Henry Sy children undertake coordinated SM share disposals
The children of taipan Henry Sy Sr. have undertaken coordinated share disposals in SM Investments and SM Prime ahead of the Yuletide holidays.
According to regulatory disclosures, Teresita and Henry Jr., the two vice chairmen, along with recently retired president Harley each sold 187,667 shares of SM Investments on Dec. 5 at an identical price of P960 a share.
That works out to about P180 million arguable windfall for each sibling. Also on the same day, Herbert and Hans trimmed their respective stakes in SM Prime, with each sibling disposing an identical 5,353,598 shares at P36.50 each.
That works out to a P195 million arguable windfall for each of the two brothers.
We had to qualify the windfalls from the coordinated disposals as purported and arguable since, according to the SM grapevine, the share disposals were merely “inter-company transfers.”
An SM Group spokesman later declined to identify as to which SM company the Sy disposals went to.
Still, one buyer has emerged, and it was none other than the SM Prime chairman himself, Henry Jr.
Also known as Big Boy, the eldest of the male siblings disclosed he acquired on the same day over 7.1 million SM Prime shares at P36.50 each, the same price that younger brothers Hans and Herbert had disposed their shares.
As a prelude to the December disposals, the three siblings at the SM Investments board – Tessie, Big Boy, and Harley – transferred in September all their direct shareholdings and warehoused them to indirect accounts held by their unnamed broker (is that you, Eddie Gobing?) to facilitate easier trading in the future.
The series of personal disposals were the first known transfers that the six Sy siblings have undertaken since SM Prime and SM Investments went public.
Ex-Dominguez company settles with BIR
PTFC Redevelopment, a real estate company that had Carlos Dominguez III as president and chief executive until he was drafted into the Duterte cabinet last year, has quietly settled its festering dispute with the taxmen.
According to new regulatory filings, PTFC, formerly the Philippine Tobacco Flue-Curing Corp., disclosed that it had shelled out P4.4 million sometime in August to finally settle a decade-long litigation with the Bureau of Internal Revenue.
Aside from Dominguez, who has since been replaced by his brother Leo in the board, PTFC also counts a former BIR commissioner, Bienvenido Tan Jr., as chairman, which probably explains the company's earlier stance to fight it out with the tax brigade all the way to the Supreme Court.
Heard through the grapevine
The Philippine Daily Inquirer has informed its employees that the expected closing of sale of the broadsheet tabloid to San Miguel president Ramon S. Ang has been moved to end-March 2018 instead of this year-end.
Despite the corporate slogan “Dare to Ask,” none of the staffers dared to inquire if the company has also prepared any package for the rank-and-file who wish to join the señoras for the exit door.