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PHL listed firms lagging behind in sustainability reporting

Makati skyline
BW FILE PHOTO

PUBLICLY LISTED companies fell short when it came to publishing sustainability reports as part of their good corporate governance initiatives, amid increasing awareness on the importance of sustainability to move businesses forward.
This is according to the 2nd Corporate Governance Study by the Good Governance Advocates & Practitioners of the Philippines in partnership with PwC Philippines (GGAPP-PwC). The group cited non-financial and sustainability reporting as among the areas for development PLCs can improve on, alongside board committees and risks and controls.
The group found that while 89% of companies recognized and placed importance on sustainability — higher than the first study’s 76% — only 22% were able to publish sustainability reports in accordance with globally recognized standards, such as the guidelines set by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
“The Philippines is actually very much behind in sustainability reporting, not only globally but also our ASEAN neighbors,” Securities and Exchange Commission Corporate Governance and Finance Department Assistant Director Rosario Carmela B. Gonzales-Austria said in during the 6th Annual GGAP forum in Pasay City yesterday in reaction to the study.
Ms. Gonzales-Austria noted that Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia have been releasing sustainability reports from the early to mid-2000s, with all three companies, along with Singapore, already equipped with their own sustainability reporting guidelines.
The GGAPP-PwC study evaluated 246 listed firm in the period ending Aug. 31, based on integrated annual corporate governance reports submitted to the Philippine Stock Exchange and Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
PwC Chairman and Senior Partner Alexander B. Cabrera explained that the gap between awareness and actual reporting is due to the lack of commitment and sturdy guidelines in the country.
“You need resources to prepare the sustainability report. You need teams of two or three with certain expertise. So first is the commitment, second is framework. If the study is your framework, then you can reduce that to an informed report,” Mr. Cabrera said in an interview on the sidelines of the forum.
Speaking in a panel discussion during the forum, Ayala Corp. (AC) Group Risk Management & Sustainability Head Ma. Victoria Tan highlighted that firms should monitor their non-financial performance such as sustainability since it also contributes to the overall growth.
“Because when the financial performance that you have is growing, it’s because of the non-financial performance that actually contributes to that. The natural resources that we use, those are not unlimited. We have to put that into the equation,” Ms. Tan said during the panel.
University of Asia & the Pacific Professor and Executive Director for the Center of Corporate Social Responsibility Colin Legarde Hubo identified the chief financial officer (CFOs) as the top executive who should most pay attention to sustainability issues, taking cues from AC which was the first listed conglomerate to come up with a sustainability report.
To note, AC CFO Jose Teodoro K. Limcaoco also acts as its chief risk officer and chief sustainability officer.
“CFOs nowadays are becoming the darlings of sustainability. Now CFOs are making decisions on the basis of intangibles,” Mr. Hubo said, noting that only 17% of CFOs based their investment decisions on intangible factors in the 1970s compared to 2015’s 84%.
“Globally, there is a trend to align executive compensation with sustainability performance and bonuses,” Mr. Hubo added.
One Meralco Foundation Chief CSR Officer Jeffrey O. Tarayao noted the same, emphasizing the importance of placing leaders in charge of sustainability programs.
“We look at two critical points, the first one is that who in the organization is responsible for sustainability both at the strategic and operational areas. And second, is sustainability part of performance evaluation, and implementing sustainability performance into the management incentive system?,” Mr. Tarayao explained.
Right now, AC’s Ms. Tan said the SEC has been enforcing the importance of starting sustainability reporting among companies.
“The first thing really is to start reporting. You can only manage what you can measure, and you can only measure what you know. And we can only know if you start collecting… we are far in terms of reporting, but I think it is already in the business model,” Ms. Tan said. — Arra B. Francia

Foreign portfolio investments yield net outflow

BSP
HOT MONEY flew out of the country in September amid local and foreign issues.

By Melissa Luz T. Lopez, Senior Reporter
MORE FOREIGN CAPITAL exited the Philippines in September, marked by sustained net foreign selling of local stocks amid concerns on surging consumer prices and a weaker peso, the central bank said yesterday.
Foreign portfolio investments posted a $440.3-million net outflow last month, reversing the $225.85 million net inflow in August as well as the $112.63 million in fresh capital which entered the country in September 2017.
These flighty investments are often called “hot money,” as such funds enter and leave the country with ease.
September’s tally is the biggest net withdrawal since the $516.12 million outflow recorded in June. Investor appetite turned sour last month amid concerns on local and global issues.
In a statement, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) said market players are cautious about the trend weakness of the peso, which has depreciated by over eight percent year-to-date against the dollar, as well as the “continued uptick” in inflation likely aggravated by the effects of typhoon Ompong (international name: Mangkhut).
Prices of widely-used goods rose by 6.7% last month, a fresh nine-year high amid surging costs of food; transport; and housing, utilities and fuel, the Philippine Statistics Authority said. This brought the nine-month inflation tally to five percent, well above the BSP’s 2-4% target range.
The BSP raised interest rates by another 50 basis points during their Sept. 27 policy meeting to rein in inflation expectations and temper excessive exchange rate swings.
Worsening trade tensions between the United States and China also kept foreign investors wary about placing their money in the Philippines, the central bank said.
Foreign firms invested $743.31 million in the Philippines in September, a third lower than the $1.121 billion infused the previous month.
These investments were cancelled out by $1.184 billion in outbound capital, also a third higher than the $895.31 million withdrawals in August and is the biggest seen in three months.
Bulk of the hot money placements were invested in listed firms at the Philippine Stock Exchange, particularly into holding firms; banks; property companies; food, beverage and tobacco firms; and telecommunication companies. This led to a $351 million net outflow, which came at a time of sustained net foreign selling at the local bourse.
Around 14.3% of the investments went into peso debt papers, which also resulted to an $89-million outflow.
By source, the biggest sources of capital are investors in the United Kingdom, the US, Singapore, Switzerland and Malaysia.
Despite September’s slump, hot money netted a $161.71 million net inflow for the first nine months. The BSP expects foreign portfolio investments to net a $900-million outflow by yearend, which would be wider than the $205.03 billion in withdrawn capital last year.

