Weak peso good for some sectors

A WEAK peso is good for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs), business process outsourcing (BPO) companies, merchandise exports, and local tourism, an analyst said.

This came as a former Socioeconomic Planning secretary said the currency hitting P55 against the US dollar was unlikely, even if

In an interview on Wednesday, Christina Ulang, head of research at First Metro Investment Corp. (FMIC), said those claiming that a weak peso had more drawbacks

- pact more broadly.

The Philippines’ dollar earnings should be looked at “if we want to fully evaluate if the current rate of the peso against the greenback

she added.

The peso was P53.46 to the dollar at Thursday’s close.

According to her, almost half of the country’s gross domestic prod-

from dollar earnings, which are now increasing.

merchandise exports,” Ulang said.

The FMIC research head denied that a weak peso is disadvantageous to the country’s debt servicing, which is mostly dollar-denominated.

“Philippine government debt [is] now at a lower 41 percent of GDP, compared [with] 70 percent 10 years ago,” she said.

In a text message, former National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) Director General Romulo Neri said the peso reaching P55 would not happen if “export growth decline is corrected and recovers.”

Filipinos should think of the export revenues that the currency’s weakness can bring, he said.

“Forget about [the] peso recover-

depreciation would encourage more exports” and import substitution, “and discourage too [many imports of consumer goods],” Neri said.