MVP’s offer

It’s long been planned and considered and now it’s finally coming into fruition.

Tycoon Manuel V. Pangilinan or MVP wants to delist his sprawling infrastructure conglomerate Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC) from the Philippine Stock Exchange 17 years after it listed on the local bourse in 2006 by way of introduction.

For years now, MPIC has been considering delisting as management deems that the company’s shares are significantly undervalued by the market. This may be due to the regulatory hurdles besetting some of its businesses such as the tollways and water.

Some say it might also be that the market is waiting for a clear succession plan from Pangilinan.

At 77, MVP is still the workaholic boss; he holds meetings even on Sundays with his executives, often at the PLDT office in Makati. Although sometime in March, Pangilinan told Context.ph that he is seriously contemplating retirement and is in search of a new CEO for MPIC.

In any case, MPIC said it is taking the company private with a P49-billion tender offer.

Will investors take it? This early, some analysts are already saying the offer price of P4.63 per share is too low.

April Lynn Tan, chief equity strategist at COL Financial, in fact, advised investors not to participate in the tender offer.

“[W]e deem the tender offer price of P4.63 per share to be too low and we advise investors not to participate in this round of tender offer. We believe there is a likelihood for the consortium to increase the offer price in the subsequent round of tender offer should it fail to acquire enough shares that will meet the threshold for voluntary delisting,” Tan said, adding that the tender offer price presents a steep 54 percent discount to its NAV (net asset value) estimate for MPIC.

Nicky Franco, head of research of Abacus Securities, said the fairness opinion has to be completely independent from the tender offer.

Franco said the market was “spoiled by Ramon Ang’s buyout of Eagle Cement” at P22 per share or higher than the 12-month average price.

Note that in this country, tender offers aren’t usually generous, with some even brazenly below the average price.

COL Financial’s April Tan believes there will be a better offer but for now, that’s still a guessing game.

What is clear now is that the market is speculating. MPIC’s share price rallied by 3.99 percent to close at P4.43 per share.

Will MPIC shareholders, including government financial institutions and foreign investors, take MVP’s offer? Let’s wait and see.

Tony TanCaktiong is having a jolly year

Remember my McDonald’s column last March? This time, I decided to check its biggest competitor, the Jollibee Group, to see how it’s doing.

Happily, the Tony TanCaktiong-led company reported that it’s been “benefitting from post-pandemic consumer confidence as the company continues to beat its pre-pandemic results with a record-breaking performance last year” which it hopes to continue this year.

This can only mean good news for investors and potential franchisees, as this means the company is now back on its feet and growing.

Let’s look at the indicators.

The Jollibee Group’s system wide sales (SWS) – a measure of all sales to consumers both from company owned and franchised stores – grew by 38.5 percent in the fourth quarter of 2022 compared to the same period in 2021, and by 40.2 percent for the entire year of 2022.

With this, the company has surpassed its pre-pandemic sales performance in 2018, which is considered a banner year for the company.

In all, after two years of challenging macroeconomic conditions brought about by the pandemic, the JFC Group was able to generate an operating profit of P9.9 billion in 2022, 58.4 percent higher compared to 2021 and 6.5 percent better than its 2018 pre-pandemic operating income level of P9.3 billion.

However, it sees challenges persisting this year, projecting systemwide sales for 2023 to be up by 15 percent to 20 percent, lower than 2022 sales.

Despite the lower sales projection, the company is planning a bold expansion of 550 to 600 owned and franchised stores in the country this year, higher than the 542 stores opened last year.

It now has a recorded 1,208 stores in the Philippines.

Reverse colonization

Against this backdrop, Jollibee Group’s quest for global domination is on track with plans to continue expanding abroad.

It has a goal of having 500 Jollibee stores in North America in the next five to seven years from around 69 at present.

Last year, I had the chance to visit Jollibee Times Square and I saw the long queues.

It’s a “reverse colonization” of sorts and I hope other local companies continue to bring Filipino brands abroad.

Injap Sia says Hola Spain!

Speaking of reverse colonization, tycoon Edgar “Injap” Sia II is bringing his hotel brand Hotel101 to Madrid, Spain.

This marks Hotel101’s foray in Europe. Sia’s Hotel101 Global has already acquired a 6,593-square meter prime commercial land in Madrid for the site of the hotel. 
This will be Hotel101’s second overseas location after Niseko, Japan.

In all, Injap is eyeing 25 countries for Hotel101’s expansion by as early as 2026.

Perhaps Hotel101 can also serve other locally-made products – from our artisan chocolates to mangoes – once it opens its doors overseas.

This can only be good for the Philippines. It’s high time the world experiences the many Filipino brands we can offer.

*      *      *

Email: [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @eyesgonzales. Column archives at EyesWideOpen on FB.