Universal Robina Corp. has sent the market a clear message: despite a year of margin pressure, it still believes its cash-generation capacity and balance sheet are strong enough to justify a higher payout. The company’s board approved a cash dividend of ₱2.10 per share , payable in May 2026, which is 5% higher year on year . That matters not only because dividend increases are never declared lightly, but because the move comes after a year in which earnings growth was constrained by elevated commodity costs, particularly coffee. At first glance, URC’s 2025 results tell a two-speed story. On one hand, the topline remained healthy. For the first nine months of 2025, URC posted sales of ₱124.6 billion, up 4.8% , driven by growth in branded consumer foods and commodities. For the full year, sales reached ₱168.0 billion, up 4% , with management describing the performance as “volume-led” and broad-based across divisions. On the other hand, profit growth lagged. In the first nine months...
The Department of Energy deserves credit for insisting on a competitive rebidding of the Semirara coal blocks instead of granting an outright extension to Semirara Mining and Power Corporation’s current coal operating contract, which expires in July 2027. The DOE has made clear that the Semirara area will be included in the 2026 coal bid round, and that awards will be based on technical, financial, legal, and work-program qualifications rather than on a simple highest-bid-wins formula. That is the right policy. But good policy does not guarantee intense competition. The more difficult question is whether many serious players will actually want to commit capital to a coal asset at a time when the economics of coal are no longer what they were just a few years ago. Semirara’s own results suggest the answer may be more complicated than the optics of an open auction imply. Coal is clearly no longer in the 2022–2024 supercycle conditions. In 2025, Semirara Mining and Power Corporation ...