Drake, Ed Sheeran most streamed Spotify artists of last decade


THIS WEEK marks the 10th anniversary of the public debut of Spotify, and the streaming service has released a few all-time “most-streamed” lists. Think of them as global playlists for the last decade of your life.
Taking the No. 1 spot on the most-streamed artist rundown is Drake, with Ed Sheeran landing atop the most-streamed song list with “Shape of You.” Rihanna was the first artist to achieve 1 billion streams in 2013 and leads the global list of most-streamed female artists.
Sheeran marks two entries on the most-played track list with “Shape of You” at the top and “Thinking Out Loud” in fifth place. Drake’s “One Dance” holds second place, the Chainsmokers and Halsey’s “Closer” is third, while Post Malone takes fourth place with “rockstar” (featuring 21 Savage). The Chainsmokers also mark two spots on the top 10, thanks to “Don’t Let Me Down” landing at No. 10, while Justin Bieber gets two entries with “Love Yourself” and “Sorry” at No. 8 and No. 9 respectively and is credited in a third along with Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee for “Despacito Remix” at No. 7.
Spotify felt the need to break out a separate list of most-streamed female artists, possibly because no female artist had a song make the most-streamed top 10. Rihanna sits atop the list, followed by Arianna Grande, Sia, Beyoncé, and Nicki Minaj. Their initial reluctance to join the service in its infancy may explain why Adele and Taylor Swift follow at No. 6 and No. 7, respectively.
Sweden-based company Spotify Technology SA launched to the public in October 2008 with Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida” becoming the most-streamed track in the debut month. A decade later, the service, founded by current Chief Executive Officer Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon, has more than 180 million monthly active listeners across 65 countries, features more than 40 million tracks, more than 2,000 genres, and more than 3 billion playlists. It has clocked 16,858,080 years of time streamed.
In April, it went public on the New York Stock Exchange. Shares opening at $165.90, which gave the company a market value of $29.5 billion. Shares closed at $149.48 on Wednesday.
Streaming music services have increased in recent years both in volume of music and competition, with customers now having multiple outlets vying for their business. Apple Inc., Tidal, Amazon.com Inc., and Android have all launched their own services, with YouTube Music, a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc.’s Google Inc., debuting in June.
Spotify’s biggest competitor, apart from illegal downloads, is currently Apple Music, which has more than 40 million subscribers and more than 50 million users. Globally, 38% of online listeners continue to consume music illegally through copyright infringement practices such as stream ripping, according to a 2018 report by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).
Here, though, are the hits.
MOST-STREAMED SONG EACH YEAR SINCE SPOTIFY LAUNCH
2008: The Killers — “Human”
2009: The Black Eyed Peas — “I Gotta Feeling”
2010: Eminem, Rihanna — “Love The Way You Lie”
2011: Don Omar, Lucenzo — “Danza Kuduro”
2012: Gotye, Kimbra — “Somebody That I Used To Know”
2013: Macklemore & Ryan Lewis — “Can’t Hold Us” (featuring Ray Dalton)
2014: Pharrell Williams — “Happy” (from Despicable Me 2)
2015: Major Lazer, Mo, DJ Snake — “Lean On”
2016: Drake — “One Dance”
2017: Ed Sheeran — “Shape of You”
TOP-STREAMED ARTISTS OF ALL TIME
1. Drake
2. Ed Sheeran
3. Eminem
4. The Weeknd
5. Rihanna
6. Kanye West
7. Coldplay
8. Justin Bieber
9. Calvin Harris
10. Ariana Grande
MOST-STREAMED SONGS OF ALL TIME
1. Ed Sheeran — “Shape Of You”
2. Drake — “One Dance”
3. The Chainsmokers, Halsey — “Closer”
4. Post Malone — “rockstar” (featuring 21 Savage)
5. Ed Sheeran — “Thinking Out Loud”
6. Major Lazer, Mo, DJ Snake — “Lean On”
7. Luis Fonsi, Daddy Yankee, Justin Bieber — “Despacito Remix”
8. Justin Bieber — “Love Yourself”
9. Justin Bieber — “Sorry”
10. The Chainsmokers — “Don’t Let Me Down”
FIRST 10 ARTISTS TO REACH 1 BILLION STREAMS ON SPOTIFY
1. Rihanna (2013)
2. David Guetta (2013)
3. Eminem (2013)
4. Kanye West (2014)
5. Avicii (2014)
6. Coldplay (2014)
7. Jay Z (2014)
8. Katy Perry (2014)
9. Drake (2014)
10. Pitbull (2014)
MOST-STREAMED ALBUMS GLOBALLY
1. Ed Sheeran — ÷
2. Justin Bieber — Purpose
3. Drake — Views
4. Ed Sheeran — x
5. Post Malone — beerbongs & bentleys
6. The Weeknd — Starboy
7. Drake — Scorpion
8. The Weeknd — Beauty Behind The Madness
9. Post Malone — Stoney
10. Kendrick Lamar — DAMN.
MOST-STREAMED FEMALE ARTISTS GLOBALLY
1. Rihanna
2. Ariana Grande
3. Sia
4. Beyoncé
5. Nicki Minaj
6. Adele
7. Taylor Swift
8. Selena Gomez
9. Katy Perry
10. Shakira
— Bloomberg

