DMCI HOMES, the property arm of listed DMCI Holdings, Inc., is introducing a new sub-brand that will cater to students and young professionals through a new project on Taft Ave.
In a statement, DMCI Homes said it is launching DMCI Homes Ascend, which will feature units located near universities and business centers and will have commercial areas, co-working spaces and convenient facilities.
This is the second sub-brand to be formed out of DMCI Homes, after DMCI Homes Exclusive, which was launched in 2016 for the luxury market.
“With DMCI Homes Ascend, we hope to provide quality living spaces that better fit the needs of young working professionals and students, especially with the evolving lifestyle brought about by the pandemic,” DMCI Homes President Alfredo R. Austria said.
The company will launch its first property before the end of the year, which will feature a mix of studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom units.
This will be located in Malate, Manila near College of St. Benilde and De La Salle University. DMCI Homes said the location is suited for the brand it is vying for because it links Manila, Pasay and Makati—all cities with business hubs.
“Our clients can be assured that DMCI Homes Ascend will carry the same brand DMCI Homes is known for—quality workmanship and value-for-money homes,” Mr. Austria said.
DMCI Homes said in August that it was looking to launch two to three new properties before the end of the year because of encouraging sales despite the coronavirus pandemic.
The company booked P38 million in profits during the first semester, down 97% year on year, due to lower revenue recognition from delayed construction accomplishments.
The income of DMCI Holdings, which includes interests in real estate, mining, construction, water and power, fell 69% to P2 billion during the six-month period.
Shares in DMCI Holdings at the stock exchange picked up four centavos or 0.95% to close at P4.25 apiece on Tuesday. — Denise A. Valdez
A GROUP of three local firms and two businessmen is doing a P64.99-million tender offer of 279.15 million common shares in listed Steniel Manufacturing Corp.
The company told the exchange on Tuesday that its shares are being tendered by Greenkraft Corp., Golden Bales Corp., Corbox Corp., and a certain Rex Chua and Clement O. Chua.
The group is eyeing to buy the company’s shares from public shareholders at 10 centavos each. The tender offer period is scheduled from Oct. 12 to Nov. 10, with the closing date set on Nov. 23.
“The purpose of the private transactions requiring the conduct of this tender offer is for the group, with their extensive experience in the paper industry, to acquire control of Steniel and extend their expertise for the expansion and growth of the paper manufacturing business,” the investors said in a tender offer report disclosed by Steniel on Tuesday.
Shares in Steniel were suspended from trading at the Philippine Stock Exchange since July 2006, when it closed at 26 centavos apiece.
Steniel is in the business of manufacturing and selling paper products, paper board and corrugated carton containers. It has an authorized capital stock of P1 billion composed of 1 billion common shares priced P1 each.
The investors that want to buy the company’s shares are all originating from the Philippines. In the tender offer report, Greenkraft was described as a Pampanga-based business involved in trading craft roll, Golden Bales is a Davao-based business involved in buying and selling paper products, and Corbox is a Cebu-based general merchant. Rex and Clement Chua are both Iloilo-based businessmen, and the latter is a director at Greenkraft.
On Oct. 7, the group signed a share purchase agreement with the listed firm’s parent Steniel (Netherlands) Holdings B.V. The deal involves the sale of 649,908,308 common shares in listed Steniel at 10 centavos each, for a total consideration of P64.99 million. This makes up 64.99% of Steniel’s outstanding capital stock.
Some 279,151,088 common shares comprising 27.91% of the company’s outstanding capital stock will be bought through a tender offer. The remaining 70,940,604 common shares will be bought through a private sale.
BDO Securities Corp. has been tapped as the tender offer agent for the P64.99-million offering.
Last year, Steniel and the investors agreed on a share-swap transaction exchanging the investors’ 269,500,000 common shares in Steniel Mindanao Packaging Corp. for common shares in the listed firm.
Some P11.47 million loans to Greenkraft were also converted to 11.47 million common shares in Steniel, which entailed increasing the company’s capital stock to P1 billion.
