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‘Give us back our jewels,’ Count of Paris urges Louvre thieves

A TIARA adorned with pearls worn by French Empress Eugenie, which was among the items stolen by thieves during a heist at Paris’ Louvre Museum on Oct. 19, on display in this undated still frame from a video. — LOUVRE MUSEUM/HANDOUT VIA REUTERS

THE Count of Paris, whose great-grandmother once wore the sapphire tiara stolen from the Louvre Museum, has pleaded with the robbers to return the stolen jewels intact for the sake of France’s heritage — and for his family.

This as a “chronic, structural underestimation of the risk of intrusions and theft” left the Louvre exposed for over 20 years to the kind of heist the museum experienced this month, French Culture Minister Rachida Dati said on Friday.

“Give us back our jewels, there’s still time,” said Jean d’Orleans, a direct descendant of French kings, speaking to Reuters at the royal domain of Dreux, 70 kilometers southwest of Paris.

“It’s both personal and intimate,” said d’Orleans, 60, as he leafed through family photographs showing his great-grandmother, the Duchess of Guise, wearing the Ceylon sapphire and diamond tiara in 1931. “These jewels were worn on special occasions, family events, sometimes also to create a specific portrait.”

Another picture showed the tiara being worn by d’Orleans’ grandmother Isabelle d’Orleans-Bragance for the last time at Princess Astrid of Belgium’s 1984 wedding, before it was sold to the museum by his grandfather in 1985 for 5 million francs.

$102-MILLION HEIST
The heist in broad daylight has stunned France and left the nation reeling at its audacity, and at the security failures that allowed the intruders to make off with national treasures worth more than $100 million in an operation that lasted just a few minutes.

It was the biggest robbery at the Louvre since the Mona Lisa was stolen in 1911. Police have made multiple arrests.

The eight stolen items were from the 19th century and once belonged to French royalty or the country’s imperial rulers.

They included the tiara, a necklace and a single earring from the sapphire set that belonged to Queen Marie-Amelie and Queen Hortense.

A tiara and brooch belonging to Empress Eugenie as well as an emerald necklace and a pair of emerald earrings gifted to Empress Marie Louise by Napoleon for their marriage were also among the thieves’ loot.

The sapphire set, acquired in 1821 by King Louis-Philippe from Queen Hortense, remained in the Orleans family for more than a century before going on public display.

‘PRICELESS HERITAGE’
The count urged the thieves to return the jewels intact.

“For our family, for the French people, it’s important that these jewels return to their display case at the Louvre,” he said in a grand living room lined with portraits of French monarchs including Henri IV, Louis XIII, Louis XIV and Marie-Antoinette. A renovated, more secure room should be used, he added.

The count, who implored the authorities to hold accountable anyone found to have been negligent in the theft, likened the public reaction to the heist to the outpouring of emotion after the Notre-Dame Cathedral blaze in 2019.

“It’s priceless heritage,” he said, “we need to recover that.”

CHRONIC UNDERESTIMATION OF RISK
Security gaps contributed to a brazen daylight heist on Oct. 19, in which four hooded thieves made off with eight precious pieces from the museum’s Apollo gallery, home to the French Crown Jewels.

A preliminary report into the theft found inadequate safety equipment, poor organization and obsolete protocols at the museum, Ms. Dati told TF1 TV.

“The devices as they were installed, the alarm and security devices as they were installed on the day of the theft at the Louvre Museum, functioned properly,” but that wasn’t enough to prevent the robbery as security “was not a priority,” Ms. Dati said.

She said that the museum will introduce additional security by the end of the year, including anti-intrusion devices and anti-vehicle ramming barriers on nearby public roads.

Louvre director Laurence des Cars told senators last week that she had offered her resignation after the heist, but Ms. Dati refused it.

Ms. Des Cars spoke of her “disappointment and surprise” at the state of the Louvre, the world’s most visited museum, when she moved there from the Musee d’Orsay — home of the French Impressionists.

Seven suspects have been arrested so far in connection with the robbery, but none of the stolen jewels have so far been recovered. — Reuters

Is corruption inborn in democracy?

STOCK PHOTO | Image from Freepik

(Part 2)

Part One of this column* looked into how acutely vulnerable Philippine democracy to corruption. And explored this colossal corruptibility of liberal democratic institutions, a century old in this country, to then ask whether there is in fact something about democracy that yields easily — or actually produces — its own corruption.

The proposed answer: No, but.