Low-cost carriers fueling growth of South Korean tourism to PHL


LOW-COST carriers (LCC) are fuelling the growth of traffic between the Philippines and South Korea, accounting for 40% of the capacity linking the two countries, an aviation think tank said.
“LCCs have accounted for most of the growth in the market over the past seven years. During peak periods there are now nearly 30,000 weekly one-way LCC seats from the Philippines to South Korea. Seven years ago, there were less than 13,000 weekly one-way seats during the peak season,” the Center for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA) said in a recent report.
CAPA noted the Philippines-South Korea route is served by five out of the six South Korean LCCs, namely Jin Air, Jeju Air, Air Busan, Air Seoul and T’way Air, and both Philippine LCCs Cebu Pacific and AirAsia Philippines.
Jin Air, Jeju Air and AirAsia Philippines each have almost 10% of the total capacity.
Jin Air, a subsidiary of Korean Air, increased the capacity of its one-way weekly flights to more than 7,500 seats during peak seasons from less than 1,000 in 2011.
Jeju Air did the same, expanding its one-way weekly seating capacity to more than 5,000 from only 1,300 seven years ago.
AirAsia Philippines also maintains up to 6,300 seats for its one-way weekly flights plying the route, larger than the average 2,000 to 4,500 one-way seats weekly that its predecessor Zest Airways used to have seven years ago.
Cebu Pacific offers around 5,600 one-way seats weekly during peak seasons, and 4,300 seats on off-peak seasons.
CAPA noted that although full service carriers like Philippines Airlines (PAL) are growing the Philippine-Korea route, LCCs still lead the market growth.
“Full service airline capacity has also expanded, but not as rapidly as LCC capacity,” it said. “Of the FSC competitors, PAL has expanded the fastest, broadly doubling capacity over the past seven years.”
The report said South Korean tourists in the Philippines have surged three times over the past eight years, taking up 24.3% share or more than 1.6 million visitors last year.
“Philippines-South Korea is mainly an inbound market. In 2017 there were less than 450,000 Filipino visitors to South Korea, compared to more than 1.6 million South Korean visitors to the Philippines,” it added.
CAPA said while inbound tourism has been affected this year because of the six-month closure of Boracay — tallying only a 1% increase in the past seven months — peak travel period is usually towards the end of the year.
“Philippines-South Korea is a highly seasonal market. The peak period for travel is late December to March,” it said.
A total of 11 routes between the Philippines and South Korea are currently operational, led by the Manila-Seoul route with 19,072 weekly seats. — Denise A. Valdez

PBCom looks at agency banking, small branches

By Karl Angelo N. Vidal, Reporter
PHILIPPINE Bank of Communications (PBCom) is eyeing to open branch-lite units and deploy cash agents as it maximizes its synergy with the Puregold network.
In an interview, PBCom President and Chief Executive Officer Patricia May T. Siy said the Co-led lender will focus on its ecosystem as it aims to increase its presence to more areas.
“As we said, we’ll focus on the ecosystem right now… For us, it’s really more of presence and likely within the Puregold network,” Ms. Siy told BusinessWorld following the listing ceremony of the bank’s long-term negotiable certificates of time deposit on Monday.
She added that PBCom intends to “take advantage” the central bank’s guidelines which allow lenders to open smaller branches and deploy cash agents.
“[Our new branches] could be a permanent presence or just a temporary presence which the current agency banking allows.”
In January 2017, BSP issued regulations which allow clients to withdraw and deposit cash, access online self-service deposits, fund transfers as well as bills payment through cash agents employed by the banks.
Aside from this, Ms. Siy added that part of its long-term strategy is to put up more branches across the Puregold network of supermarkets, some of which could be branch-lite units.
“Eventually the plan is to [place branch-lite units] in as many [areas], but not this year,” she said.
Branch-lite offices are branches that are more compact and less formal compared with the typical full-service bank branch, which can be placed in unbanked or underserved towns and cities.
“That’s already part of the long-term plan so there will be a deployment strategy,” Ms. Siy added, referring to the establishment of branch-lite offices.
In 2014, retail tycoon Lucio L. Co bought a stake in PBCom for nearly P6 billion, making Puregold the bank’s biggest single shareholder.
PBCom posted a P146.3-million net income in the second quarter, declining by 20% from the P183.8 million tallied a year ago.
The listed lender, the 20th biggest in the industry in asset terms, is currently licensed as a commercial lender and had a network of 89 branches and 147 automated teller machines as of end-June.