In the first six months of 2020, Steniel’s attributable net loss was trimmed to P811,000 from P1.21 million a year ago. Its consolidated revenues slid 2.4% to P31.21 million. – Denise A. Valdez
BROOKLYN Museum’s only Lucas Cranach, Lucretia, will be up for auction at Christie’s Old Masters sale on Oct. 15. — WWW.CHRISTIES.COM
THE ONE-TWO punch of COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) and the racial-justice movement has upended huge swathes of society — work, school and health care. Below the radar, it’s also shaking the foundations of another set of US institutions — museums — forcing them to sell prized works and broaden the definition of great art.
For generations, museums lived by a tightly scripted set of rules. They accepted tax-deductible donations and acquired artists seen as great — mostly European and American, mostly white, mostly men. In deference to the sacredness of their task, they were permitted to sell a work only to buy another, not to keep on the lights or pay conservators.
This past April, after museums from San Francisco to Maine shut their doors due to the pandemic, the Association of Art Museum Directors announced that for two years, works could be sold and the proceeds used for “direct care,” with each institution defining what that means.
The impact has been profound. Museums are not only selling works long off the market but acquiring pieces by female, Black and Latino artists, and — they hope — gaining new visitors who will see themselves reflected in the hushed halls. In other words, they’re expanding the canon and hoping to turn this crisis into an opportunity.
Masterpieces are pouring into the market. Last week at Christie’s, Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse, New York, sold its sole Jackson Pollock painting for $13 million and Springfield Museums in Massachusetts offloaded a Picasso for $4.4 million. Brooklyn Museum’s only Lucas Cranach is heading to the auction block this week while the Baltimore Museum of Art is shopping around its signature, monumental Last Supper by Andy Warhol for about $40 million.
“This is really an unparalleled moment,” said Brent Benjamin, president of the museum directors association and director of the Saint Louis Art Museum. He said earlier financial crises, like the one in 2008, were hard, “but we’ve never seen anything like this.”
Museums are slowly reopening but with reduced staff — the Metropolitan Museum of Art eliminated 400 jobs during the pandemic — and at lower capacity. They can’t hold fund-raising events in person or deepen relationships by organizing trips to international exhibitions and fairs. They’re selling to stay alive, and auction houses Sotheby’s and Christie’s are busy.
Museums represent the distress in the art market while their rich patrons, for the most part, have been so far immune from forced sales. The works are extremely desirable because they’re fresh, historically significant and come from the most exalted of collections.
“In the next two weeks, we’ll be making some significant announcements,” said Nina del Rio, Sotheby’s head of advisory and museum, private and corporate art services, who was granted the $65 million consignment from the Baltimore Museum of Art and smaller ones from Palm Springs Art Museum, San Diego Museum of Art, and Art Institute of Chicago.
Adam Levine, the new leader of the Toledo Museum of Art, says he consults often with Ms. Del Rio. He is exploring if there are ways to extract liquidity from art without breaching public trust, he said. The museum got permission to use $200,000 this year in restricted funds for collection management and its staff is finalizing a plan to diversify its holdings.
“Museums have amazing power,” Mr. Levine said. “When we put something on the wall, it becomes unimpeachably great.”
It also becomes unimpeachably valuable, and museums are under pressure to give power and value to those who’ve been underrepresented. Levine’s first acquisition was Black artist Bisa Butler’s large-scale quilted portrait of Frederick Douglass, whose title alludes to his speech to abolish slavery.
To be sure, museums have in the past sold works outside the rules and have occasionally been sanctioned for it. Most exhibit a tiny fraction of the art they own, with the rest in storage rarely if ever seeing light of day. Taking something off the wall can be precarious. Everson Museum’s sale of Pollock’s Red Composition drew sharp criticism. And Brooklyn Museum’s sale of the Cranach, among other works, raised eyebrows.
“These aren’t easy decisions,” said Anne Pasternak, the Brooklyn Museum director. “The Cranach was an outlier in our collection and had need for restoration. Am I sad to let it go? Sure. Are there more important works in the museum collection? Yes.”
She plans to sell at least $40 million worth of art in the next two years, starting with 12 pieces valued at $2.3 million to $3.6 million at Christie’s next week, and use the income to care for the 160,000 objects in the museum’s care. In Baltimore, the city’s encyclopedic museum is selling three signature works — by Clyfford Still, Brice Marden and Warhol — to raise $65 million.
