BPI appoints Purisima before it streamlines Family staffers
PNoy-era finance secretary Cesar Purisima is set to join the Bank of the Philippine Islands as independent director, as the country’s oldest bank prepares to fold thrift bank subsidiary, BPI Family Savings, into its operations.
Purisima, who had just turned senior citizen, will fill up the board vacancy created with the resignation, due to health reasons, of former BPI president Xavier Loinaz.
Along with the Purisima appointment, BPI reclassified Ramos-era finance secretary, Phinma chief executive Ramon del Rosario Jr., from independent director to non-executive director. Purisima will be joining GMA-era press secretary Ignacio Bunye in the BPI board, with the more senior Bunye wise not to stray into topics such as Hyatt 10 and Hello, Garci in small talks with his repentant GMA traveler.
As to the matter of BPIFamily Savings merger, easily 10 to 15 percent of the 3,000 employees of the thrift bank could be streamlined with the integration of backroom operations and closure of adjacent branches, if the initial banking chatter is to be believed.
One likely candidate for closure: The Family Savings head office at Paseo de Roxas and De la Rosa no less, for being just across the street from the BPI headquarters.
BPI itself had 14,385 employees as of end-2019, according to its latest general information sheet, much lower than the 21,429 employee count reported by the Wall Street Journal.
Sell high, buy back lower
It looks like the chief finance officer of DITO Telecom knows how to time the market.
After unloading 300,000 DITO shares between P13.77 and P14.67 during the first trading week of the year, CFO Joseph John Ong bought back nearly half of those same shares the following week while they were falling, catching them anywhere from P11.91 to P11.98 amid profittaking sentiment.
Known within the company with his initials JLO, Ong hopefully did not catch a falling knife, with renewed buying interest reversing DITO’s downtrend trend for the stock to close yesterday at P11.60.
Money talks
• San Miguel Corp. has elected president Ramon S. Ang’s eldest son, John Paul, director, concurrent with his position as president and chief executive of Eagle Cement.
John Paul Ang filled the SMC board vacancy with the passing of former DBP chairman Reynaldo David.
• Seafood City, the largest Filipino-American supermarket chain, opened yesterday its fourth Canadian branch in the Scarborough suburb of Toronto, home to a large Filipino immigrant community.
Seafood City now has 32 supermarkets in North America and Hawaii since it opened its first store in National City, California in 1989.
Heard through the grapevine
After Filipino nurses and fishermen, the labor-short United Kingdom has started importing potato farmers from the Philippines.
An initial batch of 50 Filipino workers have already found emergency employment in Jersey potato farms after Polish workers abandoned the Channel Islands in the wake of Brexit. E-mail: moneygoround.manila@yahoo.com