DoLE agency flags lack of inclusiveness in youth employment despite job growth

THE BUREAU of Local Employment (BLE) said that despite improved employment rates this year, more effort is needed to achieve inclusive growth especially among the youth.
“Young people often do not have the knowledge and skills they need to get decent jobs and employers find it difficult to hire people with the skills they need,” BLE said in a document obtained by BusinessWorld on Wednesday.
“Despite high economic growth, young people struggle to find employment after they leave school,” BLE added.
Citing a study by the International Labor Organization (ILO), BLE noted that global youth unemployment has risen the past 10 years, with the global youth unemployment rate rising from 11.6% in 2007 to 13.0% in 2016.
In the Philippines, youth unemployment improved from 17.6% in 2010 to 14.4% in 2017 but BLE observed that unemployment is still rampant within the youth sector. The Philippine Statistics Authority’s (PSA) Labor Force Survey (LFS) for July 2018 indicates that there were 1.040 million unemployed people aged 15 to 24.
“Unemployment can be attributed to mismatches between demand and supply of labor, as well as the limited absorptive capacity of the formal economy,” BLE explained.
Job-skill mismatch is a factor BLE said is contributed by poor education curricula, unreasonable qualifications by certain industries, insufficient competencies of job seekers, and inept employment services.
BLE also noted that the labor force participation rate of youth declined from 45.4% in 2010 to 40.1% in 2017. BLE said “This can be attributed to the calendar shift of some universities and due to the implementation of the K-12 programs.”
BLE added that the calendar shift of some institutions has hindered high school and college graduates from entering the work force.
The Bureau said currently available youth and employment skills programs can help enhance youth employability.
One of the employment programs available is the Department of Labor and Employment’s (DoLE) Special Programs for Employment of Students (SPES) which is authorized by Republic Act 10917, allowing poor students the opportunity to work during the long holidays at the end of term or over Christmas.
DoLE’s JobsStart Philippines program aims to address job mismatches and unemployment among the youth labor force. It also provides technical training skills and career guidance.
BLE added that other government agencies with human-capital development programs include TESDA, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED), the Department of Science and Technology (DoST), the Cabinet Cluster on Human Development and Poverty Reduction (HDPR), the Department of Agriculture (DA), the Social Security System (SSS), and the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS). — Gillian M. Cortez

Timberlake, Kobe in talks for short videos

POP STAR Justin Timberlake and basketball legend Kobe Bryant are in talks to create programs for a new online service called Quibi, according to people with knowledge of the matter, joining a video start-up backed by titans from Hollywood and the Silicon Valley.
The two globally known stars would produce and appear in the series for service, whose name is short for quick bites, under the deals being discussed, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the negotiations haven’t been completed.
Quibi is a new video service led by Jeffrey Katzenberg, the long-time head of DreamWorks Animation, and Meg Whitman, the former chief executive officer of EBay and Hewlett-Packard. The two have raised $1 billion to build a paid outlet for high-end, short-form video — promising HBO-like quality in TV shows that run 10 minutes or less.
“This quick-bite form of entertainment should be as big a growth opportunity, as TV was when it came around in the mid-1950s,” Katzenberg said on a panel at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit in Beverly Hills.
The talks with Timberlake and Bryant offer a glimpse into the programming strategy of the service. The two executives on Wednesday also announced a handful of other creative partners, including Get Out producer Jason Blum, Oscar-winning director Guillermo del Toro and Training Day filmmaker Antoine Fuqua.
Quibi plans to produce more than 70 programs in its first year, about half of which will be original series, according to the people. The company plans to spend the equivalent of up to $5 million an hour on those shows and pay the producing studios a fee on top of production costs.
The other half of the slate will be a mix of short news clips, sports and lifestyle videos. The company recently hired Janice Min, former editor-in-chief of the Hollywood Reporter, to oversee entertainment news. Scripted shows would run eight to 10 minutes, while news and other unscripted programs would last five to seven minutes.
Whitman and Katzenberg aim to release the service in late 2019. It will cost $5 a month for those willing to watch advertisements, and $8 a month for those who aren’t. — Bloomberg

