London firm acquires 4.95% stake in Ayala

MANILA, Philippines - London-based investment manager Marathon Asset Management now has acquired a 4.95 percent stake in conglomerate Ayala Corp.

In a report filed with the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday, Marathon said it accumulated a total of 29.407 million Ayala shares with a 3.9 percent voting control.

Marathon said its clients have a long-term investment interest in Ayala.

Founded in 1998, Marathon manages over $10 billion in capital for a globally diverse client base comprising a broad range of institutional investors.   It is focused on opportunistic investing in credit and fixed income markets worldwide.

Marathon manages a family of investment programs principally focused on credit strategies including hedge funds, managed accounts, single-client funds and collateralized loan, and debt obligation vehicles.

Ayala is one of the highly-diversified business groups in the country with interests in real estate and hotels, financial services and insurance, telecommunications, water distribution, electronics manufacturing solution services, automotive dealerships, business process outsourcing, power generation and transport infrastructure.

The conglomerate also has investments in overseas real estate projects and technology related ventures.

Ayala grew its first half profit 23 percent to P6.1 billion, mainly driven by the double digit growth in its property, banking, water and electronics businesses.

Core income grew at an ever faster pace at 35 percent to P6.3 billion. This excludes the impact of the accelerated depreciation of Globe Telecom as a result of its network modernization program and the revaluation gains realized at AG Holdings in the first half of last year.

As of end-June, Ayala had gross debt of P49 billion and cash of P23 billion. After it issued a P10-billion 15-year corporate bond last May, which was the longest tenor issued by a publicly-listed corporate, the company raised another P6.45 billion in cash as it placed 15 million common shares it held in treasury.