Which is to recognize that the freedom guaranteed by democracy guarantees it for the entire citizenry; but that, therefore, also guarantees it for bad actors who have increasingly upped their ability to usurp the legal system that should have curtailed greed.

Democracy’s guarantee of freedom unexpectedly guarantees the freedom to think to subvert freedom. This sentence, particularly in the case of the Philippines’ democratic project, is no mere semantic curlicue. The corrupt and corrupted political landscape is very real indeed — concrete, as the Marxists will say. (Today’s United States is an even more horrific example.)

Still, as the previous column observed, democracy managed to sustain its idealisms and restrain its innate corruptibility through most of the 20th Century. Despite the century-old, incrementally more awful histories of criminal leaders using democracy against itself, the threat was not existential until this past decade of the 21st Century.

Today it is clear that democracy may not hold as majority culture and politics globally. In the Philippines as in the US, Turkey, Hungary, Venezuela, even Austria, Italy, and also India, Pakistan, Bolivia, Brazil, Nicaragua, and many others, at least one of three pillars of a democratic state is listing badly.

They lack adequate representation, or strong enough protection of human rights, and the constant ascendance of the vaunted rule of law. Either one, two, or all three have been thrashed (however differently and unevenly) by corrupting agents arrogating the freedom to foist impunity on the weak.

New data from the Global State of Democracy Indices “documents a troubling trend: more than half of all countries assessed have declined in at least one key aspect of democratic performance over the past five years.”

The conservative Brookings Institute writes: “…there are more closed autocracies than liberal democracies in the world. Nearly three-fourths of the world’s population lives in an autocracy.”

SURVIVING PREJUDICE
Why this is happening now and not sometime earlier in the 20th Century — why democracy’s weakness, indeed democracy’s suspicious intimacy with corruption, did not succumb to ruin decades ago in different parts of the world — gives political scientists and historians wide berth for analysis.

One or the other specialist points to the vastly increased human migration as a possible tipping point. Still others take up a new elitism that survives from old forms of racisms, suprematicisms, and nostalgically remembered castes. Of late, the concentration of power in top executive (top of the food chain) personae appears to be driven by wishful thinking of a return to a world where some are simply thought superior to majorities.

In fact, increasing migration as contributory to democratic decay may be recognized for its core idea of white suprematism.

Surviving prejudice also manifests in other explanations. Incremental voter disenfranchisement — which is the other side of sweepstakes vote buying — at core pivots on the idea that the multitudes are not fit for self-governance. The old colonial attitude seems truly hard to kill off.

Then again, some explanations emerge from new political phenomena. Terrorism operating globally is one obvious dynamic to point to. Fear on the ascendant, many societies start to pray to strongmen.

Then again, there is the success of China, an unapologetically autocratic world, in raising hundreds of millions of its citizens from poverty to constitute a vast middle class. To many in the world, Deng Xiao Ping’s and even Xi Jin Ping’s China is worth emulating.

Anti-elitisms — such as Donald Trump’s promise to drain the swamp or French anti-Macron, populist sentiment — cluster around the willingness to let go of democratic guardrails to knock down the establishment. With this establishment are, unfortunately, the institutions of a free press, an above-board and august judiciary, and guardians of rigorous education.

Populist sentiment can be and is in fact often anti-democratic. Ironically enough. The multitudes have been known to choose political alternatives inimical to their welfare. And this historical matter-of-course is now a gargantuan phenomenon made possible by digital technology.

ALTERNATIVE REALITIES
All of the above explanatory approaches to figuring out democratic decay are fed by the one totalizing change that human beings have never before had to face. The alternative to organic intelligence — machine intelligence, even in its “infancy” — has already overdetermined the outcomes of cultural clashes.

What is true is now every bit contestable and impeachable, nearly always exposed to attack by weaponized alternative realities. What is true is usually whatever the disinformation campaigns succeeded in forcing on target demographics.

Study after study, of recent vintage and of consistent integrity, maintain that democracy is being battle-rammed big time by autocrats. Democracy’s degradation is deliberate; at the largest scale that can be bought by the dirtiest, biggest monies; sophisticated in the deployment of digital architectures; and incessant.

Yet even without the massive disinformation campaigns, digital technology by its very character will mitigate against democracy.

To the question posed by The New York Times about ChatGPT “hijacking democracy,” only a couple of weeks after this app was launched, the answer zeroed in on the changes imminent in lobbying. At the time of the Opinion piece by Nathan E. Sanders, a data scientist, and Bruce Schneier, a security technologist, in January 2023, the authors wrote: “Generative AI threatens three central pillars of democratic governance: representation, accountability, and, ultimately, the most important currency in a political system — trust.”