An Ideal Cut above the rest

By Cecille Santillan-Visto, Text and photos
Concert Review
2018 Seventeen Concert: Ideal
Cut in Manila
Sept. 29
SM Mall of Asia Arena
SOME KOREAN pop groups — no matter how popular — have performed in the Philippines only once and without an insistent demand, they never managed to return. Not so in the case of the 13-member group, Seventeen, which can now boast of a three-sold-out-concert streak in Manila, a feat that only equally phenomenal bands such as BTS, EXO, and Super Junior have managed.
Seventeen had its baptism of fire in Manila in 2016 at The Theater of Solaire Resorts and Casino for the local leg of the Shining Diamonds world tour. They came at a time when there was a high-profile dispute between the country and China, forcing Chinese members Jun and The8 to skip the show. ( http://www.bworldonline.com/content.php?section=Arts&Leisure&title=sweet-seventeen&id=132148). But they were complete last year for the Diamond Edge concert, filling up the SM Mall of Asia Arena. With the clamor from their fandom, called the Carats, Seventeen returned to Manila less than a year later.
Leader S. Coups, Woozi, Wonwoo, Mingyu, Hoshi, DK, Jeonghan, Dino, Seungkwan, and Vernon and Joshua, who are from the US, plus the two Chinese members sizzled on stage and made sure that Ideal Cut in Manila was as, if not more, memorable as the first two concerts in the country.
They kicked off with “Highlight,” from the group’s Going Seventeen album. The opening salvo was, to say the least, explosive. The energy at the MOA Arena before the concert was already delirious. Thus, when the boys emerged from backstage wearing matching black suits and gyrating to “Highlight” and later, to fan-favorite “Thanks,” the shrieking reached the maximum decibel possible.
The distinct advantage of Seventeen, which has been active since 2015, is the group’s sheer number of members. The MOA Arena may not be as big as other stadiums but its stage is relatively huge. With more members performing in sync, the stage somehow felt fuller and more dynamic than if there were only six or seven performers on the platform at any one point. Moreover, Seventeen has three distinct sub-units, each with a different specialization. It has a vocal unit, a hip-hop unit, and a “performance” unit. As such, there is always variety in every show. As some members were given a short breather when they were not all required to be on stage, the boys were able to deliver 26 songs with no problems.
In the three years since its debut, Seventeen has released two studio albums and five extended plays.
Although Ideal Cut in Manila was a largely mix of staple Seventeen dance hits such as “Chuck,” “Pretty U,” “Oh My!” “Beautiful,” and “Thinkin’ About You,” there were a number of nice inserts including the performance of the unreleased song of the hip-hop team, and “Campfire” and “Healing” which formed part of the encore. They returned to the stage thrice during their last song, “Aju (Very) Nice,” which could be taken as an indication that they so enjoyed the show that they did not want it to end.
Performance-wise, all members contributed but special mention should be given to diminutive Woozi whose wide vocal range is the envy of other K-pop groups. It was also delightful to see that their dance choreography is the same live as seen in their music videos. The crisp dance moves make the group a joy to watch.
In between sets, Seventeen members took the opportunity to interact with the audience. They tried to outdo each other with the little Filipino that they have learned. The middle segment even became a mini-talent show of sorts, with members dancing to Twice’s “TT,” competing in a rap showdown, and generally just titillating fans.
Producer Pulp was spot on with the lights, sounds, and stage effects, contributing to heightening the excitement and the drama exactly when necessary.
A downside to the show, if at all, was the strict no photography, no videography policy enforced by the producer. Bouncers were all over the venue to remind the audience that all forms of recording were prohibited. Some fans were not too happy that they were unable to record even snippets of the show. On the bright side, it gave them the opportunity to enjoy the show without having to wonder whether they took the photo or the video at the perfect angle.
Ideal Cut in Manila was definitely a concert that could be listed as among the most enjoyable K-pop shows in recent memory. It was obvious that performing is second nature to the members who definitely knew how to make sure the audience have a great time.
Now, that really makes Seventeen an ideal cut above the rest.

Timson Securities to take over DW Capital

STOCK BROKERAGE firm Timson Securities, Inc. is taking over the operations of DW Capital, Inc., after the latter was suspected to be trading P2.6 billion worth of securities without authority.
In a memorandum posted Thursday, the Philippine Stock Exchange, Inc. (PSE) announced that all customers of DW Capital who have yet to move their accounts to another trading participant will effectively be transferred to Timson Securities.
The stock exchange had earlier advised DW Capital customers to transfer their accounts to another trading participant of their choice through a notified affidavit of claim filed with the PSE last May.
“In this regard, please be informed that effective today, all account customers who did not avail of such opportunity will be transferred to Timson Securities, Inc., as the designated successor trading participant of DWCI,” the PSE said.
The PSE took over DW Capital’s operations in December last year, following a resolution issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) which cited Rule 33.1(d) of the 2015 Securities Regulations Code. The rule pertained to the protection of customer accounts in case of business failure of an exchange trading participant.
The takeover allowed the PSE to take the necessary actions to protect DW Capital’s customers, including the preservation of the assets, books, and records of the embattled brokerage firm. The stock exchange was also given the power to validate its customer accounts and settle its liabilities to customers.
At the same time, the brokerage was prohibited from accessing the PSE’s trading system or facilities.
The SEC started its investigation on DW Capital last August 2017, acting on a complaint filed by PSE’s independent watchdog Capital Markets Integrity Corp.
DW Capital was alleged to have engaged in the unauthorized trading of securities for five accounts totaling P2,599,324,718. The accounts were owned by the Gaisano family, a member of whom is married to former DW Capital President Derwin Ngo Wong. — Arra B. Francia

