.3% NCM Mutual Fund of the Phils., Inc. -a 1.8357 -7.35% -1.54% -0.64% -6.42% PAMI Horizon Fund, Inc. -a 3.4811 -9.77% -2.78% -1.8% -8.13% Philam Fund, Inc. -a 15.5083 -10.67% -3.07% -1.99% -8.56% 1.9147 -12.95% -4.06% -1.8% -9.77% Solidaritas Fund, Inc. -a Sun Life of Canada Prosperity Balanced Fund, Inc. -a 3.2648 -18.4% -5.27% -3.18% -15.5% Sun Life Prosperity Achiever Fund 2028, Inc. -a,d 0.9389 -10.67% n.a. n.a.

-7.56% Sun Life Prosperity Achiever Fund 2038, Inc. -a,d 0.8391 -20.2% n.a. n.a.

-15.79% Sun Life Prosperity Achiever Fund 2048, Inc. -a,d 0.8135 -22.4% n.a. n.a.

-18.09% Sun Life Prosperity Dynamic Fund, Inc. -a 0.8027 -21.57% -6.35% -4.46% -17.65% Primarily invested in foreign currency securities Cocolife Dollar Fund Builder, Inc. -a $0.03921 4.67% 3.06% 2.04% 2.64% 0.67% 1.36% 1.29% PAMI Asia Balanced Fund, Inc. -b $1.0251 2.1% Sun Life Prosperity Dollar Advantage Fund, Inc. -a $4.0493 6.37% 5.16% 4.26% 3.54% Sun Life Prosperity Dollar Wellspring Fund, Inc. -a,3 $1.1489 3.23% 2.81% n.a.

1.79% Bond Funds Primarily invested in Peso securities ALFM Peso Bond Fund, Inc. -a 367.37 4.43% 3.21% 2.62% 2.63% ATRAM Corporate Bond Fund, Inc. -a

1.9454 2.12% 0.96% -0.04% 2.28% Cocolife Fixed Income Fund, Inc. -a 3.1958 4.4% 5.06% 5.06% 2.5% Ekklesia Mutual Fund Inc. -a 2.3034 4.67% 3.08% 2.37% 3.6% First Metro Save and Learn Fixed Income Fund,Inc. -a 2.4527 5.31% 3.48% 2% 3.97% Philam Bond Fund, Inc. -a 4.6587 9.87% 4.53% 2.81% 6.54% Philam Managed Income Fund, Inc. -a,6 1.3027 6.39% 4.21% 2.32% 3.66% Philequity Peso Bond Fund, Inc. -a 3.9635 7.32% 4.47% 2.38% 4.63% Soldivo Bond Fund, Inc. -a 1.0389 9.81% 3.85% 1.98% 7.74% Sun Life of Canada Prosperity Bond Fund, Inc. -a 3.1798 6.03% 4.92% 2.96% 3.39% Sun Life Prosperity GS Fund, Inc. -a

1.7458 4.88% 4.27% 2.38% 2.63% Primarily invested in foreign currency securities ALFM Dollar Bond Fund, Inc. -a $476.49 3.49% 2.57% 2.78% 1.74% ALFM Euro Bond Fund, Inc. -a Є216.44 -1.09% 0.74% 1.04% -1.52% 3.22% ATRAM Total Return Dollar Bond Fund, Inc. -b $1.2386 4.36% 2.77% 2.6% First Metro Save and Learn Dollar Bond Fund, Inc. -a $0.0263 2.33% 1.84% 1.51% 1.94% PAMI Global Bond Fund, Inc -b $1.084 -0.37% 0.28% 0.49% -0.88% Philam Dollar Bond Fund, Inc. -a $2.4889 5.52% 3.8% 3.34% 3.55% Philequity Dollar Income Fund Inc. -a $0.0608736 2.41% 2.06% 1.9% 0.95% Sun Life Prosperity Dollar Abundance Fund, Inc. -a $3.2307 4.34% 2.43% 2.67% 1.75% Money Market Funds Primarily invested in Peso securities ALFM Money Market Fund, Inc. -a 128.52 3.63% 3.27% 2.46% 2.14% First Metro Save and Learn Money Market Fund, Inc. -a 1.0429 2.55% n.a. n.a.

1.62% 2.97% 3.03% 2.59% 1.6% Sun Life Prosperity Money Market Fund, Inc. -a 1.2853 Primarily invested in foreign currency securities Sun Life Prosperity Dollar Starter Fund, Inc. -a $1.0462 1.61% n.a. n.a.

0.76% Feeder Funds Primarily invested in Peso securities Sun Life Prosperity World Equity Index Feeder Fund, Inc. -a,d,7 1.019 n.a. n.a. n.a. n.a.

Primarily invested in foreign currency securities ALFM Global Multi-Asset Income Fund Inc. -b,d,2 $0.94 n.a. n.a. n.a.

-5.05%

a - NAVPS as of the previous banking day. b - NAVPS as of two banking days ago. c - Listed in the PSE. d - in Net Asset Value per Unit (NAVPU).

1 - Launch date is September 28, 2019. 2 - Launch date is November 15, 2019. 3 - Adjusted due to stock dividend issuance last October 9, 2019.

4 - Renaming was approved by the SEC last October 12, 2018 (formerly, One Wealthy Nation Fund, Inc.). 5 - Launch date is December 09, 2019.

6 - Re-classified into a Bond Fund starting February 21, 2020 (Formerly a Money Market Fund). 7 - Launch date is July 6, 2020.

"While we endeavor to keep the information accurate, the Philippine Investment Funds Association (PIFA) and its members make no warranties as to the correctness of the newspaper’s publication and assume no liability or responsibility for any error or omissions. You may visit http://www.

pifa.com.ph to see the latest NAVPS/NAVPU."

www.businessmirror.com.ph

PSE STOCK QUOTATIONS

July 27, 2020

Net Foreign Bid Ask Open High Low Close Volume Value Trade (Peso) Stocks Buy (Sell) FINANCIALs

ASIA UNITED BDO UNIBANK BANK PH ISLANDS CHINABANK CITYSTATE BANK EAST WEST BANK METROBANK PB BANK PHIL NATL BANK PSBANK RCBC SECURITY BANK UNION BANK COL FINANCIAL FERRONOUX HLDG FILIPINO FUND IREMIT MEDCO HLDG NTL REINSURANCE PHIL STOCK EXCH VANTAGE

45 89.95 65 19.96 7.21 7.17 34.3 8.1 19.74 47.5 16.02 92.6 51.7 20.05 2.32 7.21 0.93 0.27 0.58 158 1.05

45.5 90 67.2 19.98 8 7.2 35 8.97 19.78 48 16.5 93 52 20.4 2.39 8.29 0.99 0.275 0.6 159 1.13

44.55 91.9 69.45 20 8 7.26 36 8.11 19.9 47.1 16.58 97.7 52 20.7 2.39 7.1 1 0.275 0.6 159 1.05

45.5 92.25 69.5 20 8 7.3 36.05 8.11 20.25 48.5 16.7 97.7 52.9 20.7 2.39 7.21 1 0.275 0.6 159 1.05

44.55 89.7 65 19.9 8 7.14 33.2 8.1 19.7 47.1 16.02 92.1 52 20.05 2.39 7.1 1 0.275 0.58 159 1.05

45.5 90 65 19.96 8 7.2 34.3 8.1 19.78 47.5 16.02 93 52 20.05 2.39 7.21 1 0.275 0.6 159 1.05

13100 2276880 2518430 59400 2500 894100 6663600 4900 206900 2400 24400 713620 8590 91700 1000 1000 10000 220000 61000 30 95000

592115 206201833.5 171407632.5 1184530 20000 6435841 232484960 39692 4107934 115100 394930 67168496 446757 1851980 2390 7166 10000 60500 36050 4770 99750

551790 -86517877 -54794871 434388 -160938105 -1404424 47990 -37167741 -83720 -

INDUSTRIAL AC ENERGY 2.22 2.23 2.29 2.3 2.22 2.22 4292000 9637970 1169950.0001 ALSONS CONS 1.2 1.21 1.14 1.2 1.14 1.2 863000 1010340 -612269.9997 25.4 25.9 25.55 25.9 25.1 25.9 781200 19995155 -8731120 ABOITIZ POWER BASIC ENERGY 0.159 0.16 0.16 0.168 0.154 0.16 640000 103220 23.7 23.95 23.85 23.95 23.55 23.95 322500 7650740 4791855 FIRST GEN FIRST PHIL HLDG 59 60 59.2 60 58.55 59 24270 1432810.5 -1114486.5 MERALCO 258 260 261 261 254 258 214330 55,096,430( 16,232,537.9996) 12.6 12.62 12.7 12.7 12.58 12.6 1517400 19114058 1698550 MANILA WATER PETRON 3.11 3.12 3.11 3.13 3.11 3.11 3794000 11803940 -96160 3.33 3.35 3.39 3.39 3.3 3.35 204000 676940 PETROENERGY PHX PETROLEUM 11.38 11.4 11.38 11.4 11.38 11.4 60500 689496 PILIPINAS SHELL 17.5 17.52 18 18.04 17.5 17.5 302600 5364634 -1750750 7.9 7.95 8 8.01 7.88 7.95 90200 716042 -3170 SPC POWER AGRINURTURE 7.15 7.18 7.75 7.75 7.03 7.18 519800 3830955 168225 1.88 1.91 2.05 2.05 1.88 1.88 3237000 6317230 -571030.0001 AXELUM BOGO MEDELLIN 76.05 80 83 83 76.05 76.05 240 19050.5 CNTRL AZUCARERA 10.14 11.48 11 11.5 11 11.5 15400 173010 14.48 14.5 14.46 14.5 14.1 14.5 1076800 15602118 -5127198 CENTURY FOOD DEL MONTE 5.05 5.14 5.1 5.8 5.02 5.05 1364900 7,375,819( 1,074,166.9997) 4.61 4.68 4.72 4.72 4.61 4.68 568000 2642330 -1302480 DNL INDUS EMPERADOR 9.08 9.09 9.06 9.15 9.02 9.09 476700 4339487 -1017957 63.3 63.95 64 64.45 63.25 63.95 266090 16978950 -1294953.5 SMC FOODANDBEV 0.62 0.63 0.59 0.63 0.59 0.62 1387000 841000 -9150 ALLIANCE SELECT FRUITAS HLDG 1.19 1.2 1.19 1.22 1.18 1.2 12858000 15423120 -352760 31 31.1 30.5 31 30.4 31 44000 1361775 1242980 GINEBRA JOLLIBEE 128 128.1 128.3 128.3 125.3 128 653170 83095328 -2082199 6.4 7 7.12 7.12 7.12 7.12 300 2136 MACAY HLDG MAXS GROUP 4.69 4.7 4.86 4.86 4.7 4.7 342000 1623280 -284030.0001 MG HLDG 0.125 0.133 0.125 0.125 0.125 0.125 180000 22500 5.98 6 6 6.07 6 6 1107800 6649120 1446562 SHAKEYS PIZZA ROXAS AND CO 1.16 1.17 1.25 1.26 1.14 1.17 6733000 8018350 159360 1.39 1.48 1.49 1.49 1.33 1.33 137000 196680 ROXAS HLDG SWIFT FOODS 0.103 0.109 0.103 0.11 0.103 0.11 2280000 237270 -23960 UNIV ROBINA 119.8 120 120.3 120.7 119.8 119.8 510930 61335864 -29361072 0.77 0.78 0.81 0.81 0.77 0.77 7816000 6079950 -111050 VITARICH VICTORIAS 2.24 2.6 2.24 2.24 2.24 2.24 8000 17920 72.5 75.5 53 79.5 53 75.5 27640 2051364 CONCRETE A CONCRETE B 87.05 87.1 58 87.15 58 87.1 186390 15213135 -3510 CEMEX HLDG 0.89 0.9 0.92 0.92 0.88 0.9 7271000 6471340 306660 9.8 9.88 9.16 9.81 9.16 9.8 521400 5106374 -392000 EAGLE CEMENT EEI CORP 5 5.01 5.1 5.1 5 5 210300 1056636 -133803 4.7 4.71 4.9 4.92 4.55 4.71 2298000 10782480 2247710 HOLCIM MEGAWIDE 6.94 6.95 7 7.1 6.86 6.94 1593100 11088595 -1850965 TKC METALS 0.66 0.69 0.7 0.7 0.64 0.66 144000 94920 0.78 0.79 0.76 0.79 0.76 0.79 109000 85240 VULCAN INDL CHEMPHIL 117.4 146.8 146.9 146.9 146.9 146.9 10 1469 1.87 1.94 1.88 1.94 1.87 1.94 10000 18810 CROWN ASIA EUROMED 1.68 1.7 1.76 1.76 1.68 1.7 452000 776190 -301910 MABUHAY VINYL 3.55 3.6 3.8 3.9 3.6 3.6 45000 166630 4.13 4.23 4.15 4.25 4.15 4.25 21000 87650 PRYCE CORP CONCEPCION 17.22 18.5 18.14 18.14 17.04 17.58 5300 93812 1.79 1.8 1.77 1.81 1.73 1.8 7566000 13468820 171650 GREENERGY INTEGRATED MICR 4.83 4.85 5.1 5.1 4.82 4.83 62500 303002 -66665 0.95 0.97 0.94 0.99 0.94 0.97 114000 108940 -1940 IONICS 4.21 4.7 4.01 4.87 4.01 4.87 3000 13480 PANASONIC SFA SEMICON 1.23 1.24 1.25 1.28 1.24 1.24 773000 964580 5.07 5.08 5.52 5.52 5.07 5.07 3013300 15609071 160846 CIRTEK HLDG