According to the present issue of The Journal of Democracy (October 2025), the situation is much more dire.

“The most problematic aspect of generative AI is that it hides in plain sight, producing enormous volumes of content that can flood the media landscape, the internet, and political communication with meaningless drivel at best and misinformation at worst. For government officials, this undermines efforts to understand constituent sentiment, threatening the quality of democratic representation. For voters, it threatens efforts to monitor what elected officials do and the results of their actions, eroding democratic accountability.

“A reasonable cognitive prophylactic measure in such a media environment would be to believe nothing, a nihilism that is at odds with vibrant democracy and corrosive to social trust. As objective reality recedes even further from the media discourse, those voters who do not tune out altogether will likely begin to rely even more heavily on other heuristics, such as partisanship, which will only further exacerbate polarization and stress on democratic institutions.”

All this was unexpected, except by the most prescient information technologists. The imminent reorganization of bodies of knowledge and experience — not the least of which is democracy — is changing what it is to be human.

Whether democracy will remain an order for a particular kind of humanity, is by no means certain.

*Part 1 can be read here: https://tinyurl.com/272s4w3b

 

Marian Pastor Roces is an independent curator and critic of institutions. Her body of work addresses the intersection of culture and politics.

Equinix eyes higher utilization as co-location demand rises in PHL

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GLOBAL DIGITAL infrastructure firm Equinix, Inc. is targeting a higher utilization rate in its Philippine data centers as demand for co-location and interconnection services continues to grow.

“The utilization is relatively low right now,” Equinix President for Asia-Pacific Cyrus Adaggra told reporters last week. “But as we fill it with customers, it will obviously grow over time. As soon as we acquired the data centers, we started talking with both our international and local customers about locating here.”

Equinix launched its Philippine operations in October, marking the opening of three data centers in Cavite and Makati. The facilities were acquired last year from Total Information Management Corp. (TIM), signaling the company’s entry into the country’s fast-growing data infrastructure market.

Mr. Adaggra said Equinix is focusing on increasing the use of its existing facilities before pursuing further expansion. “We are focusing on the three data centers that we have here, and then we will continue to expand as this data center continues to be fully utilized.”

He added that the company has room to grow within its existing Cavite site. “The good news is that on this piece of land, we’ve got the ability to build our next data center. We don’t need to look for new land, and we know the local utility can provide us with more power at this location,” he said.

Equinix’s data centers provide high-speed interconnection services, giving enterprises direct access to cloud platforms, artificial intelligence (AI) providers and major network ecosystems through secure private links. The company operates more than 260 data centers globally across 70 markets.

The Philippines is a key part of Equinix’s broader Southeast Asian expansion strategy, which includes new projects in Malaysia and Indonesia. The company said it sees strong growth potential in the country’s digital economy and a rising need for secure, scalable data infrastructure.

The Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) projects that the Philippines’ data center capacity could reach 1.5 gigawatts (GW) by 2028 as both local and foreign operators ramp up investments. — Ashley Erika O. Jose

As US federal food aid lapses, most states unable to fill the void

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WASHINGTON — For Roma Hammonds, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, food stamps have been a lifeline since taking custody of her grandchildren five years ago.

Ms. Hammonds, 60, who cannot work because of a physical disability, has relied on her $563 in monthly Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits to feed her family of four and to afford other bills like rent, she said.

But her November benefits may not be issued by the US government due to the ongoing federal shutdown, and Tennessee is among the vast majority of states that have said they cannot pay for the aid themselves.

“I don’t know what I’ll do,” Ms. Hammonds said.

Ms. Hammonds is one of the roughly 41 million SNAP recipients wading into a potential historic lapse of the 60-year-old food aid program, which sends roughly $8 billion each month to low-income Americans in every state.

Neither Congress nor the administration of President Donald Trump has acted to fund benefits. Two federal judges ruled that the administration cannot block November SNAP benefits and must use about $5 billion in agency contingency funds to pay for them, requiring updates by Monday on compliance with their rulings.

The US Department of Agriculture did not respond to questions about how it will react to the ruling or share any details of a plan to pay benefits.

In the meantime, just five states, Delaware, New Mexico, Louisiana, Virginia and Vermont, and the District of Columbia have said they will pay for some or all of the November food aid, according to a Reuters review of state websites and public statements. The rest have said they will not pay for the benefits due to technical or cost barriers, or provided no explanation.

