the Outsider - PSE Points to Ponder

  The Philippine lender trades at roughly 0.3052 times book value, reflecting deep skepticism about its consumer-loan portfolio. Its margins, reserve-building and importance to the Gotianun family’s Filinvest empire make the shares difficult to dismiss. MANILA— Investors generally don’t get a 7.4% dividend yield and acquire a profitable bank for roughly 35 centavos on the peso of book value without accepting some uncomfortable questions. East West Banking Corp., the consumer-focused lender controlled by the Gotianun family’s Filinvest Development Corp., offers precisely that bargain—or trap. At a recent price near ₱11 a share, EastWest carries a market value of about ₱25 billion, against June shareholders’ equity of ₱81.7 billion. Depending on the price date and whether a data provider uses reported or tangible book value, the shares change hands at roughly 0.31 times reported book value and around 0.35 times tangible book value . The bank’s latest ₱0.82-a-share dividend produces ...

  Dominion Holdings is assembling control of Atlas Mining and the Tampakan copper-gold project. Turning those assets into producing mines will require billions of dollars, new investors, and a financing structure that can survive commodity cycles. Dominion Holdings Inc. is rapidly acquiring the outlines of a Philippine mining heavyweight. The investment company, controlled by the Sy family and chaired by construction-and-mining executive Isidro Consunji, is moving to consolidate two of the country’s most consequential copper assets: the operating Toledo mine of Atlas Consolidated Mining and Development Corp. in Cebu and the vast but undeveloped Tampakan copper-gold deposit in Mindanao. Dominion’s board on Aug. 19 approved a merger with Indophil Resources Phils. Inc. and Sonar Holdings Inc., which together hold all the voting rights in Sagittarius Mines Inc., holder of the government agreement covering Tampakan.  The deal would transform Dominion from a lightly capitalized inve...

The investment firm bought into a Philippine power champion expecting a long-duration infrastructure play. Six years later, foreign-ownership constraints, governance uncertainty, heavy capital requirements and a stubbornly weak stock price have narrowed its exit routes. MANILA— When KKR first bought into First Gen Corp. in 2020, the investment had the hallmarks of a patient infrastructure wager: scarce generating assets, growing electricity demand and a portfolio positioned around natural gas and renewable power. Six years later, the global investment firm’s roughly 19.9% economic interest has become something more complicated—a large minority position that is difficult to expand, difficult to sell and now difficult to take private. KKR’s attempted solution, a ₱35-a-share proposal that would have enlarged its stake and removed First Gen from the Philippine Stock Exchange, was rejected by controlling shareholder First Philippine Holdings Corp., or FPH, as failing to reflect First Gen’s...

  Years of Quorn write-downs shrank the asset base. Cash-funded debt repayments lightened the liability side. Now the once-troubled protein business is recovering, cash flow is strengthening, and dividends are rising. Monde Nissin’s balance sheet tells a story that its income statement alone cannot. As of June 30, 2026, the Philippine food manufacturer had ₱14.38 billion in cash, total liabilities of ₱20.24 billion and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33—figures that make it look more conservative than the company investors encountered after its 2021 initial public offering. Yet that balance-sheet strength didn’t emerge from a single corporate turnaround. It was forged through two distinct cleanup processes, each with very different consequences for shareholders.  First came billions of pesos in noncash write-downs tied predominantly to Quorn, Monde’s British meat-alternative business. Those charges reduced goodwill, brand values, plant assets and retained earnings. Then came actua...

  A sharp rise in metal prices helped reverse last year’s losses, but debt, mine spending and a thin liquidity cushion make a near-term dividend far from certain Atlas Consolidated Mining and Development Corp. has completed a striking earnings turnaround. The question for shareholders is when—or whether—that improvement will reach them in cash. The Philippine copper producer reported net income of ₱4.62 billion for the first half of 2026 , reversing a ₱653 million loss in the same period last year. Net revenue climbed 68% to ₱13.72 billion , while income from operations swung to ₱4.77 billion from a ₱454 million loss.  The reversal was powered principally by copper. Atlas said its average realized copper price rose to $5.97 a pound during the second quarter , 38% above the $4.32 recorded a year earlier. Gold, a valuable credit contained in the company’s copper concentrate, also provided support: average gold prices increased to $4,622 an ounce from $3,112 .  Higher pric...