The sale of the Still especially stings some locals. A key Abstract Expressionist who spent the final decades of his life on a Maryland farm, Still gave his 157-G painting to Baltimore as a gift. It’s estimated to sell for $12 million to $18 million and some funds are to be used to buy works by women and people of color.
“The imperative to act and address decades of inaction around equality in the museum is enormously important,” said Christopher Bedford, museum director. He says the emphasis on diversity will “ensure that the story we are narrating is the full and true story.” — Bloomberg
PROPERTY developer Kepwealth Property Phils. Inc. has moved its continuing acquisition of leasable office spaces to the first or second quarter of 2021 due to the business challenges posed by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
In a disclosure to the stock exchange on Tuesday, the company said that it decided to “proceed cautiously” while evaluating available properties and checking the market demand for office spaces.
The move comes after a review of the company’s plans on how to use the proceeds from its initial public offering (IPO).
“Originally, the company had projected to complete the acquisition until the end of the second quarter of 2020. We now believe that our shareholders’ interest would be best served to move the acquisition to the first or second quarter of 2021,” the disclosure said.
Last year, the company was able to raise P384.77 million when it listed its shares on the stock exchange.
Proceeds from the IPO will be allocated to the purchase of new spaces for commercial and office leasing.
Further, the company said the earlier acquisition of its two contiguous floors and 18 parking spaces in One San Miguel Ave. had only been turned over after the enhanced community quarantine.
In March, the company forged deeds of absolute sale with Amberland Corp. for spaces in the said building in Pasig City.
Meanwhile, Kepwealth also disclosed that a couple of properties that it is managing had expressed their desire to pre-terminate the “asset management agreement” with the company.
The company’s disclosure did not state the names of the properties.
“Nonetheless, as we see when the country eventually bounces back economically, the company continues to work to explore potential tie-ups with property owners,” Kepwealth President Augusto Pablo A. Corpus Jr. was quoted as saying.
On Tuesday, shares of Kepwealth in the stock exchange rose 0.21% or P0.01 to close at P4.85 per share. – Revin Mikhael D. Ochave
PALACIO DE MEMORIA has expanded its collection of Euro-Filipino art pieces in its museum with new ecclesiastical pieces ranging from paintings of religious figures and ivory statues, to church furnishings.
The majority of the museum’s ecclesiastic collection dates back to the 14th century, though it has pieces that span that period into the 20th century. Among the new items at the museum are unique portraits of religious figures in unusual figurations, including Christ, the Virgin Mary, and different saints.
“We are the third largest Catholic country in the world, and our religion is an important part of our history and our identity as Filipinos,” saidPalacio de Memoria general manager Camille Lhuillier in a statement. “ Aside from their artistic merits, we hope the new pieces in our museum will help enlighten people about our Christian cultural heritage.”
There are paintings depicting religious life, including a 17th century painting from Spain showing the martyrdom of Saints Fausto, Jenaro, and Marcial of Cordoba, as well as an oil painting dating back to the 17th century Flemish-Spanish school portraying the scourging of Christ.
Also part of the new selection are ivory icons of ethical provenance, such as a Madonna and Child sculpture from 18th century Portugal and the Crucified Christ figure encased in a wooden frame. There are also reliquaries of venerated individuals including the apostles and various saints.
The museum collection extends to church artifacts like furniture, altar pieces, and other items used in a liturgical ceremony. This includes a wooden oratorio with a tableau of the Holy Family in polychrome terracotta, a two-seat choir stall from 18th century Portugal, a wooden processional cross from Spain, and a bishop’s chair from Bolivia with a depiction of a relief of Archangel Michael and the Blessed Virgin along its wooden frame.
Aside from the new pieces, the museum will also soon serve as a chapel where religious gatherings such as weddings or baptisms can be held.
Palacio de Memoria is located at 95 Roxas Boulevard, Tambo, Parañaque. Tours are available upon request. For more information, visit https://www.palaciodememoria.com or follow @thepalaciodememoria on Facebook and @palacio.de.memoria on Instagram.