Star wars

By Noel Vera
Movie Review
A Star is Born
Directed by Bradley Cooper
THERE ARE as of this writing five, count em, five, different versions of the story, of an ambitious young artist in love with a declining old star: George Cukor’s What Price Hollywood? (1932) where film director Max Carey (Lowell Sherman) takes an interest in aspiring actress Mary Evans (Constance Bennett), based on a story by Adela Rogers St. John and Louis Stevens; William Wellman’s A Star is Born (1937) where film star Norman Maine (Fredric March) spots aspiring actress Esther Blodgett (Janet Gaynor); Cukor’s 1954 A Star is Born — for many the definitive version — where James Mason as Maine hooks up with Judy Garland as Blodgett; Frank Pierson’s 1976 A Star is Born where Kris Kristofferson’s John Norman Howard jump-starts the career of Barbra Streisand’s Esther Hoffman; and, of course, Bradley Cooper’s spanking new version, with Cooper’s Jackson Maine discovering Lady Gaga’s Ally in a drag bar.
So which one’s best? Well lemme tell you:
Cooper’s version is not nothing; if anything it’s cannier version than Pierson’s, attuned to our more ethically diverse, politically correct (yet — without once admitting it — romantically nostalgic) times. Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (a.k.a. Lady Gaga) turns out to be a good if rather safe choice. She can sing — she belts out “La Vie en Rose” in an initially campy then casually sensuous manner — and in her unaffected way can act: when her Machiavellian manager Rez (Rafi Gavron) suggests she change her hair color, the ultimate pop chameleon (who once wore a costume that look like a cross between a Christmas tree ornament and a sea urchin) stares at him in horror, as if he’d suggested changing underwear onstage.
Bradley Cooper directing himself makes a few equally canny moves: if you’re going to play a soft-spoken charmer, who has a softer, more gravelly charming voice than Sam Elliott? And to defuse any accusations of pilfering — plus weave a not unfunny running gag into the narrative thread — casts Elliott himself as Bobby, Jackson’s older brother, who acts as manager and surrogate father to the volatile-ish celebrity.
So far so cute. But Cooper’s camera spends too much time gazing at our high-voltage couple in loving close-up and doesn’t surround them with much background. What Price had was the bleakest milieu: countless girls coming to the dream city with stars in their eyes, ending up as waitresses or prostitutes. Wellman’s and Cukor’s Star softened that depiction but still managed to deliver their share of satirical jabs, aimed not just at the Hollywood establishment but at the too-comfy press helping promote (and on occasion sanitize and salvage) their stars and product. Ally’s trajectory in 2018 has the arc and speed of a solid-fueled rocket; she doesn’t pay much of a price careerwise along the way — well, she does change her hair color.*
Cooper’s Jackson Maine has his good points. His pained yet poignant scenes with Bobby are the best-performed, most finely understated — not to mention honestly funny — passages in the movie — and his eventual breakdown is authentically and sensitively portrayed. But his Maine lacks stature; it doesn’t have the intellectual heft of Fredric March’s, the godlike arrogance of James Mason’s. Mason especially introduced an intriguing frisson of effortless charm and boundless ego, where you understand why people around him adore and abhor him, often at the same time. Cooper’s Maine is just too undangerous; his extra helping of sugar without much added spice makes the already treacly material cloying.
My favorite? Cukor’s What Price is the least sentimental; Wellman’s Star had the most adorable Blodgett. Can’t say much good about Pierson’s version, save it reformatted the story in a rock-n-roll setting, which was smart in several ways: we don’t deal with the long gestation period of film production, and we can see the audience directly adoring their stars — the instantaneous feedback adds energy to an often overlong picture (every version from 1954 onwards is overextended by a half hour). The 2018 keeps the pop music and to its credit features Gaga and Elliott — not much else.
Cukor’s ’54 Star towers over them all. It isn’t just that it has the noblest Maine (his fall feels almost Shakespearean) but Judy Garland’s Blodgett is a performance for the ages. Garland feels miscast — at 31 and visibly aged by alcohol and prescription meds she is barely credible as an aspiring singer in her 20s — but I submit Garland in her best roles has always seemed miscast. She was 15 when she played Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz (the studio, to mute criticism, insisted she was 14) and this awkward gawky quality to her performances made you feel for her.
That’s the power of onscreen Garland — she never seems all that confident, never seems guarded; her every emotion is thrillingly open to you (it’s the quality that makes her so much fun in comedies, devastating in dramas). And when the music swells and her divine voice fills the screen — when, for example, Maine listens to her sing “The Man that Got Away” to a simple piano in an after-hours club, you can’t help but look around, wondering where the hell all that grace and power comes from. Who wouldn’t fall for a woman like that?
Cukor’s Star is great but isn’t my favorite. Mario O’Hara’s Kastilyong Buhangin** (Castle of Sand, 1980) arguably constitutes a sixth version (far as I know there’s two more, both Indian musicals) is arguably the oddest of the lot: singer-actress Aunor wanted to act with stunt-man-turned-actor Lito Lapid and the result has both (rather cheesy) musical numbers and (excellently staged) fight scenes — think A Star is Born crossed with Ringo Lam’s Prison on Fire. Aunor’s Laura is the most muted of all the Blodgetts — guarded, levelheaded, almost constantly inward-looking. Her finest moment comes midway through, when Lapid’s Oscar finally makes a pass at her. She resists, thinks about it — you can see her regard (all without uttering a word) her withered cautious life, regard her relationship with this troubled troubling man-child she has supported and defended for years. Finally you see her say (to herself): “Fuck it.” The wine has to be decanted eventually — why not now?
Aunor gives the film its dramatic arc then generously cedes center stage to Lapid: his Oscar is arguably the most self-destructive of the Maines, a man so steeped in violence he can only express himself by striking back, so unsure of himself he can only find comfort in a penitentiary. In one beer session, egged on by his drinking buddies, he dances till he laughs, laughs till he cries, cries till he collapses; the scene shouldn’t work only Lapid throws body and soul into the dance with such intensity you aren’t allowed room for doubt. Oscar is obviously struggling with demons but whose? Lapid has never shown this much intensity in his acting before or since; screenwriter Mely Tagasa is a master at women’s melodramas (she also wrote O’Hara’s Uhaw sa Pagibig*** [Thirst for Love] and reportedly the original radio script which served as basis for Lino Brocka’s Insiang) but this alcohol-fueled sense of rage and despair seems out of her range (I’m guessing; I don’t know for sure). Is it the director’s?
Oscar’s end (skip this paragraph if you haven’t seen the movies!) is, I submit, the most ignominious: no spectacular sunset, just a prison shower room, with a piano tinkling sadly in the background. Cukor ends his with one of the most famous last lines in all of Hollywood, delivered with simple force by Garland; Cooper flubs his by tacking on a final song number that takes the moment past its point. If we’re going to have a final number I much prefer Aunor singing her picture’s title song — where Gaga pays tribute to everlasting love (“I was stupid to think that any love can compare to the love that you gave to me”), Aunor’s has this mono, no aware, sense of the transience of love (“flawless, yet crumbles at a breath of wind”) without once denying that love’s fragile beauty. Between lasting love and sand castles, I suppose I believe in the castle.

