the Outsider - PSE Points to Ponder

  We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs. By any textbook of corporate finance, Ayala Land’s share buyback should have been a powerful statement. The company has essentially exhausted its ₱28 billion appropriation , having repurchased 1,105,204,046 shares for a cumulative ₱27,998,838,069 —a near‑complete deployment of the program. Yet the market’s verdict is blunt: ALI continues to trade around the low ₱20s , a neighborhood it hasn’t called home in years, with recent quotes near ₱21.30 .  That disconnect—between aggressive capital return and a stubbornly weak share price—tells you something important: the market is not doubting ALI’s willingness to support its stock. It is questioning the durability and qualit...

  We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs. The seduction of “growth” when you’re already cash-rich There is a recurring corporate temptation that shows up most clearly in consumer giants: once the core franchise throws off reliable cash, management begins to treat that cash as a mandate to do something big . Often that “something” becomes acquisitions—new brands, new geographies, new narratives—frequently justified as “growth,” even when the acquired businesses are structurally low-return or outright loss-making.  Jollibee Foods Corporation (JFC) offers a timely cautionary case study. By its own disclosures, JFC delivered strong topline momentum through September 2025 and expanded its global store footprint, wit...

  We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs. By the numbers, every “dividend machine” has a hidden engine. The question is whether that engine runs on operating cash—or on wishful thinking. Dividend investors love simple stories: strong brands, steady profits, a board that “always pays.” But the market’s most expensive lesson is that dividends don’t come from the income statement. They come from cash—and specifically from cash generated by the core business. That distinction is now the difference between holding a yield stock with confidence and holding one with crossed fingers. Consider RFM and Monde Nissin—two consumer names that can appear, on the surface, to offer what income investors crave: regular payouts and re...

  We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs. If you’re buying MREIT for dividends, the latest numbers deliver the kind of comfort income investors like: a growing rental base, steady cash generation, and distributions that track distributable income almost to the penny. But therein lies the catch. When a REIT is already paying out nearly everything it can , future dividend-per-share growth becomes less about “discipline” and more about whether the business can expand distributable income per share —after interest costs, lease-linked expenses, and dilution.  A strong quarter—driven by assets, not alchemy MREIT’s nine-month story to September 30, 2025, is straightforward: bigger portfolio, higher revenues. Total rev...

We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs.   If Victorias Milling Company (VMC) were a simple “revenue story,” the latest quarter would have been a celebratory one: consolidated sales climbed to ₱3.235 billion , up from ₱2.511 billion a year earlier.  But the market doesn’t pay dividends in revenues—it pays them in durable margins and cash flow . And this quarter’s defining feature is not growth; it is compression . VMC’s earnings print shows why. Despite higher sales, net income fell to ₱161.5 million from ₱367.9 million , and EPS dropped to ₱0.03 from ₱0.07 . In short: the company moved more product, but kept less profit per peso sold. That is the telltale signature of a margin squeeze—exactly the kind that of...

  We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs.   There’s a particular kind of quiet opportunity that shows up when a familiar consumer name gets priced like a mistake. Not a scandal, not a bankruptcy candidate—just… unloved . Monde Nissin (MONDE) feels like that right now. The stock has been orbiting the bottom end of its recent trading band, with market data showing a 52‑week range around ₱5.61 to ₱8.60 and recent prints in the ₱5–₱6 area. At those levels, the conversation changes. You stop debating “what’s the next growth driver?” and start asking a simpler, more investor-friendly question: “Will they keep paying me while I wait?” For dividend-yield investors, that’s the whole game—collect cash distributions whi...

  We’ve been blogging for free. If you enjoy our content, consider supporting us! Disclaimer:  This is for informational purposes and is  not  investment advice. Figures are taken from company disclosures and exchange data; valuation ratios include the author’s calculations based on cited inputs.   If there’s one phrase that captures Megawide Construction Corporation’s nine-month performance to September 30, 2025, it’s this: profit resilience amid a cyclical slowdown . The company managed to keep earnings in the black— ₱501 million in net income —even as revenues pulled back to ₱12.3 billion , down ₱4.04 billion year-on-year . That headline result deserves both applause and scrutiny. Applause, because a construction-heavy group surviving a downshift without collapsing margins is not trivial. Scrutiny, because the numbers also reveal an uncomfortable truth: Megawide is still largely tethered to a business that is inherently lumpy, and it is carrying a financing s...