The USDA said in an Oct. 24 memo that it will not reimburse states if they cover the cost of benefits.

Most states balance their budgets annually or biennially, and the increased uncertainty of federal funding for healthcare, education and other key resources has added layers of risk to state finances, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts.

“Every year we have significant budget shortfalls and are working to balance the budget,” said Christine Woody, food security policy manager at Empower Missouri, a social justice organization. “We don’t have $130 million to put towards this without any assurance.”

A USDA spokesperson called the shutdown an “inflection point for Senate Democrats.” The agency has repeatedly blamed the aid lapse on Democrats, most of whom have withheld their votes on a spending bill in an effort to keep healthcare costs from spiking for many Americans. Democrats have criticized the USDA for not using agency contingency funds to partially fund the November benefits.

States receive monthly sums from the federal government for SNAP benefits, ranging from $4.9 million for Wyoming to more than $1 billion for California, according to USDA data.

To distribute those benefits, states contract with third-party processors who add the money to recipients’ Electronic Benefit Transfer cards. Some states have said they cannot make the technical changes needed to get money to recipients themselves.

“Tennessee is unable to utilize state dollars to provide the benefit, as states do not have a mechanism to load benefits onto customer cards,” said Governor Bill Lee in an Oct. 24 statement.

Others said the sums are simply too large to accommodate. “SNAP brings in more than $210 million monthly in federal funding. The state budget cannot absorb even one month of federal failure,” said a notice on the Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance website.

Virginia is drawing on a budget surplus for its stop-gap program that will issue weekly benefits through at least November, Governor Glenn Youngkin said this week. Virginia SNAP benefits cost about $143 million per month, according to USDA data.

Delaware on Wednesday said it would fund week-by-week benefits through November if needed. Louisiana, Vermont and New Mexico are making funds available for partial benefits.

Some states, including Connecticut, New Mexico and West Virginia, have said they will send additional money to food banks. Food banks are already under strain from rising US hunger rates and have said they are unlikely to be able to meet surging demand during the benefit lapse.

Many states encouraged SNAP recipients to budget and visit food pantries, and others to donate time and money during the benefit lapse.

“Let’s do everything we can to support one another so that no family goes hungry,” said the Arkansas Department of Human Services website.

Some Democratic-led states have blamed the Trump administration for the lapse, while some Republican-led states blamed Democrats in Congress.

North Carolina Governor Josh Stein, a Democrat, said the administration is at fault because of its decision not to use the emergency funds.

“The administration’s refusal to use these available funds as temperatures cool and the Thanksgiving holiday approaches is a cruel abdication of the responsibility to support families and communities,” Mr. Stein said in an Oct. 27 statement.

The website of Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry, a Republican, blamed Democratic Senators for withholding their votes on a spending bill.

“Our US Senators representing Louisiana have voted over and over again to re-open the government. They are doing their part. Now it is time for those US Senators, voting under Democrat Senate Leader Chuck Schumer, to vote yes and re-open the federal government,” the website said.

Thirteen Senate votes to fund the government have failed. — Reuters

Toyota flexes new vehicles, recommits to decarbonization

The Century Coupe Concept takes center stage at Century’s Japan Mobility Show area. — PHOTO BY KAP MACEDA AGUILA

Something old, something new at the Japan Mobility Show 2025

By Kap Maceda Aguila

THE RECENT Japan Mobility Show (JMS) 2025 once again proved how much it is an important showcase of what is and what’s to come in mobility. The biennial show was held once more at the Tokyo Big Sight or Tokyo International Exhibition Center in the Ariaki Minami district of the Tokyo Waterfront City.

Toyota Motor Philippines sent a huge contingent of media and content creators to Tokyo where key executives of the brand mapped out the aspirations of the world’s leading automobile maker — particularly with regard to its operations and presence in the ASEAN region.

Toyota, Lexus, Daihatsu, Gazoo Racing, and the new ultra-luxury marque Century remain committed to the multi-pathway approach of the group, and continue to espouse the notion that carbon is the enemy, not any one powertrain. The clear message from its JMS stint — as elucidated by Toyota executives — also remains to be the continuing effort of the group in providing mobility for all; empowering even the differently abled to be able to lead mobile, more enabled lives.