HOLDING & FRIMS ABACORE CAPITAL 0.46 0.465 0.465 0.47 0.46 0.465 3080000 1428700 ASIABEST GROUP 7.98 7.99 7.39 8 7.01 7.98 17900 131815 710 711 733 733 710 710 185060 132525535 AYALA CORP ABOITIZ EQUITY 48.95 49 50 50 48.55 49 682650 33602739 5.79 5.8 5.76 5.94 5.75 5.8 5417300 31351530 ALLIANCE GLOBAL AYALA LAND LOG 1.62 1.63 1.61 1.62 1.61 1.62 174000 281430 ANSCOR 6.1 6.2 6.23 6.24 6.23 6.24 1500 9347 0.48 0.495 0.49 0.49 0.465 0.49 50000 23950 ANGLO PHIL HLDG ATN HLDG A 0.59 0.6 0.61 0.61 0.57 0.6 1690000 990520 0.6 0.64 0.6 0.64 0.6 0.64 307000 184240 ATN HLDG B COSCO CAPITAL 4.97 4.98 4.99 5 4.91 4.97 182700 906650 DMCI HLDG 3.42 3.45 3.5 3.55 3.4 3.45 11934000 41296290 8.26 8.41 8.2 8.2 8.2 8.2 500 4100 FILINVEST DEV GT CAPITAL 433.4 433.8 437 437.6 423 433.4 271950 117821780 62.6 63 65 65 62.2 63 943000 59291449 JG SUMMIT JOLLIVILLE HLDG 4.16 5.24 5.27 5.27 5.27 5.27 100 527 LODESTAR 0.59 0.6 0.6 0.62 0.58 0.6 552000 328210 2.39 2.41 2.4 2.42 2.39 2.41 1193000 2865230 LOPEZ HLDG LT GROUP 7.41 7.44 7.43 7.49 7.4 7.44 1049100 7794348 0.455 0.49 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 1000 500 MABUHAY HLDG MJC INVESTMENTS 1.83 2.03 2.52 2.79 1.77 1.8 24000 51330 3.02 3.03 3.15 3.18 3.01 3.02 24280000 74307190 METRO PAC INV 2.9 3.08 2.89 3.08 2.89 3.08 15000 43730 PACIFICA HLDG PRIME MEDIA 0.73 0.76 0.74 0.78 0.74 0.78 31000 22980 0.99 1 1 1 1 1 4000 4000 SOLID GROUP SYNERGY GRID 131 160 150 150 150 150 70 10500 884 885 900 900 865.5 884 271930 240135165 SM INVESTMENTS 97.5 97.8 97.9 97.9 95.7 97.8 165010 16012735.5 SAN MIGUEL CORP SOC RESOURCES 0.66 0.67 0.69 0.71 0.65 0.66 737000 487500 0.179 0.199 0.179 0.179 0.179 0.179 50000 8950 WELLEX INDUS ZEUS HLDG 0.15 0.151 0.145 0.162 0.141 0.15 4300000 665150

-83800 -65675345 -13883179.5 -2525801 98820 150000 -72743 -16601960 -819.9999 60804784 -33121234 693380 -2545123 -26073640 -113247765 140391.5 -

PROPERTY ARTHALAND CORP 0.5 0.51 0.52 0.52 0.495 0.51 411000 209270 AYALA LAND 31.9 32 32.35 32.4 31.75 31.9 3982200 127456185 0.99 1.01 1.03 1.05 0.98 1.03 18000 18310 ARANETA PROP BELLE CORP 1.34 1.36 1.36 1.36 1.34 1.34 203000 272980 0.73 0.74 0.76 0.79 0.73 0.74 7525000 5737910 A BROWN CITYLAND DEVT 0.74 0.75 0.74 0.74 0.74 0.74 1230000 910200 CROWN EQUITIES 0.118 0.12 0.118 0.12 0.117 0.12 4250000 501130 5.8 6.06 5.78 5.8 5.78 5.8 6400 36994 CEBU HLDG CEB LANDMASTERS 4.97 4.98 4.94 4.98 4.9 4.98 1415000 7005180 0.36 0.365 0.37 0.37 0.36 0.36 1590000 574900 CENTURY PROP CYBER BAY 0.27 0.275 0.275 0.275 0.275 0.275 300000 82500 DOUBLEDRAGON 16.02 16.26 16.22 16.26 15.98 16.26 204600 3285216 6.12 6.2 6.2 6.2 6.1 6.2 261100 1618490 DM WENCESLAO EMPIRE EAST 0.248 0.255 0.25 0.255 0.247 0.255 3380000 841500 0.093 0.101 0.093 0.093 0.092 0.093 1350000 125230 EVER GOTESCO FILINVEST LAND 0.88 0.91 0.96 0.96 0.87 0.88 28795000 26081520 GLOBAL ESTATE 0.78 0.8 0.79 0.8 0.79 0.8 775000 615380 8.67 8.7 8.75 8.75 8.67 8.67 8500 73915 8990 HLDG PHIL INFRADEV 0.89 0.9 0.89 0.98 0.87 0.9 9282000 8571120 3.02 3.03 3.06 3.07 2.98 3.02 21166000 63633390 MEGAWORLD MRC ALLIED 0.201 0.202 0.187 0.214 0.187 0.202 126040000 25467160 0.29 0.31 0.29 0.29 0.29 0.29 30000 8700 PHIL ESTATES PRIMEX CORP 1.3 1.39 1.32 1.39 1.31 1.39 21000 27690 ROBINSONS LAND 15 15.14 15.9 15.9 14.84 15 3096300 46674680 1.55 1.58 1.55 1.55 1.55 1.55 4000 6200 ROCKWELL STA LUCIA LAND 1.8 1.87 1.81 1.81 1.81 1.81 100000 181000 30.3 30.35 30.5 30.7 30 30.3 5562300 168406325 SM PRIME HLDG 3.9 4.09 4.12 4.25 3.85 4.09 171000 685790 VISTAMALLS SUNTRUST HOME 1.16 1.19 1.22 1.23 1.16 1.17 1978000 2340490 37.05 44.95 37.05 37.05 37.05 37.05 100 3705 PTFC REDEV CORP VISTA LAND 3.2 3.25 3.55 3.57 3.18 3.2 6013000 19925800

520 -64127090 -9380 -334480 -19040 -248160 1191942 1732940 -790 -20025 -41310090 15840 -25440220 21374780 1220 3648240

SERVICES ABS CBN 7.73 7.78 7.82 8.7 7.31 7.73 3206900 25913939 GMA NETWORK 5.47 5.48 5.62 5.63 5.46 5.47 2274800 12529918 0.385 0.39 0.395 0.395 0.38 0.38 660000 253100 MANILA BULLETIN MLA BRDCASTING 11.2 11.92 11.04 11.04 11.04 11.04 200 2208 2010 2016 2100 2110 2006 2010 47340 96007080 GLOBE TELECOM PLDT 1320 1325 1339 1339 1316 1320 67530 89415480 APOLLO GLOBAL 0.049 0.05 0.049 0.05 0.049 0.05 4920000 242130 2.81 2.9 2.85 2.9 2.73 2.9 173000 485500 DFNN INC DITO CME HLDG 2.66 2.67 2.72 2.73 2.63 2.66 11249000 30088890 1.29 1.42 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 43000 55900 IMPERIAL ISLAND INFO 0.068 0.073 0.068 0.068 0.068 0.068 240000 16320 JACKSTONES 1.59 1.75 1.56 1.79 1.56 1.58 108000 174390 1.99 2 1.93 2.03 1.89 2 3210000 6307380 NOW CORP TRANSPACIFIC BR 0.17 0.171 0.175 0.175 0.171 0.171 6840000 1179620 1.84 1.86 1.85 1.87 1.82 1.84 807000 1485800 PHILWEB 2GO GROUP 8.78 8.98 9 9 8.8 8.8 94000 833064 ASIAN TERMINALS 15.24 16.58 16.58 16.58 16.58 16.58 300 4974 3.32 3.39 3.4 3.5 3.25 3.32 417000 1391610 CHELSEA CEBU AIR 37.05 37.1 38.1 38.1 37 37.05 192900 7221635 97 97.25 96.8 97.35 95.05 97.25 723210 70147543.5 INTL CONTAINER LBC EXPRESS 13.2 13.3 12.22 13.32 12.22 13.2 35900 473586 0.71 0.78 0.75 0.75 0.71 0.71 30000 22100 LORENZO SHIPPNG MACROASIA 4.7 4.75 5.09 5.1 4.7 4.7 7752500 38381466 METROALLIANCE A 1.5 1.51 1.62 1.62 1.5 1.5 773000 1172130 6.1 6.3 6.2 6.5 5.8 6.1 61800 375575 PAL HLDG HARBOR STAR 0.76 0.77 0.79 0.79 0.77 0.77 211000 163710 1.18 1.25 1.29 1.29 1.25 1.25 2000 2540 ACESITE HOTEL BOULEVARD HLDG 0.026 0.027 0.028 0.028 0.026 0.027 45100000 1217400 WATERFRONT 0.37 0.375 0.37 0.37 0.365 0.37 1500000 551150 591 630 600 600 600 600 19310 11586000 FAR EASTERN U STI HLDG 0.295 0.3 0.295 0.3 0.295 0.3 2240000 667100 2.14 2.18 2.13 2.19 2.13 2.18 56000 120080 BERJAYA BLOOMBERRY 6.25 6.28 6.8 6.8 6.18 6.25 4983600 31410404 PACIFIC ONLINE 2.02 2.1 2.01 2.1 2.01 2.1 78000 158080 1.19 1.25 1.25 1.25 1.19 1.19 849000 1026560 LEISURE AND RES MANILA JOCKEY 2.22 2.67 2.22 2.22 2.22 2.22 52000 115440 2.22 2.36 2.3 2.36 2.3 2.36 7000 16400 PH RESORTS GRP PREMIUM LEISURE 0.295 0.3 0.295 0.3 0.295 0.3 8410000 2487700 ALLHOME 6.83 6.85 6.88 6.88 6.7 6.83 605200 4129043 1.45 1.47 1.46 1.49 1.43 1.47 384000 559640 METRO RETAIL PUREGOLD 46.65 46.7 48 48 46.5 46.7 1282900 60221075 59.85 60 61.8 61.8 59.4 60 1816940 109029336.5 ROBINSONS RTL PHIL SEVEN CORP 123.5 126.8 124 124 124 124 20 2480 SSI GROUP 1.06 1.07 1.13 1.13 1.07 1.07 1782000 1917170 14.7 14.82 15.2 15.2 14.52 14.7 2990500 44351914 WILCON DEPOT APC GROUP 0.31 0.325 0.31 0.325 0.31 0.325 950000 298600 6.34 6.4 6.4 6.54 6.32 6.43 36400 232974 EASYCALL GOLDEN BRIA 285 306 280.4 306.8 280.4 306.8 50 14560 PRMIERE HORIZON 0.221 0.222 0.226 0.227 0.217 0.221 18390000 4106980

