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Tax treatment of COVID-19 vaccines

In the beginning of the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic, strict government regulations were imposed as an attempt to stem the transmission of the virus. These restrictions required business establishments to put their workplace operations on hold, save for businesses deemed necessary to provide basic necessities.

While the regulations were meant for the immediate protection of people’s health, their adverse economic impact was deeply felt by establishments relying heavily on actual customer contact.

To keep their businesses afloat, employers needed to adjust to the demands of the situation by adopting flexible work policies. Indeed, while businesses were forced to operate at a reduced on-site workplace capacity, technology made employees conveniently accessible to their employers. This ensured the on-boarding of every employee daily and, effectively, serves as a prelude to the new normal business operations.

Undeniably, physical interactions are still key for some industries and work productivity in the workplace setting has been proven to be effective. As such, employers cannot be faulted for seeking the “old” normal. However, since we are still without a universal cure for COVID-19, society’s hope for the return of normalcy would rely heavily on safe and effective vaccinations. Given that the government’s vaccination plan prioritizes frontline health workers and other vulnerable sectors, employers are taking charge and are beginning to procure vaccines for their employees.

Aside from deciding on what vaccine brand to procure, employers are determining the proper tax treatment of the employees’ vaccine benefit, i.e., whether or not it is taxable as additional compensation of employees subject to withholding tax on compensation.

DE MINIMIS BENEFITS
In general, all compensation for services performed by employees for their employers are subject to withholding tax on compensation (WTC). However, De Minimis benefits are exempt from income tax and the consequent WTC. These are the benefits of relatively small value and are offered or furnished by the employer merely as a means of promoting the health, goodwill, contentment, or efficiency of his or her employees.

Under Revenue Regulation No. 02-98, as amended, the following are considered De Minimis benefits:

“xxx

b. Medical cash allowance to dependents of employees, not exceeding P1,500 per employee per semester or P250 per month;

xxx

e. Actual medical assistance not exceeding P10,000 per annum;

xxx”

ACTUAL MEDICAL ASSISTANCE
In Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) Ruling No. 019-02, the BIR clarified that in order for yearly medical benefits to be considered as De Minimis benefits exempt from tax, these must not exceed P10,000 per annum and it must be actually used or utilized for medical reasons. As such, the following conditions must concur:

1. The amount given to the employee shall be for his own medical expenses;

2. The amount actually given and actually spent shall not exceed P10,000 in any given calendar year; and

3. The employee must fully substantiate with official receipts in his name the medical allowance so granted, on or before the annualization of withholding taxes in any given calendar year.

Based on the above, the benefit of COVID-19 vaccination may fall under “actual medical assistance,” provided the requisites are met.

It is worthy to note that because of the P10,000 threshold, the value of the vaccine will be added to the value of other medical assistance actually provided by the employer for the year. The amount exceeding the threshold shall be subject to tax or it may be considered in determining the P90,000 threshold of other benefits excluded from gross income provided in Section 32 (B)(7)(e)(iv) of the Tax Code.

Nevertheless, if the value of the vaccine added to other benefits goes beyond the P10,000 threshold for actual medical assistance and the P90,000 threshold for other benefits, it may still be argued that it is exempt from tax as it is provided for the ultimate benefit of the employer and that the convenience on the part of the employer can be sufficiently proven. The employer is ultimately benefited by having a healthy worker and workforce.

MEDICAL CASH ALLOWANCE TO DEPENDENTS OF EMPLOYEES
For employers who intend to subsidize their employees’ dependents/immediate family, only to the extent of P1,500 per employee per semester or P250 per month may be considered exempt De Minimis benefit. Thus, the amount exceeding the threshold is taxable or may be considered in determining the P90,000 threshold for “other benefits.”

BUSINESS EXPENSE OF THE EMPLOYER
At the end of the day, whether or not the vaccine benefit is considered as taxable compensation of the employees or not, it may be considered as business expense deductible from the employer’s gross income.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author. This article is for general information and educational purposes, and not offered as, and does not constitute legal advice or legal opinion.

 

Kristel Mariz G. Marajas is an Associate at the Tax Department of the Angara Abello Concepcion Regala & Cruz Law Offices.