Toyota Motor Asia Executive Vice-President Pras Ganesh reminded how the focus, as defined in JMS 2023, has continued to evolve from actual cars to mobility, and — in parallel — the “many ways to decarbonize at speed and scale.” A battery electric vehicle is not the single answer because the world’s various markets have various needs and state of readiness to full electric. Decarbonization can take the form of the use of e-fuels or biofuels, and the many powertrains that indeed cut the emission of carbon: battery electric, plug-in hybrid electric, low-carbon internal combustion engines, and hydrogen fuel cell electric.

For Toyota in the ASEAN region, widely touted to be the next growth area, Mr. Pras mentioned a so-called “30 x 30” mission: to realize 30% of vehicle sales comprised of electrified vehicles by 2030. A majority of these electrified vehicles will be hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). Taken as a whole, the effort to decarbonize, maintained the Toyota executive, will redound in benefit equal to the planting of 25 million trees.

That’s certainly something to write home about — and we’ll have more reportage coming your way in the weeks ahead.

Pacquiao launches MannyPay e-wallet

MANNYPAY.PH

FORMER SENATOR Emmanuel “Manny” D. Pacquiao has launched MannyPay, an electronic wallet that promises lower transfer fees and will eventually feature remittance and cryptocurrency services.

The e-wallet was launched on Thursday through tech and business process outsourcing (BPO) company 7th Pillar Integrated Systems Corp., which is also chaired by Mr. Pacquiao and began operations in 2023.

The company also signed a memorandum of agreement with Prime Electric Holdings, Inc. to use the e-wallet across its distribution network.

“MannyPay is not just an app or a payment gateway. Ito ay simbolo ng tiwala at katapatan. We built this platform for everyone — para sa mga negosyante, online sellers, riders, freelancers, at bawat Pilipinong araw-araw nagsusumikap para sa pamilya,” Mr. Pacquiao said in a speech at the launch.

He said their target is to have one million customers.

7th Pillar Integrated Systems President and Chief Operating Officer Marc Hussein P. Bundalian told reporters on the sidelines of the event that the e-wallet will feature fees at least P2 lower than those of competitors. He added that the e-wallet is supported by Amazon Web Service’s cloud systems and will feature better security.

“We are not rushing this so we can ensure the security of our users. Our top priority is to have no scams… Hopefully we do not have any problems,” he said.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas has issued the company a temporary license and was allowed a test period of 30 days, Mr. Bundalian said.

The app currently only functions as a payment gateway, but they expect to have all services available before the end of the year, he said.

“Other features such as fund transfers will be available after the official launch. This is like a pre-launch to show that the app is there. You can download it on both iOS and Play Store… The ultimate goal of MannyPay is to first start as a payment gateway, and then an e-wallet, and then remittances.”

Mr. Bundalian added that the company plans to apply for an electronic money issuer license by the second quarter of next year.

He said they expect to onboard up to 100,000 users by yearend. — Aaron Michael C. Sy

Disney networks go dark on YouTube TV after failed talks

DISNEY’S networks went dark on Google’s pay-TV platform YouTube TV after negotiations to reach a licensing deal failed, the companies said in separate statements late on Thursday.

The affected Disney networks include ESPN, ABC, FX, Nat Geo, Nat Geo Wild, Disney Channel, ABC News Live and others.

A source told Reuters that Disney’s channels were removed from YouTube TV ahead of the contract lapsing. YouTube TV issued its statement on X at 11:16 p.m. ET on Thursday, while the deal was originally set to expire only at midnight.

YouTube TV, one of the largest pay-TV distributors in the US, has been locked in a series of negotiations this year with firms threatening to pull their media networks from the platform.

Earlier this month, the company, after a difficult negotiation period, struck a deal with Comcast-owned NBCUniversal to keep NBC shows such as Sunday Night Football and America’s Got Talent on YouTube TV. The platform also struck similar deals with Fox and Paramount earlier this year after difficult contract negotiations.

YouTube TV, which has over 10 million subscribers, said Disney’s proposed offer terms would raise prices for its subscribers and benefit Disney’s own live TV services such as Hulu + Live TV, while Disney accused YouTube TV of being unwilling to pay fair rates.

“Our contract with Disney has reached its renewal date, and we’ll not agree to terms that disadvantage our members while benefiting Disney’s TV products,” YouTube TV said in a post on social media platform X.

A Disney spokesperson said the company was committed to working toward a resolution as quickly as possible.

“With a $3-trillion market cap, Google is using its market dominance to eliminate competition and undercut the industry-standard terms we’ve successfully negotiated with every other distributor,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

YouTube TV will offer its subscribers a $20 credit if the Disney networks remain unavailable on the platform for an extended period of time.