-31650700 -24149900 -257790 -88410 173900 168300 -3209200 -39556330.5 -27804 -10529982 147622 -21853263 -467780 4600 1508950 -7300 -1661015 -85407687 2480 -548220 -22991630 -

MINING & OIL ATOK 7.79 8.16 8.15 8.16 7.78 8.16 7300 58261 1.5 1.51 1.49 1.55 1.47 1.5 19582000 29590250 -1848260 APEX MINING ABRA MINING 0.0008 0.0009 0.0008 0.0009 0.0008 0.0009 765000000 640800 2.6 2.67 2.58 2.68 2.58 2.6 570000 1500140 -740990 ATLAS MINING BENGUET A 1.84 1.97 2.05 2.05 1.84 1.97 523000 1022040 BENGUET B 1.77 1.92 1.92 2.02 1.8 1.92 604000 1130420 -756840 0.218 0.219 0.218 0.229 0.218 0.219 1560000 344220 COAL ASIA HLDG DIZON MINES 7.4 7.5 7.43 7.5 7.35 7.5 2600 19245 1.09 1.1 1.08 1.13 1.07 1.1 18199000 20007780 -2207880 FERRONICKEL GEOGRACE 0.231 0.235 0.243 0.243 0.227 0.231 370000 87450 LEPANTO A 0.167 0.168 0.137 0.18 0.135 0.168 279010000 45185000 0.166 0.168 0.137 0.179 0.135 0.166 43400000 6775990 -829670 LEPANTO B MANILA MINING A 0.01 0.011 0.0093 0.012 0.0093 0.01 815000000 8627800 0.01 0.011 0.0094 0.012 0.0094 0.011 190000000 2028400 MANILA MINING B MARCVENTURES 0.85 0.87 0.79 0.9 0.75 0.87 5457000 4715890 44500 NIHAO 1.33 1.35 1.32 1.38 1.3 1.33 407000 538560 2.43 2.44 2.3 2.44 2.25 2.43 35251000 83846770 1525660 NICKEL ASIA OMICO CORP 0.39 0.41 0.4 0.42 0.39 0.39 990000 406200 0.64 0.65 0.62 0.66 0.59 0.64 7536000 4750280 ORNTL PENINSULA PX MINING 3.25 3.26 3.07 3.31 3.07 3.25 8569000 27706530 -2854020 9.49 9.5 9.49 9.6 9.44 9.5 6124300 58246481 -14040588 SEMIRARA MINING 0.005 0.0055 0.0049 0.0057 0.0048 0.0053 244000000 1308800 UNITED PARAGON ACE ENEXOR 5.7 5.75 5.87 5.87 5.75 5.75 6600 38037 0.0082 0.0085 0.0083 0.0083 0.0082 0.0082 14000000 115000 ORNTL PETROL A ORNTL PETROL B 0.0068 0.0094 0.0088 0.0088 0.0088 0.0088 9000000 79200 0.0079 0.008 0.008 0.008 0.0079 0.0079 9000000 71900 PHILODRILL PXP ENERGY 5.8 5.81 5.55 5.85 5.5 5.8 1249400 7033939 -1376991

PREFFERED HOUSE PREF A 100.4 103 103 103 103 103 260 26780 AC PREF B1 507 519 506 506 501.5 501.5 1600 807150 512 518 512 512 512 512 2100 1075200 AC PREF B2R DD PREF 101.3 101.9 102 102 101.2 101.9 36310 3703480 106 108.9 106.5 106.5 106 106 8490 902440 FGEN PREF G FPH PREF C 460.2 500 500 500 500 500 1000 500000 GLO PREF P 512 518.5 518.5 518.5 518.5 518.5 10 5185 1012 1020 1012 1019 1012 1019 530 539790 GTCAP PREF B MWIDE PREF 100.8 101.5 100.8 101.6 100.8 101.5 73880 7498812 1026 1034 1030 1035 1030 1035 15000 15474550 PNX PREF 4 PCOR PREF 3A 1055 1058 1056 1056 1055 1055 720 759700 PCOR PREF 3B 1090 1114 1100 1100 1090 1090 250 273590 78.4 78.5 78.55 78.55 78.4 78.4 6110 479039.5 SMC PREF 2C SMC PREF 2D 75.3 75.55 75.3 75.3 75.3 75.3 750070 56480271 75.5 77.2 75.5 75.5 75.5 75.5 560500 42317750 SMC PREF 2E SMC PREF 2I 77.5 78.9 77.25 77.25 77.25 77.25 2500 193125

PHIL. DEPOSITARY RECEIPTS ABS HLDG PDR 7.1 7.3 6.8 7.5 6.76 7.3 588600 4204922 -2188644 GMA HLDG PDR 5.15 5.2 5.5 5.5 5.15 5.2 778300 4058058 -4049014

WARRANTS LR WARRANT 0.62 0.66 0.63 0.65 0.62 0.62 32000 20350

SMALL & MEDIUM ENTERPRISES ALTUS PROP 12.5 12.66 13.1 13.6 12.22 12.66 649700 8312068 207016 ITALPINAS 1.62 1.63 1.71 1.71 1.61 1.62 3038000 4990330 -39560 5.2 5.25 5.1 5.31 5.1 5.2 117300 606860 KEPWEALTH MERRYMART 2.45 2.46 2.4 2.61 2.26 2.46 99979000 248772670 -830380 0.56 0.57 0.59 0.59 0.56 0.57 359000 203260 XURPAS

EXHANGE TRADE FUNDS

FIRST METRO ETF 88.5 89.9 91.05 91.05 89 89 27300 2457580.5 89551.5

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Banking&Finance BusinessMirror

High bad-loan buffer slashes BDO earnings

By Tyrone Jasper C. Piad @Tyronepiad

H

igh provisions for bad loans reduced net profits in the first half of BDO Unibank Inc. to a fifth of its earnings last year for the same period.

In a disclosure on Monday, the Syled bank said it booked first semester earnings of P4.3 billion, which is markedly lower than the P20.1 billion notched in the same period last year.

In consonance, BDO Unibank’s reserves for potential credit losses reached P22.4 billion as of end-June, biting big on the bank’s bottom-line figures.

“The provisions are anticipatory in nature and meant to safeguard the balance sheet,” BDO explained.

The bank added that recognizing this upfront will allow the bank to “focus on growing its businesses as restrictions under the [lockdown measures] are gradually relaxed.”

Core businesses, meanwhile, performed well as pre-provision operating income surged by 17 percent despite the pandemic. Net interest income was up 17 percent as well for the period.

In the first semester, customer loans spiked by 11 percent to P2.3 trillion while total deposits rose 9 percent to P2.6 trillion. Deposits were supported by a 19-percent growth in current account/savings account deposits.

Non-interest income, meanwhile, reached P24.8 billion in the first half. Most of this is P13.4-billion fee-based income and P7-billion insurance premiums.

Gross nonperforming loan (NPL)

ratio hiked to 1.95 percent while NPL coverage ratio was booked at 139.4 percent.

Despite additional costs to adapt to the “new normal” and boost security and safety of employees and clients, BDO said operating expenses slid by 1 percent to P56 billion on lower volume-related expenses.

The bank said its total capital base for the period stood at P367.billion with capital adequacy ratio at P13.8 percent and common equity tier 1 ratio at 12.7 percent. Both are above the minimum regulatory requirement and deemed enough to fund asset growth and regular quarterly dividends.

“Going forward, BDO believes that its solid balance sheet, sustained business growth and dedicated team effort will allow the Bank to weather the Covid-19 crisis and sustain its long-term performance post-pandemic,” the listed bank said.

As of end-June, BDO has fully restored its branch operations from only 45 percent at the beginning of the lockdown in March.

BDO shares were down by 3.28 percent, or P3.05, to settle at P90 each amid the 2.37-percent drop for the benchmark index on Monday.

In a recent interview with the BusinessMirror, BDO said that its plan to open 50 branches to 70 new branches this year was derailed by the measures against the pandemic.

However, the bank said scrapping the plan would not have material impact on its operations. “[D]ue to the pandemic and restrictions/limitations under the [community quarantine], the branch expansion may not be completed as planned,” the bank said.

Despite low rates, investors find solace in govt securities

T

By Bernadette D. Nicolas

I

What is MVQ?

This is an acronym that I just thought, and it means Minimum Viable Quantity.

MVQ is the least or the essential amount that you should own of a particular item. In other words, it answers the question, “How many of this item do you really need?”

For example, think about your toothbrush and ask yourself, “How many toothbrushes do you really need?”

If you’re most people, the answer would be one. You only need one toothbrush. So, for toothbrushes, your MVQ is 1.

Let’s make it a bit harder. How about a television? What do you think is the minimum number of TV sets you should own?

Again, for most people, one TV at home is enough. But I know someone who believes they need two: one in their living room and one in the bedroom. Is that person wrong? No, they’re not wrong. Because MVQ depends on you and, most especially, your lifestyle.

If you were to ask me, I don’t need a television at all, so my MVQ is zero for this example. I’ll tell you why later. Think about your MVQ for the items you often use.

Personal finance is personal. So I’m not here to tell you how many televisions, cars, shoes, watches or bags you should own.

However, I’d like to point out that

Fitz Gerard Villafuerte

personal finance there is always an MVQ for these items and it requires total honesty with yourself to be able to determine the least number for you.

Often times, we buy items that end up as an unnecessary duplicate.

And that’s an awful waste of money, which you could have used to buy something more useful or important to you.

A friend recently bought a pair of sneakers. He’s not really a collector.

It just so happened that he liked its design and it was on sale.

A few days later, he dropped his smart phone and the screen shattered. He told me that he now regrets buying those sneakers because he could’ve just used the money to have his phone fixed.

That’s when I learned that he actually already owns two pairs of sneakers and the third one, which he bought, is just something nice that he wanted to buy for himself.

His MVQ for sneakers is 2; thus making his third pair a non-essential and wasteful purchase.

How about having a spare?

I have two pairs of leather shoes, which I normally use alternately to formal events and speaking engagements. A friend once suggested that I should have another one, because I do wear leather shoes often.

Having a third pair would certainly prolong the life of all my leather shoes, and having two extra pairs are better than just having one.

While my friend’s advice is good, I believe that my MVQ is really just 2 for leather shoes. And if one of them should get torn or break apart, then I’ll just buy a new pair immediately to replace it while I tentatively use the other one full time.

In my experience, it’s better to just keep your money and buy only when needed. This allows you to be flexible with your budget. To put it

@BNicolasBM

he Bureau of the Treasury fully-awarded P20 billion in Treasury Bills (T-bills) as investors continued to swamp government securities.

National Treasurer Rosalia V. De Leon told reporters on Monday rates across all tenors dropped as investors purchased government securities hours before President Duterte’s

fifth State of the Nation Address.

“Rates declined with strong demand on short tenors as investors await highlights of PRRD [President Rodrigo Roa Duterte] SONA [State

of the Nation Address] to address the health crisis and unveil recovery plan,” De Leon said.

Due to the strong demand for the 364-day T-bills, De Leon also said they also offered an additional P5 billion via a tap facility.

The auction was oversubscribed by more than 3.2-times the P20 billion offer as tenors lured total bids of as much as P64.3 billion.

All tenors fetched lower average rates than the previous auction and the secondary market benchmark rates. The 91-day T-bills capped at a lower rate of 1.335 percent, dropping by 11.9 basis points from 1.454 percent previously. Bids for the tenor

reached P21.791 billion, four-times the P5-billion offering.

Meanwhile, the 182-day T-bills fetched 1.605 percent, sliding by 2 basis points from the previous auction’s 1.625 percent. The security attracted tenders of as much as P16.650 billion, more than thrice the P5 billion offering. The average rate for the 364-day T-bills settled at 1.758 percent, down by 1.2 basis points from 1.770 percent in the previous auction. Total bids for the tenor amounted to P25.957 billion, twice the P10-billion offering.

For this month, the Treasury programmed to borrow P205 billion from the local debt market.

UnionBank H1 profits drop despite higher revenues

U

nion Bank of the Philippines reported a single-digit drop in profits during the first semester despite booking higher revenues.

In a disclosure on Monday, the Aboitiz-led bank said its net income in the first half slid by 6 percent to P4.5 billion from P4.79 billion in the comparable period last year. This translated to a return on equity of 9.2 percent for the period, which was lower than last year’s 11.1 percent.

Meanwhile, total revenues jumped by 55 percent to P22.1 billion year-onyear on the back of improved net interest income and higher trading gains.