(632) 8830-8000

kgmarajas@accralaw.com

The EU is much less wonderful than it thinks

RAWPIXEL.COM-FREEPIK

URSULA VON DER LEYEN did the right thing last week after she’d tried everything else. The European Commission president finally apologized for the failings of the continent-wide vaccine procurement scheme.

It followed an unseemly few weeks of battle over the vaccine, during which Von der Leyen scapegoated the Anglo-Swedish pharma company AstraZeneca Plc for supply holdups and threatened to close the Irish land border to imports of vaccines from the European Union (EU). Even Brussels, which is loath to admit fault, finally conceded that its vaccine rollout has been unsatisfactory.

It’s an admission that reveals deeper problems in institutional Europe. Bluntly, the EU isn’t as effective as it likes to think it is in many policy areas where it took over responsibility from member states.

It has also lost two opportunities to lord it over others in recent months. One is Brexit, which — while still disruptive — ended in a trade deal rather than the unregulated chaos threatened by its most vociferous opponents. Another is Donald Trump, that willful exemplar of bad faith and anti-liberal politics, who’s fallen from power.

The net effect is that the EU can no longer shine on the global stage by virtue of contrast with wicked Trump and blundering Boris Johnson. Brussels is meant to work well on many fronts, but it doesn’t and electorates are taking notice.

The world’s largest economic bloc is proving erratic as a champion of democracy, too. It has vast reserves of soft power, but rarely deploys them. Under its largely German leadership, it has difficulty combining commercial realpolitik with its stated aim of advocating for pluralism and encouraging democracy in Eastern Europe and elsewhere.

The immunization debacle had a sorry aftermath. On a visit to Moscow earlier this week, Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief, was all smiles as he praised Russia’s COVID vaccine, Sputnik V. It may have been necessitated by the EU’s possible future shortages but the timing was awful. Alexei Navalny, the dissident leader who survived a military-grade poisoning, was being dragged out of prison to face more trumped-up charges.

Vladimir Putin understands propaganda better than his European counterparts and gave Borrell a public dressing down. At a joint press conference, Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, sneered that the EU wasn’t “a reliable partner.” The Brussels representative learned from his Twitter feed that three European diplomats were being expelled from Moscow for appearing at demonstrations supporting Navalny.

There are plenty of other failures in diplomatic muscularity to pick over. Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany’s head of state, hardly helped when he defended construction work on a Russian gas pipeline beneath the Baltic, Nord Stream 2, on the grounds that his country owes Moscow a debt of guilt for the sins of World War II.

Alas, this deal has losers as well as winners. Ukrainians will be deprived of transit payments from the current land-based pipeline (and are deeply unhappy about any downplaying of their own losses in World War II). Other Eastern European democracies fear Putin is getting the means to cut off their gas without hurting his rich German client. Despite her upbringing in East Germany, which makes her more wary of the Russians than her Social Democrat coalition partners, Angela Merkel has opted for commercial advantage.

It’s not just Russia. The chancellor and Von der Leyen also handed President Joe Biden a nasty surprise as he prepared to take office by announcing an investment agreement with China. What will Trump’s replacement see when he looks at this muddled Europe?

While avoiding Trump’s tub-thumping, Biden aims to continue “extreme competition” with Beijing and to hold it accountable for human rights violations. Merkel, echoed by France’s Emmanuel Macron, makes clear she won’t join any new Cold War against Beijing and warns against dividing the world into competing blocs. China is Germany’s biggest export market for cars.

This all changes some of the diplomatic geometry between the US, EU, and Britain. Biden disapproves of Brexit and had no contact with Prime Minister Johnson when the latter was the UK’s foreign secretary, but the new president has been forced to fall back on his country’s traditional ally for moral and diplomatic support. In a crunch, only the British and the other Anglosphere countries of Australia, Canada, and New Zealand have stood up to Beijing.

The paradox is that Merkel talks the global liberal talk while acting purely in German interests — whereas Johnson sounds like a loudmouthed populist but has walked the walk on Chinese human-rights violations. He is stripping Huawei Technologies Co.’s equipment from Britain’s telecoms networks and he’s offered Hong Kong residents a path to UK citizenship after China’s crackdown on the democracy movement.