The pay-TV platform had dropped Spanish-language network Univision last month after a failed contract deal. — Reuters

A united front against counterfeit medicines

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Counterfeit medicines continue to pose serious threats to people around the world, including Filipinos. Recent reports have confirmed the presence of fake medicines and vaccines in the country across various disease categories, putting patients’ lives and public trust at risk.

These counterfeit products have been detected in multiple channels, from government bidding processes and private retailers to e-commerce platforms, social media advertisements, and unauthorized clinics or agents. Some are even illegally compounded using unapproved Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) or the components in a drug that produce the intended therapeutic effect.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), substandard medical products fail to meet required quality standards due to poor manufacturing or weak quality control. Falsified medical products, on the other hand, are intentionally misrepresented in terms of their identity, composition, or source, usually produced and sold to deceive consumers for profit. Both forms of counterfeit medicines pose grave global health risks. They may be ineffective in treating diseases if they contain the wrong ingredients or incorrect dosages. Some can be directly harmful due to toxic substances or contamination, while others contribute indirectly to antimicrobial resistance.

Patients have reported treatment failures, serious side effects, and even life-threatening complications caused by counterfeit medicines. Beyond the physical harm, these fake products also erode public confidence in hospitals, healthcare professionals, and legitimate manufacturers undermining the credibility of the entire health system.

A related concern is the unauthorized distribution of genuine medical products that were illegally imported or mishandled, bypassing proper distribution, storage, or tax regulations. Such practices endanger patients, undercut legitimate businesses, and weaken both the public health system and the national economy.

The Pharmaceutical and Healthcare Association of the Philippines (PHAP) and its member companies remain steadfast in ensuring that all medicines made available to Filipino patients are safe, effective, and compliant with local, regional, and global standards. As a long-standing partner of government, PHAP has consistently supported policies and programs that protect the integrity of the supply chain and uphold patient welfare.

PHAP member companies actively implement anti-counterfeit measures such as conducting test buys and local intelligence gathering upon reports of suspected counterfeit medicines, performing laboratory verification, and submitting detailed reports to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

However, the fight against counterfeit medicines cannot be won by one sector alone. It requires a comprehensive, multi-sectoral strategy that brings together government agencies, the private sector, the medical community, civil society, and the public.

To this end, PHAP is exploring further collaboration to strengthen collective action against counterfeit medicines in the Philippines. Among the proposed measures include imposing administrative sanctions on legally registered establishments found to knowingly engage in unauthorized distribution of genuine or counterfeit products, including suspension or revocation of licenses. Also crucial is shortening the turnaround time for investigations and the issuance of public advisories that identify perpetrators. Moreover, it will be important to establish collaborative mechanisms for information exchange between government and industry to fast-track enforcement. Finally, creating a counterfeit medicines reporting hotline to encourage the public to report suspicious products or activities will be necessary.

This collaboration also extends to patients, healthcare professionals, and hospitals, encouraging vigilance and proactive reporting of suspected fake medicines. Pharmaceutical companies, in turn, are called upon to provide verified information to regulators, strengthen supply-chain monitoring and workforce integrity, and advocate for stronger enforcement and transparency.

These actions reflect our joint commitment to integrity, accountability, and transparency. Ahead of the National Consciousness Week Against Counterfeit Medicines, PHAP is also planning a nationwide public information campaign to raise awareness about the dangers of fake medicines and the legal consequences of counterfeiting.

Counterfeit medicines remain a serious and evolving threat to patient safety, industry integrity, and public confidence in the healthcare system. Now more than ever, collective and sustained action through stronger regulation, public education, and shared accountability is needed to ensure that only genuine, quality-assured medicines reach Filipino patients.

PHAP reaffirms its commitment to work closely with the FDA and all stakeholders to protect the integrity of the country’s medicine supply chain and safeguard public health.

 

Teodoro B. Padilla is the executive director of Pharmaceutical and Healthcare Association of the Philippines, which represents the biopharmaceutical medicines and vaccines industry in the country. Its members are at the forefront of developing, investing and delivering innovative medicines, vaccines, and diagnostics for Filipinos to live healthier and more productive lives.

Manila Water up due to positive sector sentiment

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By Lourdes O. Pilar, Senior Researcher

MANILA Water Co., Inc. was among the most actively traded stocks last week amid optimism in the water utility sector and the company’s continued network expansion.

The Razon-led water concessionaire was the 10th most traded stock from Oct. 27 to 30, with 12.83 million shares worth P439.12 million changing hands, according to data from the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE). The trading week ended early in observance of All Saints’ Day.