UnionBank saw its net interest income spur by 41 percent to P13.8 billion in the first semester because

Know your MVQ to avoid wasteful spending N the tech start-up community, whenever we plan to launch a new business idea, we’d always focus on developing our MVP or the Minimum Viable Product.

The MVP is the most basic version of the product, which has enough features or qualities that can satisfy the customer’s need.

For example, think about the mobile phone. At the very least, it should be able to make and receive calls and text messages. These are the minimum features or functions that you need to sell it as a viable product.

But we’re here not to talk about MVP…but MVQ.

Tuesday, July 28, 2020 B3

in another way, my cash savings is my spare shoes.

Be aware and be honest with yourself.

If you asked me 20 years ago what my MVQ is for a television, I would have answered you that it’s 1. It is my favorite source of entertainment back then.

However, when I was starting my first business, I got so busy that I rarely got time to watch TV. In fact, it was already a couple of months after when I learned that my cable provider changed the channel assignments.

That was when I realized that I can probably survive without a television.

Thus, from 1, my minimum viable quantity for televisions became zero. From a home necessity, it became just something nice to have, but I can certainly live without.

So, take a look and see all the stuff around you, and the things you currently own. What are their MVQ? How many of them go above your minimum viable quantity?

And perhaps, it’s time to donate them; or maybe hold a “garage sale” and turn those back into cash.

Lastly, it’s important to realize that having more of something doesn’t always make it more fulfilling.

Imagine owning five mobile phones. Do you think your life would be happier because of it? I don’t think so.

If someone gave me five mobile phones, then I’d probably sell all of them, and then use the money to buy my dream phone. Because this would satisfy my mobile phone MVQ, which is 1. And I’ll get to have the brand and model that I ideally want.

Thus, the challenge for us lies in knowing how much is enough… the number where having more simply becomes overconsumption.

Fitz Villafuerte is a registered financial planner of RFP Philippines. To learn more about personalfinancial planning, attend the 84th RFP program this August 2020. To inquire, e-mail info@rfp. ph or text <name><e-mail> <RFP> at 09179689774.

of higher earning assets and margin improvement.

Other income, comprising mainly of trading gains, rose 86 percent to P8.3 billion in the first half. The listed bank’s total assets grew by 7 percent to P751.5 billion while total deposits surged 19 percent to P510.4 billion in the first semester.

UnionBank said its customer loan growth was due to higher consumer (33 percent), small and medium enterprises (22 percent) and commercial lending (33 percent). According to its

consolidated key financial information, the bank’s loans and other receivables stood at P351.65 billion as of end-June.

Meanwhile, provisions for bad loans were increased to P7 billion in anticipation of potential credit losses after government imposed a lockdown to stem the spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19). The provision is more than five times the amount Unionbank had set aside during the first quarter.

“The bank deemed it prudent to add

reserves ahead of the potential impact of the Covid-19 crisis on its credit portfolio,” UnionBank said.

Shares in UnionBank ended flat at P52 apiece amid the 2.37-percent decline for the benchmark index on Monday.

Last June, UnionBank was one of the six financial service providers appointed to disburse the second tranche of government cash subsidies. It was allocated 1.36 million beneficiaries from the 7.123 million total number of recipients. Tyrone Jasper C. Piad

B4

Art

BusinessMirror

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Today’s Horoscope

Works by Richard Quebral, one of the featured artists in Art in the Park 2020. The event returns in August following its postponement in March.

By Eugenia Last

z

CELEBRITIES BORN ON THIS DAY: Dustin Milligan, 35; Sally Struthers, 73; Jim Davis, 75; Peter Cullen, 79.

Happy Birthday: Take the initiative, and follow through with your plans. Refuse to let emotions stand between you and what’s right. Pursue your passion, and be true to yourself and honest with those around you.

Be the one to step up and confront what needs to be changed. Don’t take romance, love and family ties for granted. Your numbers are 3, 10, 16, 21, 29, 35, 47.

a

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Look for a unique way to save money. A change may seem out of reach, but when you crunch the numbers and look at the long-term savings, you’ll revisit the idea. Take physical action, do the work yourself and good things will happen. HHH

b

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Consider what you want, and make it happen. A partnership with someone who shares your interests and beliefs will step up and bear half the brunt. An emotional discussion will bring you closer to someone you love.

HHH

Art in the (virtual) Park: ‘Affordable c art fair’ returns, goes online for a week

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Refuse to let the changes going on around you throw you off guard. Keep moving at a consistent pace, and you will overcome any setbacks you encounter along the way. Personal improvements will give you the oomph you need to go the distance. HHH

A

FTER being postponed in mid-March at the onset of the Covid-19 outbreak in the country, Art in the Park 2020 is set to return next month in a new format and a longer run.

The annual one-day fair traditionally held at the Jaime Velasquez Park in Salcedo Village, Makati City, now goes online at www.artinthepark.ph from August 10 to 17. Tagged as Manila’s affordable art fair, Art in the Park will still showcase artworks that are capped at P50,000.

“Appreciation to art has to be available to all,” said Lisa Periquet of Philippine Art Events Inc., which is also behind Art Fair Philippines, during the event’s presscon in March. “Of course, there are certain aspects of it that are very high brow, but there’s something to art that should really be part of everyone’s life.”

Art in the Park 2020 was postponed a week ahead of its original March 15 date, which was just a day before the government imposed a total lockdown in Luzon in response to the growing pandemic that has crippled not only the country but the rest of the world.

Now, the event is on again with much of its initial offerings. Still to be featured in special exhibitions are

Underground, Art Verite Gallery, Art Wednesday, Artepintura Gallery, Artery Art Space, Association of Pinoyprintmakers, Avellana Art Gallery, Blanc, Boston Art Gallery, Cevio Art Haus, District Gallery, Famous Artists, Far Eastern University, Galeria de las Islas, Galerie Anna, Galerie Artes, Galerie Stephanie, Kulay Art Group, Los Nuevos Conquistadores, J Studio, Kasubulan, M A G, Mono8 Gallery, Museum Foundation of the Philippines–Joe Geraldo works & Carlo Villafuerte’s jewelry, Nineveh Artspace, Nord Anglia International School, Potters’ Group–Jon Pettyjohn, Potters’ Group–EJ Espiritu, Potters’ Group–Sagada, Potters’ Group–Joey De Castro, Project 20 Maginhawa, Orange Project, Resurrection Furniture and Found Objects Gallery, Sheerjoy, Silverlens, Space Encounters, TUP Fine Arts, The Authenticity Zero, The Mighty Bhutens, The Photography Zone, The Thursday Group, Tin-Aw Art Gallery, Village Art Gallery, Vinyl on Vinyl, UP College of Fine Arts, vMeme Contemporary Art Gallery, and Ysobel Art Gallery.

For a complete Art in the Park experience at home, there will be an online musical performance by independent singer-songwriter and guitarist Martti Franca on the fair’s closing day. A selection of food and drinks and special promos from Art in the Park F&B partners will also be available.

Art in the Park began in 2006 as a companion event to the second anniversary of the Salcedo Saturday Market. The concept instantly took a life on its own and evolved to a fund-raising event, with a portion of all sales donated to the Museum Foundation of the Philippines (MFPI).

For this year’s unusual edition, Art in the Park will continue to help MFPI in support of their projects and programs for the National Museum of the Philippines and its network. n

three artists handpicked by the organizers.

One is Richard Quebral, an artist from Vigan whose architecture background is reflected in his vibrant and geometric imageries. He will present a special show for the “Globe Platinum Hour,” copresented by Art in the Park and Globe, titled Isometric Ay! lah, lah, land...

Quebral will, likewise, invite visitors into his artmaking process through a series of videos that will be launched on Art in the Park’s web site and socialmedia accounts. There will also be a live auction on August 16 of Quebral’s largest painting among the five he made specially for the fair.

The other two featured artists are Jackie Lozano and Dex Fernandez.

Lozano will hold a virtual demonstration of her method of portraiture in “BPI Presents,” a special collaboration with the Bank of the Philippine Islands.

Also in the show’s lineup is an original performance

by Fifth Wall Fest, a group that seeks to introduce Philippine audiences to dance films as an art form.

Meanwhile, in another special exhibit at the virtual fair, called Garapata Hatchery, street artist Dex Fernandez will be creating a special paper mural that he will section into 22 separate artworks. The pieces will be on offer after fair visitors get a glimpse of his process via a specially-produced time-lapse video.

Popular artist and illustrator Robert Alejandro will also be conducting live online sessions on Art in the Park’s social-media accounts.

Aside from the featured artists, a total of 53 exhibitors representing galleries, art collectives, independent art spaces, and student groups are slated to showcase artworks.

The participants include Ang I.n.K., Archivo 1984, Arnold Art Collection, ART for Space Gallery, ART LAB: Atelier Cesare & Jean Marie Syjuco, Art

CDC launches ‘State of the Art’ online exhibit THE Clark Development Corp. (CDC) continues to explore measures to promote the arts and tourism in Clark amid the pandemic—this time, by launching its firstever State of the Art online exhibit.

The online exhibition consists of 45 unique artworks proudly made by 25 Pampanga-based artists, which are all posted at a designated web site that can be accessed through clarkmuseum.wixsite. com/stateoftheart.

The artists found solace during the quarantine period by expressing themselves through their paintings, thus giving birth to State of the Art. One Kapampangan artist, Dodgie Aguinaldo, said that art has become his therapy to ease his anxiety brought by the pandemic. “Art is my therapy. I always make colorful artworks that reflect positivity.

Since we are still in the ‘dark,’ the pop of colors will bring joy to those who will see it,”

he said. The inspiration behind the artworks is the theme “We heal as one,” which depicts daily life during the quarantine.

The State of the Art online exhibit has been made possible by CDC’s Tourism Promotions Division (TPD), which aims to bring the Clark Museum into homes by utilizing technology.

At the same time, the online platform encourages everyone to stay at home where they can still access, view and enjoy the

virtual gallery for free at the comfort of their own homes.

State of the Art shows us how Filipinos use their talents and skills to produce something that can be a source of hope, inspiration and strength during these difficult times.

In support of local artists, those who are interested in buying a piece from the gallery may fill up an online form at clarkmuseum. wixsite.com/stateoftheart.

d

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Don’t give up on your dreams. Take the initiative, and do something to activate what you want to achieve. Be the one to step up and follow through.

Positive change is within reach. It’s time to make your move. HHHHH

e

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): An incident will leave you on shaky ground with someone you live or work alongside. Be consistent, stick to the truth and follow your heart. A new routine that promises better health, peace of mind and excellent compatibility with others is encouraged. HH

f

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): If you aren’t happy, it’s up to you to make the changes necessary. Take control of your life, say what’s on your mind and refuse to let anyone stand between you and the dreams you want to achieve. Walk away from manipulative people. HHHH

g

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Trust in your skills, intelligence and beliefs. If someone tries to push you in a direction that isn’t right for you, recognize what you have to do, and proceed. Honesty is favored, regardless of what others do. HHH

h

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): Look at the possibilities, and do whatever works best for you. Don’t forgo an opportunity because someone is jealous or threatened by the changes that will take place. Concentrate on what makes you happy.

Let go of the past, and forge ahead. HHH

i

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Don’t let the compliments you receive lead you down a dangerous path. Stick to the rules, focus on what’s important and gravitate to the people you know you can trust. Make home and family priorities.

Romance is featured. HHH

j

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Leave nothing to chance. Make the necessary changes to ensure your plans unfold without a hitch. Reach out to someone you have worked with previously; he or she will help you reach your expectations on time.

HHHH

k

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Don’t take a risk. Iron out any problems before you begin something. Knowing what you are up against will be half the battle; the other half will be letting go of what’s not working for you anymore. HH

l

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Talks will lead to positive change. Use connections to enlighten you about changes in your community or the industry in which you work. Innovation and intelligence will help you surpass any competition you encounter today. HHHHH Birthday Baby: You are open-minded, curious and ambitious.

You are enthusiastic and heartfelt.

‘back payment’ by gary larson The Universal Crossword/Edited by David Steinberg

ACROSS 1 They’re usually crunched 5 Falls in torrents, say 10 Reach the Candy Castle last, in Candy Land 14 Word of woe 15 Weasley family’s owl 16 Tehran’s land 17 Menu 19 Strong who voiced Timmy Turner 20 Poles and Ukrainians 21 Summer top 23 Indent key 24 Make up (for) 25 Did major damage 28 Spy novelist Deighton 29 Actor Wilson 31 Hour that rhymes with “wee” 32 Hera’s violent son 34 Sometimes-strapless garment 35 Candy brand with orange wrappers 36 Beatles hit whose title is sung after “She’s in love with me and...”