The EU is both a commercial trading bloc and a “values” community. There’s a tension here. Von der Leyen says she wants to lead a “geopolitical Commission.” The gap between aspiration and reality is becoming dangerously wide. After Merkel retires in the autumn, a new generation of leaders will need to choose more clearly how it sets about this role. Europe won’t have Brexit and Trump to hide behind.

BLOOMBERG OPINION

World likely to pay more for meat as food inflation deepens

THERE are signs that the food inflation that’s gripped the world over the past year, raising prices of everything from shredded cheese to peanut butter, is about to get worse.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic upended food supply chains, paralyzing shipping, sickening workers that keep the world fed and ultimately raising consumer grocery costs around the globe last year. Now farmers — especially ones raising cattle, hogs and poultry — are getting squeezed by the highest corn and soybean prices in seven years. It’s lifted the costs of feeding their herds by 30% or more.

To stay profitable, producers including Tyson Foods, Inc. are increasing prices, which will ripple through supply chains and show up in the coming months as higher price tags for beef, pork and chicken around the world.

Feed prices “go up and down, and you tend to take the rough with the smooth,” said Mark Gorton, managing director at the British chicken and turkey producer Traditional Norfolk Poultry. “But when it rallies as much as it has, it starts to impact massively on the business.”

The last time grains were this expensive was after the US drought of 2012, and meat prices saw a dramatic run-up. Now, meat is again poised to become a driver of global food inflation, and part of the intensifying debate over the path of overall inflation and exactly what central banks and policy makers should do to aid economies still working to recover from the pandemic.

Vaccinations promising a return to normal life and fiscal stimulus programs amounting to trillions of dollars are already expected to unleash pent-up demand and drive a surge in consumer prices. US and European bond markets are sending signals that inflation is back. Americans’ one-year inflation expectations last week rose to the highest since 2014.

As for what’s driving the feed prices, that’s due to bad crop weather shrinking world harvests. Demand is also increasing. China, the biggest buyer of commodities, is scooping up record amounts of the available supplies to feed its expanding hog herds.

Meat producers across major exporting countries are feeling the impact of the higher grain costs. In Brazil, the biggest poultry shipper, the cost of raising chickens jumped 39% last year due to feed, according to Embrapa, a state-owned agricultural research agency. Costs rose again last month by around 6%, said Itau BBA bank.

In Europe profitability of livestock operations has plunged due to the combination of high feed expenses and stifled demand from Covid-19 lockdowns. Some smaller hog farmers may be forced to exit the market, according to Rabobank senior analyst Chenjun Pan.

The United Nations’ Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO) said global meat prices in January climbed the fourth straight month.

Since Dec. 1, corn futures in Chicago have risen 28% and soybeans 18%.

Animal disease outbreaks could also push meat prices higher, with parts of Europe and Asia seeing avian influenza outbreaks. A deadly hog virus called African swine fever is still spreading in some countries after decimating Chinese herds, and recently caused a Philippine hog company to exit the industry.

SHRINKING HERDS
Meat prices at retail grocery stores rise the most after farmers shrink their herds due to declining profits. That’s a process that takes time, which means there’s a lag between the feed-cost inflation and rising consumer prices, said Will Sawyer, animal protein economist at farm lender CoBank ACB.

In the US, livestock and poultry operations have already started contraction due to slim profits amid the pandemic. The American hog herd in December fell 0.9% from the previous year and the cattle herd in January by 0.2%, according to government data.

Cattle profits are already down. CRI Feeders in Oklahoma, a feedlot with 42,000 animals bulking up on corn, is breaking even, said co-owner Scott Anderson. Expanding drought is withering pastures and feed prices have shot up 30%.

The market and weather challenges likely will prompt ranchers to scale back, according to Clayton Huseman, executive director of the Kansas Livestock Association.

“Over the next couple of years, we do expect the supply to get tighter,” Mr. Huseman said. — Bloomberg

UN warns Myanmar vs harsh response to coup protesters

REUTERS/MIKE SEGAR

THE UNITED Nations (UN) special envoy has warned Myanmar’s army of “severe consequences” for any harsh response to protesters demonstrating against this month’s coup in a call with the military leadership, a UN spokesman said.