* Actually the movie suggests midway that Ally has unknowingly surrendered control of her career to Rez, or at least fails to indicate otherwise — it lacks a scene where Ally confronts her manager, ultimately diminishing the character.
** https://criticafterdark.blogspot.com/2014/05/kastilyong-buhangin-castle-of-sand.html
*** http://criticine.com/review_article.php?id=14
**** https://criticafterdark.blogspot.com/2018/04/insiang-lino-brocka-1976.html

Amazon scraps secret AI tool that showed bias against women

SAN FRANCISCO — Amazon.com Inc’s machine-learning specialists uncovered a big problem: their new recruiting engine did not like women.
The team had been building computer programs since 2014 to review job applicants’ resumes with the aim of mechanizing the search for top talent, five people familiar with the effort told Reuters.
Automation has been key to Amazon’s e-commerce dominance, be it inside warehouses or driving pricing decisions. The company’s experimental hiring tool used artificial intelligence to give job candidates scores ranging from one to five stars — much like shoppers rate products on Amazon, some of the people said.
“Everyone wanted this holy grail,” one of the people said. “They literally wanted it to be an engine where I’m going to give you 100 resumes, it will spit out the top five, and we’ll hire those.”
But by 2015, the company realized its new system was not rating candidates for software developer jobs and other technical posts in a gender-neutral way.
That is because Amazon’s computer models were trained to vet applicants by observing patterns in resumes submitted to the company over a 10-year period. Most came from men, a reflection of male dominance across the tech industry.
In effect, Amazon’s system taught itself that male candidates were preferable. It penalized resumes that included the word “women’s,” as in “women’s chess club captain.” And it downgraded graduates of two all-women’s colleges, according to people familiar with the matter. They did not specify the names of the schools.
Amazon edited the programs to make them neutral to these particular terms. But that was no guarantee that the machines would not devise other ways of sorting candidates that could prove discriminatory, the people said.
The Seattle company ultimately disbanded the team by the start of last year because executives lost hope for the project, according to the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Amazon’s recruiters looked at the recommendations generated by the tool when searching for new hires, but never relied solely on those rankings, they said.
Amazon declined to comment on the technology’s challenges, but said the tool “was never used by Amazon recruiters to evaluate candidates.” The company did not elaborate further. It did not dispute that recruiters looked at the recommendations generated by the recruiting engine.
The company’s experiment, which Reuters is first to report, offers a case study in the limitations of machine learning. It also serves as a lesson to the growing list of large companies including Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc and Goldman Sachs Group Inc that are looking to automate portions of the hiring process.
Some 55% of US human resources managers said Artificial Intelligence, or AI, would be a regular part of their work within the next five years, according to a 2017 survey by talent software firm CareerBuilder.
Employers have long dreamed of harnessing technology to widen the hiring net and reduce reliance on subjective opinions of human recruiters. But computer scientists such as Nihar Shah, who teaches machine learning at Carnegie Mellon University, say there is still much work to do.
“How to ensure that the algorithm is fair, how to make sure the algorithm is really interpretable and explainable — that’s still quite far off,” he said.
Amazon’s experiment began at a pivotal moment for the world’s largest online retailer. Machine learning was gaining traction in the technology world, thanks to a surge in low-cost computing power. And Amazon’s Human Resources department was about to embark on a hiring spree: Since June 2015, the company’s global headcount has more than tripled to 575,700 workers, regulatory filings show.
So it set up a team in Amazon’s Edinburgh engineering hub that grew to around a dozen people. Their goal was to develop AI that could rapidly crawl the web and spot candidates worth recruiting, the people familiar with the matter said.
The group created 500 computer models focused on specific job functions and locations. They taught each to recognize some 50,000 terms that showed up on past candidates’ resumes. The algorithms learned to assign little significance to skills that were common across IT applicants, such as the ability to write various computer codes, the people said.
Instead, the technology favored candidates who described themselves using verbs more commonly found on male engineers’ resumes, such as “executed” and “captured,” one person said.
Gender bias was not the only issue. Problems with the data that underpinned the models’ judgments meant that unqualified candidates were often recommended for all manner of jobs, the people said. With the technology returning results almost at random, Amazon shut down the project, they said.
Other companies are forging ahead, underscoring the eagerness of employers to harness AI for hiring.
Kevin Parker, chief executive of HireVue, a startup near Salt Lake City, said automation is helping firms look beyond the same recruiting networks upon which they have long relied. His firm analyzes candidates’ speech and facial expressions in video interviews to reduce reliance on resumes.
“You weren’t going back to the same old places; you weren’t going back to just Ivy League schools,” Parker said. His company’s customers include Unilever PLC and Hilton.
Goldman Sachs has created its own resume analysis tool that tries to match candidates with the division where they would be the “best fit,” the company said.
Microsoft Corp’s LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional network, has gone further. It offers employers algorithmic rankings of candidates based on their fit for job postings on its site.
Still, John Jersin, vice president of LinkedIn Talent Solutions, said the service is not a replacement for traditional recruiters.
“I certainly would not trust any AI system today to make a hiring decision on its own,” he said. “The technology is just not ready yet.”
Some activists say they are concerned about transparency in AI. The American Civil Liberties Union is currently challenging a law that allows criminal prosecution of researchers and journalists who test hiring websites’ algorithms for discrimination.
“We are increasingly focusing on algorithmic fairness as an issue,” said Rachel Goodman, a staff attorney with the Racial Justice Program at the ACLU.
Still, Goodman and other critics of AI acknowledged it could be exceedingly difficult to sue an employer over automated hiring: Job candidates might never know it was being used.
As for Amazon, the company managed to salvage some of what it learned from its failed AI experiment. It now uses a “much-watered down version” of the recruiting engine to help with some rudimentary chores, including culling duplicate candidate profiles from databases, one of the people familiar with the project said.
Another said a new team in Edinburgh has been formed to give automated employment screening another try, this time with a focus on diversity. — Reuters