39 Beethoven work for seven instruments

2 ___ leaf beetle (tree pest) 4 43 Beehive, e.g.

47 Poe’s middle name 48 Uncouth 50 Cartoon chihuahua 51 Sentry’s job 53 Speed skater Ohno 55 Pittsburgh winter hrs.

56 Person who’s always fake?

57 Texting icon 58 Battleship successes 60 Schitt’s Creek star 64 For all time 65 Stuck together 66 Cold drink at a theater 67 Successor of Claudius 68 Sounds like a pig 69 Other, in Oaxaca DOWN 1 Tiny bit of gel 2 Big-name celeb 3 Big brewski 4 Lion king?

5 Zebras at Lions games?

6 Terrier’s sound

7 One of George Gershwin’s brothers 8 Antivirus software brand 9 Streamlined 10 On, as a lamp 11 Stumpers?

12 Big name in desserts 13 Allows 18 Rake ___ the coals 22 Consumed 24 What’s added to “carte” 25 Wear down 26 Ready for action 27 What Brexit exits 30 Help with a holdup 33 Instrument in Hindustani classical music 35 Lens holders 37 Wards (off) 38 Chef Bobby 39 Female grouse 40 Slippery 41 Dish that holds many sushi rolls 44 Attribute to others, as one’s feelings 45 Drop off 46 Sean Lennon’s mom

48 Puffy clouds 49 Indistinguishable 52 The “D” in UCSD 54 Roosevelt’s affliction 57 Extremities 59 Full theater sign 61 Word after “flare” or “laser” 62 Startled cry 63 Vote of support Solution to Friday’s puzzle:

Show BusinessMirror

www.businessmirror.com.ph

Tuesday, July 28, 2020

B5

IN this March 2020 photo, Britain’s Prince Charles followed by Prince William and Kate, Duchess of Cambridge, with Prince Harry and Meghan Duchess of Sussex, make their exit at annual Commonwealth Service at Westminster Abbey in London. AP CAMILLE PRATS

‘Mars Pa More’ brightens up mornings with fresh, exciting episodes BEGINNING July 27, join GMA mommies Camille Prats and Iya Villania as they celebrate the first anniversary of the viewers’ favorite family-oriented talk show, Mars Pa More, airing weekdays at 8:45 am.

Mars Pa More’s weeklong fresh episodes are produced from home, with the two hands-on moms becoming their own cameramen, lighting directors, makeup artists and stylists.

Kick-starting the special episodes on Monday, top comedienne Ai-Ai delas Alas gave viewers a peek at how her family thrives in the new normal and a howto on her Fluffy Cake on the segment “Mars Masarap.”

On July 28, revel in exclusive house tours and a morning of chikahan with Glaiza de Castro as she introduces their simple yet comfortable bedand-breakfast and talks about her long-distance relationship with her Irish boyfriend; and soon-tobe-dad Rodjun Cruz also opens his house and receives feng shui tips on how to invite prosperity in his living space and throws in a five-minute home workout to keep everyone healthy and in shape amid the closure of fitness centers.

Relieve the stress and woes fueled by the crisis on July 29 with a funny commentary from comedian Betong Sumaya as he whips up an easy corned beef omelet dish on Mars Masarap. Also joining in on the fun is TikTok personality Marvs who will star in a comical sketch together with viral sensation Aling Nena, who is the person behind the famous lines “walang ganun mars?”

It’s about-to-rain “feels” on July 30 as GMA couple Barbie Forteza and Jak Roberto spill the beans on how they conquer relationship hiccups and maintain a healthy communication in the new normal. The two will also concoct the perfect Dalgona Coffee that everyone is raving about.

On “Pusuan Mo Mars,” a mother and Covid-19 survivor tells the heartwarming tale of love and triumph as she bravely nursed her child at the peak of her illness, and shares how she overcame discrimination while on her way to recovery.

Finally, Rocco Nacino and Kris Bernal make July 31 episode extra special with their fun quaranthings to kill everyone’s boredom. Certified plantito Rocco gives his first-hand tips on how to become a plant enthusiast, while Kris shows her easy-to-follow workouts using something as simple as a bag. Also, get to know more about a couple who still pushed through with their quarantine wedding ceremony.

New book outlines Prince Harry’s less-than-fond farewell

L

By Danica Kirka The Associated Press

ONDON—Freedom for Prince Harry came with a price.

A new book on the Duke and Duchess of Sussex lays bare the turmoil in the House of Windsor before the pair walked away from senior roles in Britain’s royal family, describing relations so frosty that Prince Harry, Prince William and their spouses were barely on speaking terms by time the saga came to a close.

The first installment of a serialized version of the book Finding Freedom, which appeared Saturday in the Times of London, underscored the hurt feelings caused by the decision of Harry and Meghan to go into self-imposed exile. Authors Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand highlight one moment in during Commonwealth Service at Westminster Abbey in March where the two brothers and their wives barely spoke despite not having seen each other since January. “Although Meghan tried to make eye contact with Kate, the duchess barely acknowledged her,” the excerpt said.

In an interview with the Times that accompanied the excerpt, Scobie said to “purposefully snub your sister-in-law or your brother or brother-in-law in Kate’s case... I don’t think it left a great taste in the couple’s mouths.”

The service marked a low point after months

of palace intrigue that worsened when the couple surprised the Royal Household in January by making public their plans to be more independent. It capped frustration on the part of the Sussexes, who are portrayed by the authors as seeking more control after being shut out by the machinations of other actors in the Royal Household despite their public popularity.

“As their popularity had grown, so did Harry and Meghan’s difficulty in understanding why so few inside the palace were looking out for their interests,’’ the excerpt said. “They were a major draw for the royal family.”

Scobie and Durand suggest that some palace officials were actually troubled by the Sussexes’ popularity and there were fears that more senior royals would be overshadowed. Harry is 6th in the line for the throne, behind his father, Prince Charles, his brother William, and William’s three young children, George, Charlotte and Louis.

“The Sussexes had made the monarchy more relatable to those who had never before felt a connection,’’ they wrote. “However, there were concerns that the couple should be brought into the fold; otherwise the establishment feared their popularity might eclipse that of the royal family.’’

The couple’s plan to be part-time royals fell apart during talks with the family, and in January the queen outlined how the couple in March would step away from royal duties, at least for a while, but always

Baby boom in the time of pandemic

THERE seems to be a baby boom in the local entertainment industry during these extraordinary times. A breather from all the not-so-good news that we see and hear is this latest batch of celebrity babies born on the first two weeks of this month.

The decision of GMA stars Max Collins and Pancho Magno to welcome their new baby through water birth was the talk of so many young parents for many days. On July 6, when Collins’ labor started, the couple was ready and had every thing they needed in place. They even had the support and assistance of two midwives and their childbirth doula Irina Otmakhova, who shared what is perhaps the first photo of the couple with their newborn baby boy, Skye Anakin.

The Filipino-American actress admitted that she had very mixed emotions and various levels of pain while she was going through each of the birthing stage but these were all worth it when the baby came out—healthy, normal and beautiful. “I feel so empowered as a woman, as a new mother after my

gentle birth. I never knew that I could be that strong.

Of course, I am thankful that my husband was with me throughout the process because he is my strength and my rock,” she shared.

Magno, the son of well-loved GMA executive Redgie Magno, happens to be a registered nurse so he was knowledgeable about childbirth, too. The first-time dad wrote in his Instagram: “To our son, you are one of the reasons why I believe in God. I can’t wait to be your best friend.” The doting grandma also posted a beautiful photo of herself carrying her latest grandchild.

On July 17, Cebuana actress Isabel Oli gave birth to hers and John Prat’s third child, a beautiful girl they named Forest. Their two children, Feather and Freedom, were both ecstatic about the new member of their growing family and were so happy when their dad finally came home after taking a break from his locked-in work in the TV series Ang Probinsyano.

Oli has set her acting career aside to become a fulltime mother and homemaker since she got married to Prats.

While she was heavily pregnant, AustralianFilipino multi-hyphenate Iya Villania said that she and her husband Drew Arellano agreed that they wanted the gender of their third child as a surprise.

On July 18, a healthy baby girl was delivered through natural birth, and the couple named her Alana Lauren.

Prior to her delivery, Villania was even quoted as saying that she was almost sure they will have a third boy because she thought she saw something like “balls” during one of her ultrasound procedures.

“I really thought I saw balls from where I was lying down, but it turned out to be a fat vagina instead!”

When the Arellanos brought their baby home, she was met with so much joy by her two older brothers, Antonio Primo and Alonzo Leon.

Bangs Garcia, who is now based in the UK, also gave birth to a healthy baby girl, her second, on July 21.

Garcia gave up her sluggish acting career when she found true love in the person of Lloyd Birchmore, a British-Filipino businessman she first met in the island of Boracay. Garcia married Birchmore three times: in a private civil ceremony in London in the fall of 2016, in a church wedding in early 2017, and at a beach wedding on the island where they first met.

Already blessed with a daughter named Amelia who is almost three years old, the couple named their little bundle of joy Isabella, who weighed exactly the same as her older sister at 7.8 lbs when she came out via a C-section.

For sure, Garcia will be enjoying her baby in the first few months of being mother all over again, and then go back to getting fit and fabulous, something she successfully achieved after she gave birth to her firstborn.

The birth of these babies are happy stories. And just like how they bring joy to their respective homes and families, they also remind us about pure love, everlasting hope and little miracles.

Clockwise: The Arellanos with Alana Lauren, the Magnos with Skye Anakin, the Birchmores with Isabella, and Isabel Oli with Forest

remain part of the royal family.

Ahead of the book’s release, Harry and Meghan issued a statement denying taking part in the publication.

“The Duke and Duchess of Sussex were not interviewed and did not contribute to Finding Freedom,’’ it said. “This book is based on the authors’ own experiences as members of the royal press corps and their own independent reporting.”

Harry’s departure was essentially uncharted territory for the House of Windsor. Only the messy abdication of Edward VIII in 1936 served as a guide to the potential pitfalls.

The couple re-located to North America with their 14-month old son, Archie. But they have yet to find peace. The couple this week sued to stop the sale and publication of photos of Archie, which they say was shot at their Los Angeles-area home without their permission. In their suit, the couple outlined the harassment they’ve faced in Southern California.

The lawsuit says the family was forced to erect a large mesh fence to block photographers with telephoto lenses from shooting pictures of them from a ridge hundreds of yards away.

That led to the appearance of drones that flew as low as 20 feet (6 meters) above their home, as often as three times a day, in attempts to get photos, the lawsuit says. Helicopters have also flown over as early as 5:30 am, disturbing the sleep of their child and their neighbors. n

B6 Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Cinemalaya sets sail with its digital edition this August

Take home your favorite gourmet eats from Belmont Manila and Savoy Manila

BHM Packaging

H

OME-GROWN Megaworld properties Belmont Hotel Manila and Savoy Hotel Manila are taking dine-at-home experience to another level with their “grab ‘n go” service. The two Newport City hotel properties recently launched, “B on the Go” by Café Belmont and “Out of the Box” by Savoy Café. These are their branded food-to-go services, which are available for takeout, pickup, and delivery.

Right now, home is the safest place to be for everyone. By offering grab and go food services, people can enjoy quality meals within the comforts of home.

Through ‘Out of the Box’ and ‘B on the Go’, those staying and working from home are given a variety of choices featuring hotelquality gourmet eats.

The novelty of dining within a Hotel set-up will always be a totally different experience. Imagine the classy ambience, the excitement of dressing up, and socializing with other guests. Having this experience instead, in the privacy of your home, is a new reality we are faced with at the moment. That is why “B on the Go” and “Out of the Box” were branded innovatively to adapt to a new demand in the market and showcase the lighter, more casual side of fine-dining. Both offer a variety of menu

BOTG Filipino Breakfast (Tocino)

items perfect for home – from healthy options to basic comfort food.