Despite the deployment of armored vehicles and soldiers to some major cities at the weekend, protesters have kept up demonstrations to denounce the Feb. 1 takeover and demand the release of detained leader Aung San Suu Kyi and others.

Protests on Monday were smaller than the hundreds of thousands who had joined earlier demonstrations but broke out in many parts of the Southeast Asian country, where the coup has halted a decade of unsteady transition to democracy.

Small crowds gathered in two places in the main city of Yangon on Tuesday — at a traditional protest site near the main university campus and at the central bank, where protesters hoped to press staff to join a civil disobedience movement.

The army cut off the internet for a second consecutive night early on Tuesday though it was again restored at about 9 a.m. (0230 GMT)

UN Special Envoy Christine Schraner Burgener spoke on Monday to the deputy head of the junta in what has become a rare channel of communication between Myanmar’s army and the outside world.

“Ms. Schraner Burgener has reinforced that the right of peaceful assembly must fully be respected and that demonstrators are not subjected to reprisals,” UN spokesman Farhan Haq said at the United Nations.

“She has conveyed to the Myanmar military that the world is watching closely, and any form of heavy-handed response is likely to have severe consequences.”

In an account of the meeting, Myanmar’s army said junta Number Two, Soe Win, had discussed the administration’s plans and information on “the true situation of what’s happening in Myanmar”.

The unrest has revived memories of bloody outbreaks of opposition to almost half a century of direct army rule that ended in 2011 when the military began a process of withdrawing from civilian politics.

The army said late on Monday that protests were harming stability and had left people in fear.

“People are delighted to have the security patrols and the security forces will conduct them day and night,” its True News information team said.

An activist group, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, said it had recorded 426 arrests between the coup and Monday and it feared the military was using internet blackouts to arrest more opponents, particularly after it suspended legal constraints on search and detention powers.

Violence during the protests has been limited compared with that under previous juntas, but police have opened fire several times, mostly with rubber bullets, to disperse protesters, including on Monday. — Reuters

WHO approves AstraZeneca COVID vaccine for emergency use

GENEVA — The World Health Organization (WHO) on Monday listed AstraZeneca and Oxford University’s coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine for emergency use, widening access to the relatively inexpensive shot in the developing world.

“We now have all the pieces in place for the rapid distribution of vaccines. But we still need to scale up production,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General, told a news briefing.

“We continue to call for COVID-19 vaccine developers to submit their dossiers to WHO for review at the same time as they submit them to regulators in high-income countries,” he said.

A WHO statement said it had approved the vaccine as produced by AstraZeneca-SKBio (Republic of Korea) and the Serum Institute of India.

“In the first half of 2021, it is hoped that more than 300 million doses of the vaccine will be made available to 145 countries through COVAX, pending supply and operational challenges,” the British drug maker said in a separate statement announcing the approval.

The listing by the UN health agency comes days after a WHO panel provided interim recommendations on the vaccine, saying two doses with an interval of around 8 to 12 weeks should be given to all adults, and can be used in countries with the South African variant of the coronavirus as well.

The WHO’s review found that the Astrazeneca vaccine met the “must-have” criteria for safety, and its efficacy benefits outweighed its risks.

The AstraZeneca/Oxford shot has been hailed because it is cheaper and easier to distribute than some rivals, including Pfizer/BioNTech’s , which was listed for emergency use by the WHO late in December.

Nearly 109 million people have been reported to be infected by the novel coronavirus globally and more than 2.5 million have died, according to a Reuters tally. Infections have been reported in more than 210 countries and territories since the first cases were identified in China in December 2019.

AstraZeneca’s vaccine makes up the lion’s share of doses in the COVAX coronavirus vaccine sharing initiative, with more than 330 million doses of the shot due to begin being rolled out to poorer countries from the end of February.

The WHO established its emergency use listing (EUL) process to help poorer countries without their own regulatory resources quickly approve medicines new diseases like COVID-19, which otherwise could lead to delays.

The COVAX Facility, which is co-led by GAVI, the World Health Organization, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the UN Children’s Fund, has said doses would cover an average of 3.3% of total populations of 145 participating countries. — Reuters

Would ‘COVID loans’ be a more affordable and sustainable way to support national economies?