Children’s book writer fights the stigma of HIV-AIDS

By Michelle Anne P. Soliman
Reporter
ENZO, Gab, Chuchay, and Luis join a support group on social media under their online alter egos. Enzo starts a group chat and sets a date to meet with the group’s other members. At a coffee shop one day, they all get together because of something called “Pete.”
The four young men are characters in the latest book by Segundo Matias, Jr., the author the Moymoy Lulumboy series, Mga Batang Poz — “poz” being slang for HIV positive.
The young adult novel confronts misconceptions about the disease by illustrating the lives of young characters living with HIV-AIDS — acquiring the disease, undergoing diagnosis, joining online support groups, revealing their situation to their families, and undergoing medication.
The book’s release is timely — the HIV/AIDS and Art Registry of the Philippines’ data for March reported that there were 912 new HIV antibody seropositive individuals, 31% who were 15 to 24 years old “at the time of testing.”
As Dr. Rossana A. Ditangco, DOH-RITM AIDS research group head, wrote in her message in the novel: “Bawat araw, may sampung tao na nada-diagnose na mayroong HIV. Sa sampung ito, dalawa ay mga kabataang nasa edad labinlima hanggang dalawampu’t apat. Kung hindi mapipigilan ang pag-laganap nito, hindi imposible na sa susunod na panahon ay mas tumaas pa ang bilang ng mga kabataang humaharap, hindi lamang sa pagkakasakit, kundi maging sa social stigma na dala ng HIV (Every day, there are 10 people who are diagnosed with HIV. Out of the 10, two are children aged 15 to 24. If the spread of the disease is not prevented, it is likely possible in the coming years that there will be a rise in the number of children facing, not only the disease, but also the social stigma brought by HIV).
“We have to take note that the year they were tested was not the same period they were afflicted with HIV,” Dr. Ditangco said in Filipino during the book’s launch in September at the Precious Pages Events Center in Quezon City. As an example, she pointed out that if an 18-year-old was diagnosed with HIV, the patient may have caught the disease at a younger age.
Mr. Matias’ thesis adviser at UP Diliman, professor Eugene Evasco, suggested that he write a book about AIDS for young people. The young adult novel served as the author’s thesis for his masteral degree in Malikhaing Pagsulat (Creative Writing in Filipino).
At a clinic where he was doing research for the book, Mr. Matias learned that there were patients as young as 12 who were diagnosed positive with the disease.
“When I learned about the demographics and the number of people who are afflicted with HIV, that pushed me [to write],” Mr. Matias said in the vernacular.
Mr. Matias considered changing his byline to J. M. Matias, citing concern over his “branding” as a children’s book writer.
“But then again, you’re fighting the stigma. Bakit ako mismo matatakot? So, nilagay ko na talaga ’yung name [ko] (Why should I be afraid myself? So, I decided to use my full name),” he said.
Mr. Evasco said that the country is blessed to have writers who are brave enough to write and educate readers about HIV. “Our society is blessed today because we have books that will guide readers and give a positive depiction not only about being gay, but also about being poz,” he said in Filipino.
Dr. Ditangco said that the book serves as an alternative learning tool not only for young readers, but also for parents and teachers.
“At present, one of the limitations in HIV education is that it is taught like heath or science. It is not taught to influence the values and behavior of a young person. That is why it is important that materials like these are available not only to affect our emotions, but also to teach the reader,” she said in the vernacular.
Despite what the conservative sector of society may think, Mr. Matias is ready to share this story with everyone.
“I cannot say that they (the conservatives) are ready, but since I have written it, I am,” he said.
Mga Batang Poz is available at Precious Pages retail outlets, National Book Store, the Pandayan book shop, and leading books stores nationwide for P300. For inquiries contact, lamparapublishinghouse@gmail.com.

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