Inspired by Café Belmont and Savoy Café’s signature favorites, their grab and go menu can be easily described as “simple yet satisfying”. Café Belmont, known for its chic and wide-array of international cuisine can boast of its signature Belmont Blueberry Burger, a juicy angus beef burger with mushroom, cream cheese, onion, topped with signature blueberry buns. Other specialties included in it “B on the Go” offerings are Seared Salmon Fillet, Beef Salpicao, and Filipino favorites, Chicken Inasal and Lechon Kawali. Italian specials are always part of Café Belmont’s choice offerings, and these were sure to be included in its grab and go menu. Try a wide selection of pasta and ofcourse, Belmont’s very own Pepperoni Pizza.

On the other hand, “Out of the Box”

by Savoy Café, is bannered by its signature dish, Savoy Chicken Zabreme, which is a Mediterranean-inspired roast chicken dish infused with sumptuous flavors and a touch of Zabana Rum. It also offers Boxed Favorites, featuring the classic Filipino Adobo, Beef Broccoli and Roast Chicken.

You may also enjoy specialty pastas, sandwiches, breakfast favorites and even refreshing Milk Tea flavors all prepared

the Savoy way.

Dishes are reasonably-priced with main courses ranging from Php300 to Php600 and snack items starting at Php200. Bulk orders are also accepted atleast two (2) days prior to pick up or delivery for your intimate home celebrations.

“For convenience in ordering, we have implemented a Food Ordering app through an FB Messenger ChatBot. With just one click thru their FB account, guests can directly browse our menu and process their orders online.”, according to Samantha Manuel, Area Marketing Manager. “We are also launching our E-Concierge platform where food ordering can be done seamlessly thru our official websites.”

Finally, through these grab and go service, elevate your e-meetings, webinars and all other web-based gatherings as both Hotels may cater gourmet meals for your virtual attendees to make every e-event a success.

Café Belmont and Savoy Café are both located in Newport City, Pasay City.

Open daily from 6:00AM to 9:00PM. Dine in guests may also be accommodated at limited capacity, with safe eats health and safety measures strictly observed. For more inquiries: Café Belmont (02) 5318 8887 | Savoy Café (02) 5317 2817.

DLSU urges Filipinos to keep learning with graduate scholarships

DLSU grad student

D

E La Salle University urges Filipino professionals to keep learning in the time of pandemic as it opens graduate scholarship slots for deserving students.

The scholarship opportunity was announced as DLSU started its application period for Term 1, Academic Year 2020-2021, last July 20.

Full and partial scholarships will be provided to new and current graduate students of DLSU who meet a set of income-based criteria.

The graduate scholarship allocations are not new.

Office of Admission and Scholarships Director Grichelle Prado said, “These have been offered annually by DLSU to graduate applicants and students for about a decade now, in keeping with the University’s commitment to maintain at least 25% of its student population under scholarship.”

Even as quarantine measures have slowed the economy and affected all sectors, DLSU continues to provide scholarship opportunities, with the support of partners, benefactors, and its alumni. The University recognizes that, more than ever, relevant education is needed by the labor force, in order to keep industries running under new work systems and conditions.

Prado adds: “DLSU is carrying out the mission of its founder St. John Baptist de La Salle to provide education to all that it can reach. It is also the thrust of

the University to be of service to the country through research, which our graduate students produce.”

Apart from scholarships, the University has also provided tuition discounts in order to help soften the impact of the pandemic on its community.

New opportunities, Human resource experts agree that education is vital to how the economy, through its workforce, survives under continued quarantine measures.

Part-time Commercial Law faculty member and Asia Foundation Human Resource consultant Krissy Dabis says, “There are new opportunities opening up even as a lot more have closed down. Taking steps toward self-improvement, such as undergoing training and earning degrees, ensures a measure of success.”

The increased reliance on virtual operations in the workplace has raised interest in some graduate programs in DLSU. The Master of Arts in Education Major in Educational Technology Program, offered by the Br. Andrew Gonzalez FSC College of Education, takes on new relevance, as teachers across the country begin to put their classrooms online.

Handpicked as a CHED partner in setting the standards for online education, DLSU encouraged its faculty members to share knowledge with

other teachers and institutions on educational technologies that are taught in the program.

A greater reliance on virtual systems in businesses is also creating an increased demand in IT-related programs. In response, DLSU opened new programs, such as its Master in Information Security, beginning this coming term.

Putting theory into practice, Even the University’s 59-year old MBA program is contributing new knowledge on coping strategies, through the traditional classroom practice of students sharing the best practices of the varied industries from where they come. With seismic shifts in the economic landscape, the program’s strength in ethical policy-making is more relevant than ever.

The scholarships are a welcome opportunity to DLSU MBA students. Ina Chan, who is in her first year in the program, applied for a scholarship and received one that covers nearly half her tuition and miscellaneous costs. “I am grateful that my scholarship application was granted. With all the uncertainties brought about by the pandemic, I will be assured of being able to continue my study and pursue my dream of earning an MBA.” Jill Legaspi, a recent MBA graduate, was a full scholar under the DLSU Science Foundation Scholarship Program. Working in the airline industry, which is heavily affected by the pandemic, she and her company are finding an MBA useful in the major adjustments at work.

“My MBA research on boosting employee morale has become useful again in light of the current situation. As difficult and new this challenge is in my career, the training and skills I learned in my graduate classes are being put to good use and it boosts my self worth that I am able to contribute to my company during a tough period.”

The application period for admission and scholarship is until August 8. To apply, interested applicants can go to http://bit.ly/DLSU-GS2020.

Scholarship requirements can be found in www. dlsu.edu.ph/admissions/scholarships/graduatescholarship For inquiries, email scholarships@dlsu.edu.ph and graduate.admissions@dlsu. edu.ph

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HE Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival continues to sail on its 16th year with its digital edition slated on August 7 to 16, 2020. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the country's biggest independent film festival will be screened on Vimeo.

Co-produced by the Cultural Center of the Philippines and the Cinemalaya Foundation Inc., this year's film festival will feature Short Films in Competition.

Out of 244 entries submitted, 10 short films were selected and will vie for the Best Film award. These are: ANG GASGAS NA PLAKA NI LOLO BERT (THE BROKEN VINYL RECORD) by Janina Gacosta and Cheska Marfori; ANG PAGPAKALMA SA UNOS (TO CALM THE PIG INSIDE) by Joanna Vasquez Arong; EXCUSE ME MISS, MISS, MISS by Sonny Calvento; FATIGUED by James Robin Mayo; LIVING THINGS by Martika Ramirez Escobar; PABASA KAN PASYON by Hubert Tibi; QUING LALAM NING ALDO (UNDER THE SUN) by Reeden Fajardo; THE SLUMS by Jan Andrei Cobey; TOKWIFI by Carla Pulido Ocampo; and UTWAS (ARISE) by Richard

Salvadico and Arlie Sweet Sumagaysay.

Aside from the main competition, the Cinemalaya will have a specially-curated Short Films in Exhibition, featuring 20 short films.

Gawad CCP Para sa Alternatibong Pelikula at Video, the longest-running independent film and video competition in Asia, will also continue its run this year. Visions of Asia, one of the major components of the film festival, will screen award-winning indie films from Asia.

Cinemalaya will also pay tribute to individuals who have made great contributions to the Philippine film industry - director Peque Gallaga and actress Anita Linda.

Screenwriter Ricky Lee, in partnership with Cinemalaya, will conduct a scriptwriting masterclass. There will also be a virtual reunion of his writing workshop alumni.

Don’t miss out on other Cinemalaya components such as the Cinemalaya Retrospectives, featuring past Cinemalaya films, and Cinemalaya Campus, among others.

For more updates, please visit the CCP and Cinemalaya websites. Follow the official CCP and Cinemalaya social media accounts.

MAITUM LGU ASSISTS BANGSAMORO WOMEN’S GROUP. The municipal government of Maitum recently turned over eight sewing and two zigzagger machines to members of the Teneb Bangsamoro Women's Association as part of a livelihood assistance starter packages. The equipment were given by the Department of Labor and Employment - Region 12 to enhance the beneficiaries’ economic activity by starting their own business enterprises. The Maguindanaon group will also be provided by the municipal government a public market stall where they can sell their finished products. Leading the turnover is Maitum, Sarangani Mayor Alexander Bryan Reganit (third from right), together with Mindupok Barangay Captain Mohamad Akmad (fourth from right), and Serbisyong Sarangan program manager Asma Akmad (second from right).

SSS implements number coding in 61 selected branches

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HE Social Security System (SSS) implemented a number coding system and modified service procedures in handling transactions in 61 selected branches nationwide.

The new procedures aim to regulate the number of people transacting in SSS branches amid the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

SSS President and CEO Aurora C. Ignacio on Wednesday signed SSS Circular No. 2020 - 017 that limits the number of walk-in transactions in the branches. It also prescribed the weekly schedule wherein members and employers (ERs) can do their transactions with SSS. The schedule is based on the last digit of their Social Security (SS) or ER ID numbers.

Under the circular, SSS will implement the number coding system and modified service procedures in all 51 branches in the National Capital Region. In Luzon, the new procedures will be implemented in Baguio, Dagupan, Bacoor, and Biñan branches. Meanwhile, in the Visayas and Mindanao, it will also take effect in Cebu, Lapu-Lapu, Bacolod, Iloilo-Central, Cagayan De Oro, and Davao branches.

Walk-in transactions in these branches will be limited to the payment of contributions and loans, compliance to the SS Number Application thru the SSS web, pick-up of Unified Multi-Purpose Identification (UMID) card, presentation of original documents to support claim applications, and other justifiable reasons.

SSS advised members and employers to conduct their transactions on the prescribed schedule, as follows: Mondays for SS or ER ID number ending in 1 or 2; Tuesdays for those ending in 3 or 4; Wednesdays for those ending in 5 or 6; Thursdays for those ending in 7 or 8; and Fridays for those ending in 9 or 0.

For transactions such as funeral and death claims, the SS number of the deceased member will be the basis for the number coding schedule.

If the prescribed transaction day falls on a declared holiday, the member or employer may transact on the next working day. In case a system downtime occurs, the branch will set an appointment for members and employers waiting in line. They can also have the option to wait until the system is once again operational, or opted to come back the following week on their prescribed schedule.

Drop boxes are also available in the said branches. The transacting public can use it to submit documents for transactions that were not mentioned and are not available through

the SSS's online channels. They may also call, text, or send an email to the branch nearest to their residence or workplace. Contact numbers and email addresses of branches are posted at its entrance or found on the branch directory on the SSS website.

The SSS will inform the public if the number coding system and modified service procedures are suspended in the said branches or if it will be imposed on other branches.

"Through these alternative branch service procedures, we are hoping to limit our stakeholders' risk of exposure to COVID-19.

We have also expanded our online services in the My.SSS web portal so that they can transact with us at the convenience of their homes or offices," Ignacio said.

The SSS encourages members and employers to use its digital platforms for their SSS transactions, if available, to avoid having to queue in its branches.

Members may access their contribution records, check the status of their benefit claims and loan applications, and make other transactions through the My.SSS web portal at www.sss.gov.ph, SSS Mobile App, Text-SSS at 2600, and Interactive Voice Response System (IVRS) at 7917-7777.

The submission of maternity notifications (for self-employed, voluntary, and Overseas Filipino Worker members), generation of Payment Reference Numbers (PRN), etc., are also available via the My.SSS web portal and SSS Mobile App. Members may also use the My.SSS web portal for transactions such as the filing of applications for unemployment and retirement benefits, and salary and calamity loans; enrollment of bank accounts for thru-the-bank releases of benefits or loans; and others.

On the other hand, SSS encouraged employers to use the SSS web portal to certify the loan and claim applications of their employees, submit their employment reports, or file their sickness benefit reimbursement applications.

Online and over-the-counter contribution and loan payment facilities are also available for members and employers through various SSS-accredited bank and non-bank collecting partners.

For further information, members and employers may call the SSS' hotline at 1455 or follow its Facebook page at the "Philippine Social Security System" and Instagram account at "mysssph."

mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph / Editor: Jun Lomibao

Cojuangco-Jaworski

Mikee, Jaime in PSA forum

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T’S going to be a special twopart session of the Philippine Sportswriters Association (PSA) Forum on Tuesday with newly elected International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board member Mikee CojuangcoJaworski and Southeast Asian Games karatedo gold medal winner Jamie Lim joining the webcast edition of the weekly program.

Cojuangco-Jaworski, who is also the IOC Representative to the Philippines, will talk about the impact to Philippine sports of her recent election as board member of the Olympic body.