Faced with a COVID-19 pandemic of unknown severity and duration, governments around the world are looking for effective and sustainable ways to maintain economic confidence and employment.

Even New Zealand, where lockdowns have been few and short-lived, is confronting the reality of repeated lockdowns, especially since the United Kingdom variant has now been detected in community cases.

With vaccines likely to require all of 2021 to be rolled out in significant numbers, more economic disruption has to be expected this year, with each successive shock further testing economic resilience.

For many countries, targeted wage subsidies of some form have been the principal tool for maintaining employment and economic confidence, often complemented by small business loans. While these have clearly been useful, they also have clear limitations — not least their cost.

This raises questions about the ongoing viability of wage subsidies and small business loans as the economic response measures of choice.

My recently published policy paper proposes an alternative approach, modelled on student loans schemes such as those operating in New Zealand, Australia and the UK.

Rather than attempting to support firms and households to pay wages, rents and other expenses, this alternative enables firms and households whose incomes have fallen due to the pandemic to take out government-supported “COVID loans” to restore their pre-pandemic income levels — a form of “revenue insurance”.

I argue this alternative approach will be not just more affordable and sustainable, but will also be more effective and more equitable.

Insuring small business and household revenues means they should be able to meet all their outgoings, not just wages and rents which are subject to selective support measures under the current approach.

Borrowers can simply determine which outgoings they need to prioritize, and access the resources they need to meet those costs.

This also simplifies administration, since only one support scheme is required, rather than multiple schemes. With student loan schemes already in place in many countries, experience and infrastructure are available to support the rollout of the proposed loans.

Just as importantly, firms and households that take out COVID loans would effectively be borrowing against their own future incomes. This places less of a burden on future taxpayers than wage subsidies financed through extra government debt.

In turn this makes the approach more equitable than debt-financed wage subsidies, since that extra government debt is a charge against future generations.

In terms of affordability, loans to make up drops in income would be repaid via tax surcharges on those taking out loans, as and when their future incomes allow. This means would-be borrowers need not be deterred by fixed repayment deadlines in times of ongoing economic uncertainty.

Furthermore, since any firms and households borrowing against their own future incomes will ultimately be repaying their debt, COVID loans represent an asset on government balance sheets.

This offsets the extra liabilities governments take on by borrowing to finance these loans — something wage subsidies do not do. This increases the affordability of a loans-based approach from a government perspective (even allowing for defaults and subsidies implicit in student loan schemes).

Using illustrative data for New Zealand, my paper shows COVID loans are 14% cheaper than wage subsidies (and small business loans) in terms of their impact on net government debt.

More importantly, they are almost 2.5 times as effective in terms of the level of support they offer. And since 67% of the cost of COVID loans ultimately falls to those who make use of them (allowing for defaults and implicit subsidies), they place less of a burden on future taxpayers than deficit-funded wage subsidies.

Affordability is also enhanced by a subtle feature of the proposed scheme. By making COVID loans generally available to all firms and households, the scheme sustains economic confidence.

Firms and households are assured the other firms and households they rely on for their own economic prospects have access to the same effective financial lifeline throughout the pandemic.

Households can therefore keep spending confidently, and employers can confidently keep employing. This means the loans might actually not need to be used to any great extent. Their strength lies in preventing economic decline — much like a vaccine’s strength lies in preventing disease.

Finally, COVID loans are not just a sustainable policy tool for minimizing the economic harm of COVID-19. They also provide a benchmark for assessing how cost-effective other support measures such as wage subsidies have been, and a possible solution for future pandemics. – Reuters

Reyes ready to embrace pressure anew of coaching in pro league

By Michael Angelo S. Murillo, Senior Reporter

BACK ON the helm as coach in the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) after nearly a decade away from it, Chot Reyes said there is no denying the pressure that goes with it, but it is something he is ready to embrace.

Speaking on The Game over One PH on Monday night, Mr. Reyes, who is making a coaching back with the TNT Tropang GIGA, said he is looking forward to get back on the swing of things and welcomes the challenge of being a head coach anew in the PBA, including the pressure and the expectations that will be thrown his way.