SMART COMMUNICATIONS, Inc., the wireless unit of PLDT Inc., said on Tuesday all its cell sites in central Philippines had been upgraded to LTE or long-term evolution, which increases the capacity and speed of wireless data networks.
“The activation of LTE in far-flung coastal community Kawayan, a fifth-class municipality in island province Biliran, Eastern Visayas, brings to nearly 1,500 the number of sites in the region now operating on LTE,” Smart said in an e-mailed statement.
The mobile network operator added all of its sites in the Visayas are now on LTE.
“Smart has also expanded LTE capacity in the Visayas by 31% compared to end-2019,” it said.
To date, all of Smart’s sites in the VIsayas are already on LTE. Smart has also expanded LTE capacity in the Visayas by 31% compared with end-2019.
Mario G. Tamayo, PLDT-Smart senior vice president for network planning and engineering, said: “Rolling out in an archipelago and in the countryside presents unique challenges. This has to be taken into consideration. Recently, we fired up an LTE base station in Pag-asa Island in the municipality of Kalayaan, the country’s most remote cell site. We have also fired up a cell site in Brgy. Tucdao, Kawayan in Biliran. These are far-flung communities, but we are committed to doing this. We have been constantly improving our services by expanding our network wherever possible.”
Smart announced recently that the Pag-asa Island in the West Philippine Sea is now covered by its LTE network service.
Telcos are hoping to improve connectivity in remote areas soon in response to the new normal caused by the pandemic.
Industry participants said the goal is achievable with stimulus legislation that reduces the requirements for permits needed to put up and operate cellular towers.
President Rodrigo R. Duterte recently signed Republic Act No. 11494 or the Bayanihan to Recover As One Act (Bayanihan II), an economic stimulus program that grants the government the power to simplify the permit process for building cell towers.
“PLDT and Smart will continue to invest in building the network. In terms of affordability, we are trying to balance the needs of our customers and their capability to avail of our services. We always make sure that we offer reliable services. Expect improvement in our services this year and next year,” Mr. Tamayo said in a recent online forum.
Hastings Holdings, Inc., a unit of PLDT Beneficial Trust Fund subsidiary MediaQuest Holdings, Inc., has a stake in BusinessWorld through the Philippine Star Group, which it controls. – Arjay L. Balinbin
ROME — After decades locked away in a basement, some of the finest sculptures from antiquity have been pulled from the gloom and returned to public view in Rome.
Busts of Roman emperors, intricate sarcophagi and an ancient Greek relief carved 2,500 years ago are just some of the 92 pieces on display in the city’s Palazzo Caffarelli.
The marbles belong to the aristocratic Torlonia family and represent a fraction of their 620 sculptures, believed to be the largest such private collection in the world.
“We could do seven, eight, 15 more exhibitions,” said art historian Salvatore Settis, who was picked by the family to help curate the show and had the difficult task of deciding which works should see the light of day.
Like many leading Rome families, the Torlonias initially put their huge collection on display in a museum. But after 101 years, they locked its doors in 1976, looking to convert the building into private apartments.
“The reappearance of such a legendary collection is a very important event,” said Mr. Settis. “When I saw them for the first time it was very emotional because I knew most of those pieces from books, but I had never seen them.”
The Torlonias, who built their wealth off the back of papal contracts, snapped up established collections, some dating back to the 15th century, and built up a collection of collections.
Among the pieces on view is a fountain basin carved in ancient Greece that was believed to have stood in the garden of Julius Caesar when it was already considered an antiquity.
Many of the works have undergone substantial restoration over the years, including a statue of a goat whose body dates to the first century AD but whose head is believed to have been created by the famed 17th century Italian sculptor Bernini.
Anna Maria Carruba helped prepare the statues for the exhibition.
“Many of these pieces were already restored from 1600 onwards. We didn’t need to work on the structure of the statues but only on the surfaces, cleaning them, removing the dust that had accumulated over the years and materials used in previous restorations,” she said.