Lim, daughter of basketball great Avelino “Samboy” Lim, will be joined by Lester Castillo, Assistant Vice President of Nestle Philippines-Milo, and Richard Lim, president of the Association for the Advancement of Karatedo, to discuss about the Milo Home Court, an online sports program for the young generation.

The special session presented

by San Miguel Corp., Go For Gold, Amelie Hotel Manila, Braska Restaurant and the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. and powered by Smart with Upstream Media as webcast partner, starts at 10 a.m.

The Forum will be shown live via the PSA Facebook page fb.com/PhilippineSportswritersAssociation and shared on Radyo Pilipinas 2 facebook page.

Sports BusinessMirror

PDD LAUDS 30TH SEAG SUCCESS, NAS IN SONA

By Ramon Rafael Bonilla

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HE success of the 30th Southeast Asian Games didn’t escape President Duterte’s attention as the 11 glorious days in December last year that saw the country running away with the overall championship on top of hosting the biggest games ever merited special mention in his fifth State of the Nation Address (Sona).

“Our athletes prevailed. More than that, we fostered pride, patriotism, genuine sportsmanship and camaraderie with our Southeast Asian brothers and sisters. Indeed, we won as one,” Duterte said in his Sona at the House of Representatives where his live audience of legislators and Cabinet members

practiced strict social distancing protocols.

But it weren’t the SEA Games alone that President Duterte gave special mention. The establishment of the National Academy of Sports (NAS) took a lofty nook early in his the Sona, something that is unprecedented each time the head of the state addresses both chambers of congress to deliver his report to the Filipino people.

President Duterte signed into law the creation of the NAS during the pandemic. As a result, a high-school institution dedicated to molding future top Filipino athletes will rise at the New Clark City, the same centerpiece venue of the country’s hosting of the SEA Games last November 30 to December 11, 2019.

Duterte lauded efforts of all the individuals

who took part in the successful of the hosting of the SEA Games.

“With the commitment of key members of Congress, Executive Department, Phisgoc [Philippine SEA Games Organizing Committee], the Philippine Sports Commission and the Philippine Olympic Committee, we were bound together with one mission to host the 30th Southeast Asian Games,” he said.

The President lauded Republic Act 11470 that established the NAS. “We can now give our deserving student-athletes the training and support they need to excel in their chosen field of endeavor,” he said.

It marked the first time in recent memory that a sitting president mentioned up high his

OLITICAL lines started appearing in the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) horizon with seven members of the POC Executive Board who thumbed down proposed amendments to the body’s constitution resented being called “The Group of Seven” or “Magnificent Seven.”

Archery association president Clint Aranas said the brand creates “divisiveness” in the POC, adding his group at the Executive Board “were very cooperative.”

“I was really surprised during the meeting.

We were labeled as ‘magnificent seven.’ But

if you look at the details of the meetings, we were very cooperative,” Aranas said.

Aranas said labelling them as a renegade group is “unfair” as they responded to the meetings called by the POC leadership.

POC President Rep. Abraham Tolentino, through committee on constitutional amendment head Ricky Vargas, proposed to set an age limit of 70 for the organization’s and those of the national sports association officials.

But this was opposed by Aranas and six others—POC Chairman Steve Hontiveros, First Vice President Jose Romasanta, Second Vice

President Jeff Tamayo, Treasurer Julian Camacho, Auditor Jonne Go and member Robert Mananquil.

Tolentino didn’t get the two-third votes from the board—or nine out of 13—for the proposed amendments that also included a provision abolishing the position of chairman and another that bars an individual from holding more than one sensitive position in the POC and NSAs. “We are thinking differently,” Aranas told an online press conference that his group called on Monday. Joining Aranas in the virtual presser were Romasanta, Camacho, Go and Mananquil.

Aranas and Mananquil said setting an

B

TOLENTINO

ARANAS

age cap of 70 is not viable. They said the likes of Robert Aventajado of taekwondo, Monico Fuentevella of weightlifting, Philip Ella Juico of athletics, Chavit Singson of shooting and Ernesto Echauz of sailing are beyond 70 but remained effective in their tasks.

Ramon Rafael Bonilla

Ronaldo’s impact decisive for Juve’s 9th straight title

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LAINE, Minnesotta—Without a gallery around him on the 18th green, Michael Thompson settled for a subdued victory celebration at the 3M Open with a FaceTime call home to his wife and children in Georgia.

The tears came from him and his wife as soon as they saw each other on the screen.

Thompson birdied two of the last three holes Sunday for a four-under 67 and a two-stroke victory, finishing off his second Professional Golfers Association (PGA) Tour win seven years after his first.

“It is a little sad that there wasn’t any body out there to cheer on some of the great shots that I hit toward the end, but I know everybody who’s rooting for me at least was watching and screaming at their TV,” Thompson said. “This is definitely a win for everybody who supported me throughout the years. It doesn’t diminish the excitement.”

Adam Long took was second after a 64.

Richy Werenski, who had the 18-hole lead and shared it with Thompson after both Friday and Saturday, shot a 70 for his worst

administration’s achievements in sports over the more onerous economic, social, health, security and education concerns.

And while the sports enjoyed a lofty billing in the President’s penultimate Sona, The Join Administrative Order allowing the return to training of the country’s professional basketball and football athletes was finally completed.

The PSC, Department of Health and the Games and Amusement Board collaborated for the resolution that was signed on Monday, thus paving the way for return-to-training activities for the two sports.

PSC Chairman William Ramirez, Heath Secretary Francisco Duque III and GAB Chairman Baham Mitra signed the resolution.

IT’S GETTING HOT IN P.O.C. KITCHEN P

Free food for IPs, LSIs LING Roasters, one of the chain of rotisseries of Bounty Agro Ventures Inc., recently donated thousands of packed meals to members of indigenous communities who were stranded at the Rizal Memorial Baseball Stadium while waiting for a ride back to their homes.

The donations were supervised through the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples.

“We cannot leave our countrymen behind in those conditions—we cannot leave them hungry and turn a blind eye on them, especially our IPs [indigenous peoples],” BAVI President Ronald Mascariñas said.

“Many of them don’t have enough money in their pockets for the high cost of food here in Manila. That is why we are assuring them that we will send over packs of ready-to-eat meals until they are able to get back home,” he added.

The stadium was turned into a shelter for locally stranded individuals or LSIs.

Tuesday, July 28, 2020 B7

JUVENTUS’ Cristiano Ronaldo (second left) celebrates after scoring his team’s first goal against Sampdoria. AP

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OME—It’s no exaggeration to say that Cristiano Ronaldo had more of an impact on Juventus’ record-extending ninth straight Serie A title than anyone else.

The five-time Ballon d’Or winner matched a record by scoring in 11 straight league matches before the break for the

coronavirus pandemic and quickly regained his form during the restart by reaching the 30-goal mark after only 30 games in his second season in Italy.

For his 31st goal, Ronaldo scored the opener when Juventus beat Sampdoria, 2-0, on Sunday to seal the title with two games to spare.

Ronaldo needs only one more goal to break a tie for the Juventus single-season record for league goals set by Felice Borel in 1933-1934.

Ronaldo’s 10 goals after the lockdown are more than any other player has scored in Europe’s top five leagues, with Manchester City’s Raheem Sterling and Bayern Munich’s

Robert Lewandowski each scoring nine.

“Records are always important, but the important thing is that the team wins,” Ronaldo said. “These things are nice, but the scoring title is a natural process that comes as a consequence of scoring to win games for the team.”

At 35, Ronaldo has started every match since the restart.

“He has this incredible ability to recover,” Juventus coach Maurizio Sarri said. “I think it’s just in his DNA, his ability to project himself on to the next goal, every time. His mental and physical recovery rate is definitely unique.”

Ronaldo has developed an effective partnership with Paulo Dybala during the restart.

“We might have some moments in a game where we don’t cover the penalty area to perfection, but everything is compensated by their individual strength,” Sarri said. “We’re talking about two players who combined to score 41 goals this season. That’s a world-class level.”

Until recently, the most consecutive titles won in Serie A had been five, first set by Juventus from 1931-35.

The five-season streak was then matched

by Torino from 1943-1949—including a period interrupted by World War II and Inter Milan from 2006-2010.

Juventus already has the longest streak in Europe’s top five leagues. Although Bayern Munich, which recently won the Bundesliga for the eighth straight time, isn’t far behind.

The longest top-flight streak anywhere in Europe was 14 set by Latvian club Skonto from 1991-2004 and Lincoln of Gibraltar from 2003-2016. AP

Thompson wins 3M Open golfest by two strokes round of the tournament and settled for a nine-way tie for third—three strokes back.

Tony Finau finished in the third-place group, too, after a 68. Finau was the only one among the five world top-30 players in the field to reach the weekend, far outperforming fellow high-profile peers Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka, Tommy Fleetwood and Paul Casey.

Thompson finished at 19-under 265 at the TPC Twin Cities. He was more nervous than he anticipated, even without spectators.

“It means so much to get a win, and it gets you into so many different tournaments and solidifies your job for two more years.

That’s enough pressure for anybody, let alone having fans out there,” said Thompson, who has a three-year-old son and an infant daughter he and his wife adopted in March.

Nobody throughout the windy and muggy week in Minnesota was steadier than Thompson, who entered the week 151st in

the FedEx Cup standings and rocketed up to 39th on the way to Tennessee for the World Golf Championships event. He had three bogeys in 72 holes.

He hit solidly out of the sand to set up a birdie on the 16th and take sole possession of the lead. He deftly steered around the water danger on the 18th, landing his approach on the back of the green within 15 feet. With Long in the clubhouse, having played five groups ahead, Thompson had two putts to win. He needed only one, bending backward and thrusting his arms straight up in the air after the ball dropped in the cup.

Thompson’s best previous finish in this stopped-and-restarted 2020 season was a tie for eighth at the Travelers Championship in Connecticut, and he missed the cut in his last start at the Workday Charity Open in Ohio two weeks ago. For this win, he not only secured a spot in the PGA Championship, the US Open and next year’s Masters, but

a prize of $1,188,000. That’s nearly 12% of his career earnings on the tour. The US Open, rescheduled for September 17 to 20, is at Winged Foot in New York, which Thompson called his favorite course “in the entire world.”

In stroke play over the last four seasons, Finau has finished 35 rounds inside the top three, by far the most without a win on tour over that stretch. Tommy Fleetwood (20) has the second most.

“They don’t give out secondplace trophies, third-place trophies,” said Finau, who shot a 78 on the final round of the Memorial last week to finish eighth in Ohio after sharing the 36-hole lead there. “I’ve learned that the hard way with lot of them coming early in my career, but I continue to just believe and hope for the best for my future.” AP

MICHAEL THOMPSON finishes off his second Professional Golfers’ Association Tour win seven years after his first. AP

SPORTS WITHOUT BORDERS Vincent Juico | @VJuico Instagram vpjp_j vince.juico@gmail.com

United City FC ERIC GOTTSCHALK, CEO of MMC Sportz Asia, recently shared a press release on the multi-titled Ceres Negros becoming the United City Football Club.

According to the release, MMC Sportz Asia will lead a group of private investors to manage the club through the 2020 Philippines Football League and Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Cup competitions.

The signing of the agreement cemented the transfer of ownership of the Ceres Negros Football Company, currently the No. 1-ranked team in Southeast Asia and three-time defending champion of the Philippine Football League (PFL), to a group of private investors which is managed

by MMC Sportz Asia.

“We would like to thank Mr. [Leo Rey] Yanson and his team for agreeing to the transfer of the Club into our name as this allows the players to continue participating in the PFL and hopefully also in the AFC Cup for the 2020 season,” says Gottschalk, who will be the team’s point of contact.

“We will now immediately apply for the permission with the PFF to rename the club to ‘United City Football Club’ and request the PFF to support our statement of intent to continue participating in the AFC Cup,” Gottschalk adds.

Gottschalk furthers: “We would like to honor the legacy which Mr. Yanson created when he founded the Ceres Negros Club and we will try to continue the development of Philippine football, especially the professional league and the national team.”

Gottschalk says additional announcements will be made regarding the players and staff that have already committed to join the new team and give a clear insight into the new ownership structure in the coming days.

“We believe transparency on all levels is key to the success of the new team and will unveil the names in due course,” he says.