“Once you accept a coaching job, there is always pressure, of course. That’s why it’s called the hot seat. And to a take a high-profile job like that with TNT, there are very high expectations. But I’m kinda used to and there is no pressure greater than the pressure I put on myself,” said Mr. Reyes.

The former Gilas Pilipinas coach last handled a PBA team in 2012 with TNT.

Mr. Reyes, an eight-time PBA champion coach, concentrated on the national team after that and later became a top executive of TV5 until he stepped down in 2019.

In bringing him back, the TNT management said it hopes to revisit the kind of success it had with Mr. Reyes as coach, which included four PBA titles, the last one during his last year as coach with the Philippine Cup crown.

Mr. Reyes takes over from TNT active consultant Mark Dickel, who ran the team along with coach Bong Ravena for the last couple of years.

Mr. Dickel was asked to stay with the team, but declined the offer to look for new opportunities elsewhere. Mr. Ravena though is still part of the coaching staff.

The comebacking coach said he has yet to sit down with his team to talk about the direction they are going to take moving forward.

But he shared that the philosophy for him is still the same and he just needs to adjust his system with the pieces that he has and the competition ahead.

“I’m a big believer in values-based, purpose-led coaching. I don’t think that’s going to change. The values that I believe in, the foundations of my coaching philosophy, they are going to be the same but the tactics, the strategies, the ways of doing things are going to be different depending on the personnel I have and depending on the competition,” he said.

Mr. Reyes went on to say that given the landscape in the PBA right now, work is cut out for them to achieve the success they want.

“It’s not going to be easy. This is not going to be a walk in the park. This is not going to be an instant thing,” he said.

With TNT, Mr. Reyes will lead a team bannered by veteran Jayson Castro, Roger Pogoy, Ray Parks, Jr., Troy Rosario, and JP Erram.

Also part of the squad are Ryan Reyes, Simon Enciso, Samboy De Leon, Lervin Flores, Jay Washington, David Semerad, and Almond Vosotros, as well as new signings Glenn Khobuntin, Dave Marcelo, and Ping Exciminiano.

Osaka thrashes Hsieh to reach Australian Open semifinals

MELBOURNE — The brute force of Naomi Osaka crushed the artistry of Hsieh Su-wei as the Japanese former champion charged into the Australian Open semifinals with a (6-2, 6-2) win on Tuesday.

On a warm and muggy day at Rod Laver Arena, Osaka attacked Hsieh’s weak serve with gusto and the Taiwanese giantkiller quickly wilted under the pressure of her Grand Slam quarterfinal debut.

Osaka had a torrid time in her last Australian Open clash with Hsieh in 2019, having to come back from a set and a break down on the way to claiming the championship.

So the Japanese third seed was thrilled with her form against the Taiwanese maverick in a 66-minute clinic.

“Yeah, definitely really happy,” 23-year-old Osaka said on court.

“Really happy with how I played today. Every time I play her, it’s a real battle and, despite the score, this was again a real battle today.”

Osaka’s reward will be a semifinal against either Serena Williams or Simona Halep, the pair having a rematch of the 2019 Wimbledon final in the evening session at Rod Laver Arena.

“I always watch Serena’s matches, anyway,” said Osaka, who has never failed to win a Grand Slam after making the quarterfinals.

“Definitely going to be real fun.”

Hsieh, 35, bowed out after a stellar tournament, having become the oldest women’s player to debut in a Grand Slam quarterfinal in the professional era.

The improbable angles conjured by her double-handed, double-sided game had Osaka in some trouble early, but Hsieh was unable to convert any of the three break points she raised in the opening games of the first set.

Osaka quashed the first of them in the opening game with an ace down the ‘T’ before smashing Hsieh’s defences with a blazing backhand down the line to break to 3-1.

After holding on grimly through a 14-point game to hold serve, Osaka raised the pressure when Hsieh served to stay in the set at 5-2 and sealed it when the Taiwanese slapped a limp backhand wide.

Hsieh was soon in a tailspin, pounding a backhand well over the line to be broken to 2-0 as an emboldened Osaka raced to the finish.

While Osaka has suffered some major wobbles in the past, there was no hint of frustration from her despite Hsieh saving two match points. She bided her time to claim the win on the third when an overwhelmed Hsieh floated a sliced backhand long.

