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 the early 2000s, DMCI Holdings looked like a company stuck between eras—too big to be just a contractor, too cyclical to promise steady returns. Two decades later, it has become one of the Philippine market’s most reliable cash machines. This is the story of how it happened.   For much of its early life as a listed company, DMCI Holdings Inc. (DMC) looked like many Philippine conglomerates: engineering‑led, asset‑heavy, and cyclical. Its core construction business delivered prestige and technical credibility, but earnings were volatile and capital‑intensive. Dividends, while present, were never the main reason to own the stock. That changed over the past two decades. By 202...

  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 most conventional measures, SM Prime Holdings Inc. (SMPH) has done almost everything right in 2025. Earnings rose to ₱48.8 billion , margins expanded despite flat revenues, leverage remained manageable, and cash flows from malls continued to exhibit enviable stability. Yet the stock price tells a different story. At around ₱21–22 per share , SMPH trades far below its pre‑pandemic highs and has failed to meaningfully re‑rate despite record earnings. This divergence between operational strength and market valuation raises a deeper question: what exactly does the market want SMPH to be now? The answer, increasingly, is yield . A Market That Has Moved On For years, SMPH was ...

  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 now, Philippine investors know what an ABS‑CBN moment looks like. It is not the day the franchise expires. It is the long, uneasy stretch before it—when the market slowly realizes that a business built on regulatory permission is approaching a political decision point it does not fully control. That moment, quietly but unmistakably, has arrived for DMCI Holdings, Inc. (DMC) . Accuretti Systems has previously described DMC as facing an “ABS‑CBN dilemma” —a large, profitable enterprise whose most valuable cash‑generating asset rests on a government‑granted contract with a finite end date. Today, that analogy is no longer theoretical. It is fast becoming the dominant risk ...

  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. When Jollibee Foods Corporation (JFC) was described late last year as a mature global consumer platform rather than a hypergrowth story , the intent was not to downplay growth—but to reframe how investors should think about valuation. The company’s preliminary Q4 2025 results now make that framing clearer and more relevant. JFC delivered all‑time high quarterly systemwide sales (SWS) of ₱122.3 billion , up about 12% year‑on‑year , while full‑year 2025 SWS grew 16.6% , surpassing management’s own growth expectations. For a restaurant group operating more than 10,000 stores across 33 countries , this is not hypergrowth. It is something more durable: scaled compounding . ...

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 looking for the cleanest proof that growth can be self-funding, Figaro Culinary Group (FCG) just put it on the table: stronger revenues plus a fatter gross margin translated into a major surge in operating cash flow , even as the company absorbed the predictable cost of building a larger network. The topline story: a bigger engine, not just a better lap time FCG’s latest quarter showed revenue acceleration that looks structural rather than accidental. The group’s quarter revenue rose ~16.8% year-on-year to ₱1.69B , while six-month revenue increased ~12.9% to ₱3.20B . What’s doing the heavy lifting? First, the Angel’s Pizza platform continues to dominate the growth narra...

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. In an energy business where prices shout and margins whisper, Petron’s 2025 story is less about oil’s theatrics and more about operational discipline. For the first nine months of 2025, the company posted ₱9.67 billion in consolidated net income— up 37% year-on-year—even as revenues fell 10% to ₱594.9 billion amid lower crude prices. The immediate takeaway is not “oil is back.” It’s that Petron managed to earn more by doing the basics better: selling more where it matters, running plants harder, and tightening the cash cycle while the market was busy blaming “softening cracks.”  The good news: demand at home is doing the heavy lifting Petron’s operational bright spot is do...

  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. When a chief executive buys shares after a rally, investors notice—because it’s the opposite of bargain-hunting. That’s the signal RFM Corporation watchers got this week after disclosures showed Chairman/President & CEO Jose Maria A. Concepcion III acquiring more RFM shares via Triple Eight Holdings, Inc.   Per a PSE EDGE Form 13-1 (Change in Shareholdings of Directors and Principal Officers) disclosure dated Feb. 10, 2026 , the transactions were executed on Feb. 9, 2026 , consisting of 4,200 shares at ₱5.48 and 80,100 shares at ₱5.50 , all recorded as indirect ownership through Triple Eight. After the purchases, Concepcion’s disclosed holdings stood at 2,640 s...