The Torlonia Marbles show had been due to open in April, but was pushed back because of the coronavirus. It runs in Rome until June 2021 and is expected to move on to at least one other European country and the United States before returning to Italy where it will be given a permanent home. — Reuters
ALLHOME Corp. has opened a new retail store in Las Piñas City to tap the builders market in the Calabarzon region.
In a statement on Tuesday, the Villar-led company said it recently opened AllHome Builder’s Centre Evia, which covers almost 2,500 square meters of store area.
The new store features wider aisles and higher shelves and offers items such as tile designs, modern sanitary wares, hardware items, and comprehensive building materials.
“AllHome Builder’s Centre aims to make material-sourcing much more convenient and less time-consuming for builders and contractors. This store is designed to provide the no-frills shopping experience preferred by busy builders,” AllHome Chairman Manuel B. Villar, Jr. said in the statement.
The company wants to ride on the increase in construction projects in Cavite, Laguna and Batangas, particularly the exclusive residential developments in the Alabang area.
AllHome will give away an AllHome Builders’ loyalty card for free to new customers, hoping to generate traction by offering promos and discounts. Its target is to grow its membership base by tenfold in the next three years.
The Builder’s Centre is located at Evia Lifestyle Center in Las Piñas City. As of end-June, AllHome had 45 stores spanning 296,772 square meters of net selling area.
During the first six months of the year, the company’s earnings dropped 37% to P275.65 million, attributed to store closures when Luzon was under a strict lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic.
AllHome shares at the stock exchange closed at P5.96 apiece on Tuesday, up six centavos or 1.02% from a day ago. — Denise A. Valdez
THE COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic has managed to stop a great many things in the world, but not everything.
“Another baby is born with cleft every three minutes — even during a pandemic,” said Miss Universe Catriona Gray, the Global Ambassador for cleft charity Smile Train, in a public service announcement released last July. This sentiment was reiterated by Smile Train Southeast Asia Director Kimmy Flaviano who showed the video last month during a webinar to give updates of the charity’s activities during the pandemic. “During the pandemic, the world doesn’t really stop,” said Ms. Flaviano. “Mothers are still giving birth to people with cleft.”
Smile Train, is arguable the world’s largest cleft charity, treating children with cleft lips and palates (Forbes lists it as #90 of the 100 Largest US Charities in 2019). It was founded in 1999, and established a presence in the Philippines in 2001, where it has since performed about 63,000 surgeries, with 5000 surgeries done every year on average. But due to restrictions on movement because of the COVID-19 lockdowns, as well as limited capacities in hospitals, Ms. Flaviano reported that “In the last three to four months of our fiscal year, we saw a drop in the number of cases [of cleft palate surgeries].”
The charity has supported more than 500 surgeries from March to August, said Ms. Flaviano, as well as provided support for 4,101 surgeries for the fiscal year of 2020. This presents a drop from 5,270 surgeries performed in the fiscal year of 2019.
However, Dr. Nikki Valencia, a Smile Train partner plastic surgeon, said that the De La Salle University Medical Center in Cavite is already preparing to perform surgeries in the near future. In addition, she also said that a handful of hospitals have already begun to resume their cleft palate surgery activities. “There are already some partners who are doing surgeries for cleft palates,” she said.
“Smile Train also has protocols in terms of when and who can receive surgeries,” said Ms. Flaviano.
“It’s not just about surgery,” she explained. “What we strive to do is to be able to provide comprehensive cleft care.”
Because of that, the charity has increased its awareness campaigns. These include Facebook live sessions where new mothers of children with cleft ask questions, among other concerns. “A lot of questions go up when they’re not able to speak to a doctor, or go to a clinic,” said Ms. Flaviano.
Speech therapy sessions and remote consultations are also part of Smile Train’s programs, due in part to its relative convenience, thanks to telehealth and telemedicine partners and programs. “This is something that can be done, even if they don’t go to the hospital,” said Ms. Flaviano. They’ve had over 100 patients, with over 500 sessions since April 1. “These are especially for older patients, who [may not] have the same self-confidence to apply for a job, or don’t have the skills to apply for a job. We’re trying to provide them with different avenues to be able to support them,” she said.
“Even during a pandemic, Smile Train is here to help. They can depend on us, and they can entrust their child to us,” said Ms. Flaviano.