“I would say it makes me a bit more calm, realizing that even when my back was against the wall, I still had chances,” said Osaka, who saved two match points in a cliffhanger against Garbine Muguruza in her previous match.

“Even today when I had two match points and she saved them… I was a bit more calm.” — Reuters

Philippine Superliga remains strong, says Juico

By Michael Angelo S. Murillo, Senior Reporter

DESPITE some teams reconsidering their participation in the league and have taken a different direction, the Philippine Superliga (PSL) remains strong and ready to forge ahead and bring its brand of volleyball to the fore.

This assurance was made by PSL President Philip Ella Juico during his session at the online Philippine Sportswriters Association Forum on Tuesday.

The PSL in recent weeks saw its roster of competing teams slashed considerably with some clubs deciding to move to the now-professional Premier Volleyball League (PVL) and others filing for a leave of absence because of the ongoing situation with the coronavirus pandemic.

The non-pro league is currently left with three teams — F2 Logistics, Sta. Lucia, and Cherry Figo — but negotiations are ongoing for a guest team (Petro Gazz) and “two to three teams” interested to come on board.

Mr. Juico said that despite the situation, the PSL is holding up and confident of being able to continue its push for the sport of volleyball in the country.

But the PSL official admitted that the recent developments have forced them to recalibrate their strategies to adapt to what is presented to them.

“We remain as strong as before, even stronger now. The team we have are very committed… [but we are] adjusting to the reality of the situation and signs of the times,” said Mr. Juico at the forum.

Part of the adjustments they are doing is negotiating with a new TV partner in GMA 7.

“We are starting anew. We have started negotiations with GMA 7 as our new TV partner,” he said.

PSL matches were aired over TV5 previously, and in the league’s negotiations with GMA 7, Mr. Juico said they are banking on the network’s push to elevate its sports content, which now includes the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

The league is hoping to have its scheduled beach volleyball competition this month aired over GMA 7 as well as its indoor tournament later this year.

Mr. Juico said as of now, the PSL will remain a nonprofessional league and will not follow the route the PVL has taken.

“Our board and team owners, the ones that are still with us, want to still be nonprofessional. We realized that there is no reason to have two pro leagues. We are happy here and we have a niche here. That’s the thinking of our team owners,” he said.

The PSL was founded in 2013 and has been credited for doing a solid part in promoting the growth of volleyball in the country.

Last year, it saw its season cut short by the pandemic, with the Grand Prix tournament cancelled midway.

Olympic boxing world qualifiers cancelled

The International Olympic Committee Boxing Task Force (BTF) announced Monday via a virtual meeting that the World Qualifiers for the Tokyo Olympics has been cancelled.

The BTF has taken over the function of organizing the boxing competitions in the Olympics after the International Boxing Association (AIBA) was suspended by the Olympic body in 2019. The suspension remains in effect.

The tournament was originally scheduled for May 2020 in Paris but was postponed for this year because of the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.

Two other uncompleted qualifiers, those of the Americas and Europe will push through, but had to be moved back to May and June, respectively.

The Olympic Games is scheduled for July to August.

Alliance of Boxing Association of the Philippines (ABAP) secretary-general Ed Picson, who attended the meeting with more than 30 other Asian countries, said the forum was headed by Task Force Head Morinari Watanabe of Japan.

 Lenny Abbey, another IOC official and Task Force member, made the one-hour presentation.

The Task Force also held similar presentations to the three other continents separately.

Mr. Picson said the Task Force explained that because of time constraints and safety concerns, it was decided to forego the World Qualifiers.

ABAP president Ricky Vargas said “this might prove beneficial to our cause, since some of our boxers are ranked highly among those who have not yet qualified. I hope we get at least two more in Tokyo.”

Two Filipino boxers have qualified through the Asian/Oceanian Qualifying Tournament held in Amman, Jordan, last year. They are middleweight Eumir Felix Marcial and women’s flyweight Irish Magno.

At the moment, several boxers are in the thick of training under “bubble conditions” at the INSPIRE Sports Academy in Calamba, Laguna, and are slated to leave for Thailand for a joint training camp late this month.

