8990 Holdings, Inc. has appointed a new president and chief executive officer (CEO) after Ace S. Sotto, a company director who held the leadership posts, resigned and will instead serve as chief operating officer.
Anthony Vincent S. Sotto will now be steering the company as its director, president and chief executive, describing the appointment as an “honor and privilege.”
“Through this position that the company has entrusted to me, I hope I would be able to continue and strengthen our commitment of providing a home to every hardworking Filipino,” new appointee Mr. Sotto said in an e-mailed statement on Friday.
Before joining 8990 Holdings, Mr. Sotto was an associate lawyer at Solis & Medina Law Offices. He holds a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of the Philippines Diliman and was admitted to the Philippine bar in Sept. 2001.
He joined 8990 Holdings 18 years ago as assistant general manager and held the position for eight years before getting promoted to general manager.
In June 2019, Mr. Sotto was promoted to deputy chief executive of the 8990 group. His appointment as one of 8990 Holdings’ directors, its president, and chief executive is effective immediately.
8990 Holdings is a low-cost mass housing developer, with horizontal subdivision projects as well as medium-rise building condominiums via its Urban Deca Homes brand. It also has high-rise building projects through Urban Deca Towers brand.
8990 Holdings entered the high-end property market via its 2019 acquisition of GENVI Development Corp., the property company behind Monterrazas de Cebu.
Mr. Sotto, the new president, said that the company is trying to stay within the market it is known for.
“I’ve always believed [that] we have to be true to the market that we really serve, mass housing — I would want that we stay there,” he told reporters on Aug. 27.
8990 Holdings reported a second-quarter income of P1.91 billion, surging from a low base of P138.93 million in the same period last year. Its topline went up by almost three times to P5.54 billion.
Its profit for the six-month period grew by 133% to P3.46 billion from last year’s P1.48 billion. The latest figure is also more than half of its full-year 2019 income of P5.86 billion.
“The mass housing market has been benefiting from the country’s demographic sweet spot or majority of the population or more than 50 million already at working age since 2015, thereby fundamentally supporting the demand for mass housing, as well as in view of the country’s housing backlog in recent years or decades,” Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC) Chief Economist Michael L. Ricafort said in a Viber message on Sunday.
He added that the country’s housing loans or mortgages have been relatively lower compared with other countries in the region.
Near record-low interest rates as well as other indicators to help support economic recovery have made it more “compelling for many individuals and households” to avail of loans to allow them to get their own homes.
“There is still [a] great opportunity for more Filipinos, especially in view of the growing working age of the population as some of them start families or already have the financial capacity to avail housing loans/mortgages to finance the acquisition of property, especially homes, such as mass housing, condominium units, house and lot or single-detached units, townhouses, among others,” RCBC’s Mr. Ricafort said. — Keren Concepcion G. Valmonte