Gottschalk says the team’s marketing activities are well under way “with the fans at the heart of everything we do starting with a logo competition, with the final decision to come from the players.”

“We are proud to also announce that we have received the commitment of 16 of the original 21 registered Ceres Negros players [not including James Younghusband who has retired recently from football], to play for the new club with more details to be shared in the coming days.”

“We are also retaining almost the entire staff around General Manager Ace Bright, and it is our intent to have Coach Risto [Vidacovic] return as the head coach. The aim is to keep the team and staff together as much as possible and allow them the well-deserved chance to continue to play football amid all the challenges that everyone has been facing.”

There you have it, folks, Ceres Negros is now under new ownership—United City FC. I met Eric during the 30th Southeast Asian Games last December. Hopefully he and the rest of the ownership group continue the winning tradition of Ceres Negros.

MMC Sportz Asia barely warmed its seat as owner of United City when I saw a question online—Didn’t MMC Sportz Asia own a Philippine football club in 2019? I asked Eric if they did and his reply via e-mail was a denial.

“No, we never owned a team, we were hired in 2019 to support Global on the sponsorship and marketing activities and sponsored the front of the jersey last season, but we withdrew from the agreement due to the long pending official ownership transfer.”

For the 2020 season, the new club owners approached MMC to renew the agreement with the assurance to build a long-term vision for a sustainable football club in the Philippines.

“Unfortunately, we had to terminate the agreement with the new owners due to the ongoing internal issues of the club, which we have no interest in being associated with,” Eric says. “We have taken a stance to tackle the grassroot issues of the professional football league by directly investing into a local football team, where we would be able to initiate all the changes we believe are required to be successful on and off the field.

“Fortunately and unfortunately, the opportunity came up with Ceres Negros, based on the past seasons the most successful club in the Philippines, and we decided to, first and foremost assure that the team with its current staff and players will be able to participate in the 2020 PFL season before we put our football philosophy forward to implement fundamental changes to the internal set up of a professional football club.

“I hope this clarifies our participation in the new club.”

The new club ownership did the right thing by making it a priority to make sure to get the commitment of the players which required buy-in from the players themselves into the philosophy and the system to be implemented composed of defensive and offensive principles.

The ownership of a domestic or local football club now raises the ante of management and ownership, thus setting the gold standard for other Philippine football clubs.

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EW YORK—The World Series champion Washington Nationals stood six feet apart along the first base line and watched as a banner commemorating their title was raised, then took a knee alongside the New York Yankees in a call for social justice.

Star slugger Juan Soto wasn’t there—he was flagged hours before the first pitch for Covid-19. Neither, of course, were any fans.

Hardly ideal, but there was hardball nonetheless.

“I’d rather be playing baseball than not,” Nationals ace Max Scherzer said.

Major League Baseball (MLB) returned to action this weekend with a flourish of highs and lows as the sport attempts to play a 60-game regular season amid a coronavirus pandemic still plaguing much of the United States.

The baseball itself was a breath of fresh air—even through all those face coverings.

Opening day gems from Jacob deGrom, Shane Bieber and Kyle Hendricks. A mesmerizing home run from Giancarlo Stanton. Deft baserunning by Lorenzo Cain that baffled the entire Cubs infield.

But Covid-era baseball has been unmistakably different.

Cardboard cutouts of fans, managers arguing with umpires through face masks, air fives after home runs—not to mention a stream of players put on the coronavirus injured list, including potential outbreaks within the Marlins and Reds clubhouses.

The 60-game sprint started with a bang— thunder, actually, along with a torrential downpour in the rain-shortened opener between the Yankees and Nationals. Despite that, it was the sport’s mostwatched regular season game in nine years.

Later that night, Mookie Betts made his Dodgers debut in Los Angeles, one day after signing a $365 million, 12-year deal to stay there through 2032.

Among Betts’s first acts—kneeling during the national anthem ahead of the opener.

There’s been a push within baseball this week to address racial injustice four years after the sport was largely silent during quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s protests—only one baseball player, Oakland catcher Bruce Maxwell in 2017, had kneeled during the anthem prior to this season.

That’s changed this year. Every team participated in Black Lives Matter-inspired ceremonies before their opener, and numerous players and coaches have taken a knee.

“Now is when people will finally listen,” explained Stanton, a Black slugger with the New York Yankees who plans to kneel throughout the season.

Forced into an unprecedented season, Major League Baseball is taking the chance to break with tradition, unleashing a trio of controversial changes.

The National League adopted the designated hitter for the first time, and Mets slugger Yoenis Céspedes—sidelined since 2018 with various lower body injuries—hit the first home run by a DH during a game between NL teams on opening day.

There’s a new protocol for extra innings, with each team awarded an automatic runner at second base to start each inning after the ninth.

Angels two-way star Shohei Ohtani became the majors’ first designated duck on the pond Friday night. A’s first baseman Matt Olson caught him trying to take third on a grounder to kill Los Angeles’ inning, then slugged a game-ending grand slam in the bottom of the frame.

The change was poorly received, but after seeing it in action, some traditionalists are seeing the appeal.

“It’s another one of these changes that we might end up liking,” 64-year-old Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “Made it interesting.”

Lastly, MLB unveiled another modification hours before first pitch, expanding the postseason from 10 teams to 16.

Some clubs with injured stars might need the bigger field to qualify.

Sports BusinessMirror

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| Tuesday, July 28, 2020 mirror_sports@yahoo.com.ph Editor: Jun Lomibao

Covid-19 ERA BASEBALL: UNMISTAKABLY DIFFERENT A NEW YORK Mets mascot dances in the stands as members of Washington Nationals kneel and hold a piece of black fabric before their opening day game against the New York Yankees at the Nationals Park. AP

Houston’s Justin Verlander, the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw, Texas’ Corey Kluber and Washington’s Stephen Strasburg have all gotten hurt—not surprising to those concerned about pitcher health following the condensed preseason camp.

Strasburg was scratched from a start Saturday because of a nerve issue in his pitching hand.

“To be frank,” the World Series MVP said, “this season is a bit of a mess.”

Soto’s stunning positive test has been followed by others.

The Atlanta Braves are without primary catchers Tyler Flowers and Travis d’Arnaud because they have coronavirus symptoms.

Cincinnati Reds second baseman Mike Moustakas and center fielder Nick Senzel felt sick Sunday, a day after a teammate went on the injured list because he tested positive for Covid-19.

The Miami Marlins scratched right-hander Jose Urena from his scheduled start Sunday in Philadelphia and delayed their postgame trip home amid concerns about a possible virus outbreak within the team.

“There’s nothing we can really do,” Marlins pitcher Robert Dugger said. “It’s out of our control. We just do the best we can with the masks and social distancing and all that, and hope for the best.”

Players have adopted some virus-minded celebrations, including air fives and foot taps, but it’s hardly been perfect. High-fives and fist

bumps continue to be common, and distancing in the dugout has appeared to be a challenge even with some reserves watching from the stands. Clubs have had a particularly hard time upholding protocols after big plays, like when the A’s piled around Olson at home plate following his game-ending slam Friday.

The news Sunday of potential outbreaks with the Reds and Marlins was a reminder of how fragile the season could be.

“We all have to take responsibility,” Twins slugger Nelson Cruz said. “I take care

of myself, don’t go around or mess around. But that has to include the whole team.

“If 10 or 15 or 25 guys do it and the rest are messing around, it can mess everything up. We’re always talking about that—being conscious what you’re doing. It’s not only for yourself, it’s for the whole team. The team can be devastated if a few guys test positive.”

College basketball stuck in holding pattern during pandemic

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ASEBALL has begun its coronavirusdelayed season with limited long-distance travel and no fans in the stands.

The National Basketball Association (NBA) has its Disney World bubble. The National Hockey League (NHL) will have two bubbles, in Toronto and Edmonton.

National Football League (NFL) rookies began reporting to training facilities last week as teams build up toward the start of training camp.

But while the major sports are finding ways to return to competition, college basketball is in a holding pattern, much like college football.

College basketball coaches do have an adv antage over the football coaches while in limbo.

Since their season starts later, they get a chance to see how things play out, both in professional sports and in college football.

“I know this for sure: it’s not going to be like any other season we’ve ever had,” Southern Miss coach Jay Ladner said. “And even if we have a season, you’re certainly looking at all types of changes and we all know that.

But football is certainly the first order

of business for administrators. A lot of what happens to them is going to drive, eventually, what happens to us.”

The 2019-2020 college basketball season came to an emphatic end on March 17 when the

growing pandemic led to cancellation of the NCAA Tournament. A handful of leagues managed to complete conference tournaments, but most were just getting started when the season plug was pulled.

In the four months since, the pandemic has ballooned as hot spots have popped up across the country. The sports world has started to come back to life in recent weeks, starting with NASCAR and the UFC. The other major sports followed, but the NCAA has delayed a decision about starting the fall sports seasons, including football.

College basketball, as it stands now, is slated to begin on November 10. The NCAA initially looked at bumping up the start of the season to afford more scheduling wiggle room, but that was shelved as Covid-19

cases rose in dozens of states.

Basketball players, like other student-athletes, were allowed to return to campus for voluntary workouts last month. Some schools halted workouts after multiple athletes tested positive for Covid-19, but others have been able to continue offseason programs with multiple health precautions in place.

Whether the season starts on time, gets pushed back or is shelved altogether will depend on what happens with the pandemic and other sports over the next four months.

Stuck in a waiting game they can’t control, basketball coaches have little choice but to prepare as if the season will start on time.

“People have said, what if you don’t play until January?” Sacramento State coach Brian Katz said. ”I don’t know, but I do know the alternative isn’t good. If we did nothing and all of a sudden we are on track, we’re behind the 8-ball. So the key is to go on as usual, within the confines and framework of what we’re allowed to do, and otherwise don’t think about it. We have to be ready for any and everything.”

The college basketball season could end up having a different look this season.

The Big Ten and Pac-12 opted to eliminate nonconference games in football and the other major conferences are considering it.

College basketball could take a similar route, which would push back the start of the season until January for most schools. If the pandemic continues to roil into the fall, the NCAA could push the start of the entire season into January, setting the stage for a potential May Madness instead of March. AP

EARLY BIRD American Magic, the AC75 “Defiant” ship, sails off Newport, Rhode Island, in October last year. The New York Yacht Club’s American Magic has become the first challenger to sail on the New Zealand waters where the America’s Cup will be contested next year. AP

PRESIDENT Donald J. Trump: We will make it later in the season! AP

Trump now says he won’t throw ceremonial first pitch at NYY game

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ASHINGTON—President Donald J. Trump won’t throw out the first pitch at Yankee Stadium next month after all.

In a tweet Sunday, Trump blamed the turn of events on his “strong focus” on the coronavirus, vaccines and the economy. “We will make it later in the season!” he promised.

Just three days ago, Trump revealed during a White House briefing that he’d throw the first pitch at Yankee Stadium on August 15. Trump made the announcement on Major League Baseball’s opening day Thursday as former Yankees pitcher Mariano Rivera watched from the briefing room.

After months of playing down its seriousness, Trump recently began starting to show the public that he is taking the virus seriously. He has resumed holding televised briefings about virus developments and last week canceled Republican convention events that had been set for late August in Jacksonville, Florida. Florida is among several states where the virus is raging.

But on Saturday, the White House tweeted a photo of Trump and former Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre after they played golf at Trump’s private club in Bedminster, New Jersey.

With baseball teams playing in largely empty stadiums, Trump wouldn’t have had to

contend with crowd reaction to his appearance at the Bronx stadium. Some of Trump’s previous appearances at major sporting events have drawn mixed responses.

But another issue could have been tricky for Trump, who has been very critical of athletes taking a knee during the national anthem before games.

The Yankees and the Washington Nationals took a knee before the season’s opening game last Thursday in Washington, then stood for the national anthem. New York also had two players kneel for the national anthem Saturday, Aaron Hicks and Giancarlo Stanton. Both have said they will continue to kneel during the anthem throughout the season.

During an interview last Thursday night with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, Trump said he would take part in the prestigious tradition of throwing out the first pitch for the Yankees, but said he hoped players would stand during the national anthem.

“It’s great that baseball is back, and other sports are back. I hope everyone’s standing; I hope they’re not going to be kneeling when the flag is raised. I don’t like to see that,” Trump said.

Some New York City politicians, including Mayor Bill de Blasio and Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr., had complained loudly about Trump throwing the Yankees’ first pitch. AP