Manila Water closed the week at P34.75 per share, up 5% from a week earlier. The company’s stock outperformed both the industrial sector, which inched up 0.01%, and the benchmark PSE index (PSEi), which slipped 1%. Year to date, the stock has climbed 28.7%, beating the industrial index’s 4.7% decline and the PSEi’s 9.2% decline.

“We view Manila Water’s week-on-week gain as a technical bounce from oversold levels, likely induced by selling pressure as investors rotated capital into the initial public offering (IPO) of its industry peer, Maynilad Water Services, Inc.,” Unicapital Securities, Inc. Equity Research Analyst Peter Louise D. Garnace said in an e-mailed reply to questions.

He said the Maynilad IPO could serve as a “key valuation catalyst” for the sector, crystallizing Manila Water’s value. “We also anticipate robust earnings from Manila Water, underpinned by higher implemented tariffs across its East Zone and non-East Zone units, which could also influence its stock price,” he added.

Chinabank Securities Research Associate Andrei Jorge G. Soriano said the stock’s recent strength reflected “overall positive sentiment” in the water utility sector. “Key points for consideration among investors are stable earnings prospects given the scheduled tariff adjustments and an attractive dividend payout to hedge against market volatility,” he said.

Maynilad, the country’s biggest private water concessionaire, opened its IPO last month at P15 per share, matching the upper end of its revised price range, according to a PSE notice. The company aims to raise P34.3 billion in gross proceeds for capital expenditures and general corporate purposes.

“Manila Water’s continued network expansion is a positive catalyst as it is poised to grow its customer base, improve operational efficiency and support development in the East Zone’s high-growth areas,” Mr. Garnace said.

As of August, Manila Water’s network spanned 5,622.22 kilometers across the East Zone and Rizal, up by 58.58 kilometers from January. The company now serves 1.2 million water connections — 1.1 million domestic and 59,414 commercial and industrial — reflecting sustained expansion in its customer base.

Manila Water’s consolidated revenues grew 9.6% to P10.45 billion in the second quarter, bringing its first-half total to P20 billion, up 8.9% year on year. Net income attributable to the parent rose 15.6% to P8.28 billion from a year earlier.

Mr. Soriano expects full-year 2025 revenues to reach P40.2 billion. The stock carries a 5.3% dividend yield, with its most recent P0.17-per-share payout made on March 28.

Mr. Garnace set resistance at P36.70 per share and support at P34.50, while Mr. Soriano pegged immediate support and resistance at P33 and P37, respectively.

Federal courts bar Trump from suspending food aid benefits

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BOSTON — President Donald Trump’s administration cannot suspend food aid for millions of Americans during the ongoing government shutdown, two federal judges ruled on Friday, saying the government must use contingency funds to pay for the benefits.

The dual rulings by judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island came in a pair of lawsuits seeking to block the US Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) suspension on Saturday of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, known as SNAP or food stamps.

Democrats and Republicans in Congress have been trading blame for the prolonged shutdown, which has put SNAP benefits in jeopardy.

It was not immediately clear whether the rulings mean that benefits will be paid on Nov. 1.

Both judges ordered the administration to report back on Monday on how it will comply with their decisions.

Mr. Trump said on social media that the federal government likely does not have legal authority to pay SNAP benefits during the government shutdown, and that his lawyers are asking courts “to clarify how we can legally fund SNAP as soon as possible.”

“If we are given the appropriate legal direction by the Court, it will BE MY HONOR to provide the funding,” Mr. Trump wrote.

SNAP benefits are available to Americans whose income is less than 130% of the federal poverty line, or $1,632 a month for a one-person household and $2,215 for a two-person household in many areas. States are responsible for the day-to-day administration of the benefits, which are paid out monthly.

The USDA has said insufficient funds exist to pay full benefits to 42 million low-income Americans, as they cost $8.5 billion to $9 billion per month. The administration said the agency lacked authority to pay them until Congress passes a spending bill ending a government shutdown that began Oct. 1.

But US District Judge John McConnell in Providence, at the end of a hearing in a lawsuit brought by cities, nonprofit organizations and a union, said the administration’s decision not to tap $5.25 billion in contingency funds to fund November benefits was arbitrary.

“There is no doubt, and it is beyond argument, that irreparable harm will begin to occur if it hasn’t already occurred in the terror it has caused some people about the availability of funding for food, for their family,” Mr. McConnell said.

