the Outsider - PSE Points to Ponder

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RLC, the Gokongweis’ property arm, finds cash in the REIT machine

Residential sales are quickening, financing costs are easing, and the balance sheet is flush. But the price of growth is showing up in margins. Robinsons Land Corporation entered 2026 with the air of a property company that has learned to enjoy several kinds of weather. In the first quarter, consolidated revenues rose by 11% year on year to ₱12.28bn , helped by a sturdier mall business, resilient offices, brisker hotel trade, and, most strikingly, a jump in residential sales. Net income climbed 9% to ₱4.40bn . Yet the result was less exuberant when viewed through the eyes of common shareholders: net income attributable to the parent rose by just 2% to ₱3.54bn , and earnings per share inched up to ₱0.74 from ₱0.72 . The headline, then, is not simply that Robinsons Land is growing. It is that the composition of its growth is changing. Its recurring-income machine remains formidable: rental income still accounted for 48% of revenues , increasing 5% to ₱5.87bn . But the livelie...

Tendering in the Dark: The Case of DoubleDragon’s MerryMart Tender

MerryMart shareholders are being asked to choose before the lights are fully on. The SEC and PSE should not let that pass. In a well-functioning market, a tender offer should sharpen a shareholder’s choice. Sell, hold, or demand more. In MerryMart Consumer Corp.’s case, the choice has instead become oddly murky. DoubleDragon Corp. is offering to acquire MM shares at ₱0.48 apiece , half in cash and half in newly issued DoubleDragon shares valued at ₱9.30 each , after agreeing to buy a 35% block from Injap Investments Inc. and launching a mandatory tender offer for the remaining 65% of MM shares. The tender offer period runs from May 18 to June 16, 2026 , with settlement scheduled for June 24, 2026 . Yet as shareholders weigh whether to tender, the most basic instruments of judgment appear to be missing. As of this writing, PSE EDGE’s financial reports page shows MerryMart’s latest annual figures as fiscal year ended December 31, 2024 , while its latest quarterly financia...

Injap Sia’s MerryMart Reckoning

DoubleDragon’s tender offer gives MM shareholders an exit. For many, it also turns a paper loss into something harder to ignore. When MerryMart Consumer Corp. listed in June 2020, the pitch was simple, timely, and seductive: a home-grown grocery chain, backed by Edgar “Injap” Sia II’s reputation for scaling Mang Inasal, would ride the pandemic-era appetite for essential retail and roll out a national network of stores. The company sold 1.594bn primary shares at ₱1.00 apiece , raising about ₱1.6bn in gross proceeds , with the proceeds earmarked for store expansion, distribution centers, and working capital. There were no selling shareholders in the IPO; this was a growth-capital story, not an exit. Six years later, that story has been repriced. DoubleDragon Corporation has launched a tender offer for MerryMart shares at ₱0.48 per share , following its planned acquisition of 2.658bn MM shares , or 35% of MerryMart, from Injap Investments Inc. The tender offer covers up to 4.937bn s...

SM Prime vs. Ayala Land: Two Property Giants, One Slump, Unequal Pain

At SM Prime, the slowdown is a bruise. At Ayala Land, it is closer to the bone. The Philippine property cycle has turned less forgiving. But the pain is not being distributed evenly. In the first quarter of 2026, SM Prime Holdings and Ayala Land both showed the same basic symptom: weaker real-estate development sales. Yet their accounts tell very different stories. At SM Prime, the slump is being muffled by malls. At Ayala Land, it is moving quickly from the income statement to the cash flow statement and into the balance sheet. SM Prime’s real-estate sales fell to ₱7.76bn in Q1 2026 from ₱9.22bn a year earlier, a decline of roughly 16% . But rent rose to ₱21.61bn from ₱20.02bn , allowing total revenue to inch up to ₱33.28bn while net income remained almost unchanged at ₱11.87bn . In other words, the developer inside SM Prime coughed; the landlord kept breathing. Ayala Land’s figures are more exposed to the weather. Its real estate revenue fell to ₱36.25bn from ₱...

Max’s Group Q1 2026 Results: Lean Cuisine

The Filipino restaurant group is learning to do more with less. Investors now want proof that discipline can become cash. For years, restaurant chains in emerging markets were judged by a simple metric: how many new stores they could open. Bigger footprints meant bigger brands, and bigger brands promised operating leverage. Max’s Group, Inc. — the operator behind Max’s Restaurant, Pancake House, Yellow Cab, Krispy Kreme, and other familiar names — is now telling a different story. In the first quarter of 2026, the company’s pitch was not expansion, but discipline. The numbers bear that out. Systemwide sales inched up by 1.1% to ₱4.3 billion , while consolidated revenues rose 2.0% to ₱2.87 billion . Same-store sales growth remained positive at 4.2% , even as the group operated with a leaner store network. Management framed this as the product of a “disciplined approach toward quality and productivity” rather than a race to add outlets. That is the encouraging part of the q...

The Ayalas’ Land Machine Slows as Inventory Swells

The Philippines’ premier property developer has long been admired for turning land into townships and townships into cash. But in early 2026, the cash machine began to look more like a warehouse. Ayala Land’s balance sheet is, in one sense, a monument to patience. Property companies do not sell widgets. They acquire land, wait, build, wait some more, then sell, lease, or recycle capital through vehicles such as REITs. In good times, inventory is not deadweight; it is embedded optionality. But when demand slows, that same inventory can become a reminder that real estate is a business of duration, leverage, and confidence. At the end of March 2026, Ayala Land carried ₱241.3bn of real estate inventories , up from ₱239.3bn at the end of 2025. The quarterly increase, less than 1%, is not by itself dramatic. The more interesting point is the size: inventories represented roughly a quarter of total assets and more than half of current assets. For a developer of Ayala Land’s scale, this...