Among them are Ms. Magno, (Eumir Marcial is still in the United States), current featherweight world champion Nesthy Petecio, Carlo Paalam, Rogen Ladon, Ian Clark Bautista, Mario Fernandez, Aira Villegas and others.

The BTF is scheduled to make the official announcement of those who will be qualified for Tokyo (due to the cancellation) in March. 

Sports marketing takes center stage in PSC summit session

THE fourth session of the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) online summit takes place this week with sports marketing taking front and center.

Happening on Thursday, Feb. 18, the 1 p.m. session, to be led by University of the Philippines Prof. Theresa Jazmines, zeroes in on the principles, strategies, and benefits of sports brand marketing. 

Ms. Jazmines, one of the country’s first women sports journalists in the ‘70s, will draw from her vast experience as a public relations practitioner and sportswriter.

The PSC said that through the session, they hope to further highlight the need for the country’s national sports associations and other sports groups to tap the help of the private sector or market their sports to find other ways to fund their activities given that the government can only do so much on that front.

“It is pivotal for sports stakeholders in the country, from the community grassroots level, the national sports associations, and up to the elite professional level to learn the value of sports marketing to forward the development of their own sports,” said PSC Chairman William Ramirez in a statement.

It is something that Ms. Jazmines agrees to, saying, “sponsors can connect directly with their target markets and create greater awareness for their brands in a rewarding fashion and the officials, teams, athletes — get their desired resources and improve their performances.”

Furthermore, the athletes also gain exposure to the public through it, she said. 

The session on sports marketing is the fourth in the series of talks under PSC’s online national sports summit.

It follows those on “Sports Success from a First World Perspective” by United States Sports Academy President T.J. Rosandich; local government’s sports program by Davao del Norte Sports and Youth Development head Giovanni Gulanes; and overview of grassroots sports in the country by Philippine Sports Institute Dean Prof. Henry Daut.

The three-phased PSC national sports summit is aimed at taking insights of different sports stakeholders and using those as foundations in crafting a sustainable and workable short to long-term plan for Philippine sports.

It is set to cover 25 topics from local sports administration up to the international linkages in the field. 

The sports body said all data gathered from the online summit will be processed and studied to create a new set of resolutions to be presented to sports leaders for action. — Michael Angelo S. Murillo

Clarkson, Utah Jazz take down Philadelphia for eighth straight win

JORDAN Clarkson helped the Utah Jazz overcome big nights by Ben Simmons and Tobias Harris while leading the NBA’s hottest team to a 134-123 win over the Philadelphia 76ers in Salt Lake City on Monday night.

Clarkson came off the bench to score a team-high 40 points, two shy of his career-high and the most with the Jazz, to lift Utah to its eighth straight win and the 19th victory in 20 games in a matchup of the teams with the best records in the West and East.

Playing without Joel Embiid, a late scratch because of back tightness, the Sixers managed to make a competitive contest thanks to a near-triple-double effort by Simmons (42 points, 12 assists, nine rebounds) along with 36 points and 10 rebounds from Harris.

Harris scored five points in a row late in the fourth to cut the Jazz lead, once as big as 16 points, down to 113-109. But Donovan Mitchell made a driving score and then Clarkson hit three free throws and drained a 3-pointer during an 8-2 run for Utah.

Royce O’Neale helped seal the win for the Jazz with three 3-pointers in the final minutes.

Mitchell finished with 24 points and five assists, while Joe Ingles added 20 points and five assists. Rudy Gobert, Bojan Bogdanović, and O’Neale each chipped in with 11 points.

Clarkson ended with eight of the Jazz’s 18 3-pointers.

Dwight Howard (14 points) and Seth Curry (11 points) were the only other Sixers in double figures.

Philadelphia has dropped three straight to end their four-game Western road trip.

Simmons, who went 15-for-26 from the field and 12 of 13 at the foul line, scored 19 points in the first quarter as the visitors exploded to a 42-35 lead.

The Jazz fired back in the second quarter, with Clarkson heating up, and used a 37-24 edge to take a 72-66 lead into the break.

Utah maintained the momentum in the second half to take a 110-94 lead after two free throws by Clarkson. — Reuters

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