GSIS raises RCR take to 8.18%

The Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) [link] has increased its stake in the Gokongwei-owned RL Commercial REIT [RCR 5.02, up 1.4%; 23% avgVol] to 8.18% through the purchase of over 790 million shares of RCR over the past 60 days. GSIS now owns 877.43 million RCR shares worth approximately P4.4 billion at RCR’s closing price of P5.02/share.

MB bottom-line: The only way this makes sense to me is if GSIS was one of the main buyers of the 1.7 billion share RCR block sale that RCR’s parent company, Robinsons Land [RLC 15.48, up 2.0%; 126% avgVol], conducted back on April 5. I say that because (according to my data) there were only around 130 million RCR shares of volume traded on the open market during that 60-day period. Either way, GSIS picked an interesting time to jump onboard, given that the block sale (and the subsequent disclosure that it was done in preparation of a large share swap transaction) took the market by surprise. I wonder if Wick Veloso and the GSIS representatives knew about RLC’s non-public plans when they bought the shares at a 5% discount to market. Presumably, they (and any potential buyers) could have inferred at least the size and shape of the strategy from the block sale itself. Still, I’d love to know if GSIS started buying off the public market before that day, or if it only started soaking up shares after its participation in the block sale.

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