He said the agency must distribute the emergency money “as soon as possible,” and if the money is insufficient, the agency should determine if money from a separate fund with around $23 billion could be used.

Minutes earlier, US District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston ruled that the administration was wrong in saying it was legally barred from using the contingency funds to pay for SNAP benefits during the shutdown. The Boston ruling came in a lawsuit brought by 25 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia.

The judge, who like Mr. McConnell was appointed by Democratic President Barack Obama, said the “suspension of SNAP payments was based on the erroneous conclusion that the contingency funds could not be used to ensure continuation of SNAP payments.”

The USDA’s shutdown plan, released last month, had said contingency funds were available to keep funding SNAP benefits if Congress did not enact spending legislation to avert the lapse in funding that began Oct. 1.

But the department last week updated its website to say that no benefits would be issued on Nov. 1 and that “the well has run dry,” prompting the filing of the lawsuits.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said on Friday that the argument by Democrats in Congress and Democratic-led states — that the USDA has money to spend on November SNAP benefits — was a “lie.”

“It is a contingency fund that can only flow if the underlying appropriation is approved,” Ms. Rollins told reporters, speaking on Capitol Hill alongside House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson.

During a Thursday hearing, Justice department attorney Jason Altabet warned that partial payments, unprecedented in the program’s history, could be difficult, saying that officials were “legitimately scared” about whether the antiquated systems some states use could handle their distribution.

“The agency thinks it would be catastrophic,” he said.

Both Mr. McConnell and Ms. Talwani indicated, however, that the administration had the ability to fund SNAP benefits in full if it used its discretion to tap other funding to cover the shortfall. — Reuters

Analysts’ October inflation rate estimates

PHILIPPINE inflation may have slightly accelerated in October amid elevated prices of food, fuel and electricity as well as a weak peso, analysts said. Read the full story.

Analysts’ October inflation rate estimates

Key economic data in focus as market seeks leads

The lobby of the Philippine Stock Exchange in Taguig City, Sept. 30, 2020. — REUTERS

BARGAIN HUNTERS could help lift Philippine stocks this week, with the release of key economic data, including reports on October inflation and third-quarter gross domestic product (GDP), to drive trading.

On Oct. 30, the benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) went down by 0.57% or 34.09 points to close at 5,929.68, while the broader all shares index fell by 0.33% or 11.93 points to end at 3,593.28. Philippine financial markets were closed on Oct. 31 for a holiday.

Week on week, the PSEi dropped by 58.34 points from its close of 5,988.02 on Oct. 24.

The bellwether index was also down for the month, dropping by 23.78 points from its 5,953.46 finish on Sept. 30.

“The numbers show that the local market has been bearish for October,” Philstocks Financial, Inc. Research Manager Japhet Louis O. Tantiangco said in a Viber message. “Trading has been tepid, with net value turnover averaging P4.90 billion per day for the month, lower than the year-to-date average of P5.85 billion. Foreigners have been net sellers for the month, with net outflows amounting to P5.85 billion.”

“This can be attributed primarily to the negative investor sentiment brought by the infrastructure related corruption issues in the Philippines and their impact on the country’s economic outlook. The peso’s decline against the US dollar also added to the market’s poor October performance,” he said.

Regina Capital Development Corp. Head of Sales Luis A. Limlingan said the market showed “some resilience” despite volatile trading last month, mainly backed by strong corporate results.

“Power and mining sectors stood out, with some notable stocks gaining traction due to recent earnings reports and project developments amidst tariff hikes and trade disruptions. Property sectors have seen some progress on the residential, retail and leasing front, as well as gradual recovery in international tourism rates,” he said in a Viber message.

For this week, Mr. Tantiangco said bargain hunting following the market’s two-week decline could lift the PSEi.

“For the market’s general direction, however, we expect investors to take cues from our upcoming macroeconomic data. Investors are expected to look towards our Q3 GDP data to know how the local economy has been. A growth slower than the government’s 5.5%-6.5% target for the year may weigh on the market,” he said.

He added that data on inflation and manufacturing activity, along with the peso’s movements against the dollar, could also provide some leads.

“Bearish sentiment continues to dominate the local market as downside risks continue to press on while positive catalysts are yet to be seen. Investor confidence remains weak.”

Mr. Tantiangco put the PSEi’s major support at 5,800 and major resistance at 6,000.

Meanwhile, Mr. Limlingan said the release of more listed companies’ financial results could also provide catalysts. — Alexandria Grace C. Magno

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