SAN MIGUEL Corp. has received regulatory clearance to sell 266.67 million preferred shares to generate funds for its infrastructure projects.
In a disclosure to the exchange on Tuesday, the company said it was given the permit to offer securities for sale by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last week.
San Miguel was given a pre-effective letter by the SEC on Sept. 29. After complying with submissions, its registration statement has been rendered effective on Oct. 9.
The company is offering up to 133,333,400 Series 2 preferred shares with an oversubscription option of up to 133,333,267 shares at P75 each.
This forms the first tranche of its shelf registration of up to 533.33 million preferred shares, which it intends to use to raise cash for its P734-billion Bulacan airport project and P62.7-billion Metro Rail Transit Line 7.
Based on earlier disclosures, San Miguel intends to offer the shares until Oct. 19, with listing date tentatively set on Oct. 29. The company expects to generate P19.89 billion in net proceeds from the offering.
San Miguel has tapped BDO Capital & Investment Corp., BPI Capital Corp., China Bank Capital Corp., Philippine Commercial Capital Inc., PNB Capital and Investment Corp., RCBC Capital Corp., and SB Capital Investment Corp. as joint issue managers, lead underwriters, and bookrunners for the offering.
The company posted an attributable net loss of P7.59 billion in the first six months of 2020, reversing its profit of P13.23 billion last year, due to the effect of the coronavirus pandemic to its fuel and beer businesses.
San Miguel shares closed flat on Tuesday at P99.90 apiece. — Denise A. Valdez
IN SUPPORT of breast cancer awareness month, Chroma Hospitality, Inc., the management company behind Crimson Hotels and Resorts and Quest Hotels and Resorts, launches the fund-raising project Passionately Pink Virtual Run from Oct. 26 to Nov. 8.
Proceeds from the virtual run will go to STAGEZERO by Project Pink Support Group, a non-stock, non-profit organization, which aims to encourage and empower patients, families and communities to conquer cancer through knowledge, emotional, social and spiritual support.
The public is invited to run for a cause whenever and wherever they are as they can do the run at their own pace and choose from the 3k, 5k, 10k, 15k, 25k distances. Registration ends Oct. 25 and is priced at P1,200. The race kit includes a Passionately Pink race shirt, a medal and a certificate of donation. To register, visit https://bitly.com/chromarace2020.
Now on its fourth year, the campaign has expanded as other Crimson and Quest properties — Crimson Resort and Spa, Boracay, Crimson Resort and Spa, Mactan, Quest Hotel Conference Center, Cebu, Quest Plus Conference Center, Clark and Quest Hotel, Tagaytay — will bring initiatives meant to educating people about breast cancer.
FEDERICO R. LOPEZ, the chairman and chief executive officer of publicly listed First Philippine Holdings Corp., has been named “Management Man of the Year” for his advocacies, including his drive for the country’s transition to a low-carbon economy.
The award is given by the Management Association of the Philippines (MAP), the decades-old organization with more than a thousand members composed of top company chiefs.
In a statement on Tuesday, the association said the “MAP Management Man of the Year 2020” award is bestowed “on individuals in the business community or government for attaining unquestioned distinction in the practice of management and for contributing to the country’s progress.”
it said the conferment of the award follows a thorough, stringent selection process. The award has only been conferred 44 times in the five-decade history of the award.
MAP said Mr. Lopez, or “Piki”, was chosen “for passionately pushing for the country’s transition to a low-carbon economy through his various advocacies to proactively address the irreparable damage of climate change.”
It also cited his move to champion the power industry’s deregulation for the benefit of the country, while steering the Lopez group of companies to “being in the forefront of energy security and sustainability, and clean technologies for renewable energy and natural gas.”
The association also credited Mr. Lopez “for developing a deep bench of Filipino technical and managerial talent who are globally competitive,” and his leadership role that led the Lopez group “to national development in terms of production, value added, income generation and job creation.”
“The criteria for the award include integrity, leadership, and management qualities; contribution to nation-building and values formation; effective stewardship within the confines of the highest standard of business and management practice; among others,” MAP said.
