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Goldman Sachs’s chief critic on New York’s top new restaurants

TWO weeks ago, the James Beard Foundation announced awards for the top restaurants, chefs, and beverage professionals across the country.

Around 600 culinary professionals cast votes for the Beard awards. (Disclosure: I’m one of them; I sit on the Foundation’s Restaurant and Chef Awards Committee.) This year, those professionals named Tribeca brasserie Frenchette the best new restaurant in the country. But in New York, everyone is a critic.

Finance professionals spend a substantial amount of money eating around the city. One of Wall Street’s most prolific restaurant supporters is David Solomon, chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Solomon eats out at least five times a week when he’s in New York and has his own opinions about the local scene.

Mr. Solomon shared his views on the best new restaurant in a telephone interview, as well as thoughts on some other notable 2018 openings.

• Best New Restaurant: Atomix — The groundbreaking Korean omakase counter offers roughly a dozen courses from chef Junghyun Park. Dishes might include Korean oyster pancakes, with pork sauce and Nuruk lemon purée.

Solomon: “Atomix is an extraordinary experience. It’s a high-end culinary event: The flavors, the taste, the presentation — all of it is unique. The service is very attentive. You’re sitting at a large counter with other people, yet it’s a very personal experience, because of the level of attention.”

• 2018 Notable Openings Misi — A pasta- and vegetable-focused restaurant from chef Missy Robbins and Goldman Sachs alum Sean Feeney — who have become renowned in the food world for their first joint effort, Lilia — Misi has made a remote part of Williamsburg a destination.

Solomon: “I love this restaurant. I thought it would be hard to follow Lilia with something as exciting and as compelling. Misi is where I want to have dinner on Sunday night with family and friends; it’s warm and comfortable, and then there’s the combination of Missy’s cooking and Sean’s hospitality. The food is delicious, and it’s not just the pasta: The vegetables and the flavors are so simple but so good. The tomatoes with hot honey are outstanding when they’re on the menu.”

• Legacy Records — (Disclosure: Solomon is an owner of the restaurant.) From the team behind Charlie Bird and Pasquale Jones, Legacy Records was an early entry in the Hudson Yards dining scene when it opened in 2018. Chef Ryan Hardy offers a Mediterranean-oriented menu that includes an array of crudos and pasta.

Solomon: “I’m one of the owners, so I’m biased. But what the team there is doing is great. I rave about the duck — it’s phenomenal. Besides the restaurant, there’s a good bar upstairs: Ada’s Place.”

• Manhatta — Set on the 60th floor of a Liberty Street office building, this restaurant, from Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group, has a French-inspired, $88, three-course menu. The panoramic views of downtown New York are unparalleled.

Solomon: “The space is spectacular. But I like all of Danny [Meyer]’s places and the attention to service you get there. Even one night, when it was raining and there was no view, it was still worth being there.”

• Frenchette — In Tribeca, this buzzy brasserie offers an indulgent menu of French-style dishes, with specialties such as duck frites and rotisserie lobster with curry butter. The vast wine list prioritizes all-natural bottles.

Solomon: “Listen, the food is great. I’ve been fans of those guys since before Minetta.”

• Odo — The small kaiseki counter from chef Hiroki Odo is hidden behind a tiny, all-day café and bar in the Flatiron District. Odo favors unconventional flavors: He’ll fold Korean white kimchi into sushi rolls and throw a course of yuzu ramen into the procession of dishes.

Solomon: “The flavors are very good. It’s one of the more interesting places to eat in the city.”

SECOND OPINIONS
Solomon isn’t the only financial pro to have opinions about restaurants.

Marc Granetz is the chief administrative officer of JPMorgan Chase & Co., corporate. He also sits on the board of City Harvest, an organization dedicated to fighting hunger. His choice for best new restaurant of 2018 is Manhatta.

Granetz: “An evening at Manhatta even begins like a special occasion: You check your coat on the ground floor and emerge from the elevator at the top of the building, unburdened, to see some very unfamiliar views of Manhattan. Chef Jason Pfeifer’s half-dozen starters and mains are both elegant and satisfying. Service is gracious and friendly, and even if you try to tip the host for showing you to a great table, he will not take it.”

Gregory Buhay, director in corporate credit trading at Barclays and chair of City Harvest Generation Harvest, agrees with Granetz.

Buhay: “Manhatta is one of my favorite restaurants in the city right now. The view is truly mesmerizing, the food is fine dining at its best, the service is extremely attentive and friendly, the prix-fixed menu is digestible when you get the bill at the end of the night. And did I mention the view? It’s the first restaurant that comes to my mind when I’m asked where to go out to eat in Manhattan.” — Kate Krader, Bloomberg

Bids for term deposits decline

APPETITE for term deposits declined on Wednesday ahead of the implementation of the first stage of a phased reduction in big banks’ reserve requirement ratio (RRR) announced by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) last week.

Bids received by the central bank on Wednesday amounted to P39.113 billion, failing to fill the P40-billion auctioned under the term deposit facility (TDF). This is also lower than the P42.891 billion worth of tenders received a week ago.

Demand for the one-week papers amounted to P20.455 billion, just a tad above the P20 billion on offer and also higher than the P17.486 billion in bids seen at last week’s auction.

Accepted yields ranged from 4.5%-4.7698%, slightly lower than the 4.453%-4.76% margin seen for the seven-day term in the previous auction. However, the average rate settled at 4.6375%, higher than the 4.5695% seen last week.

Meanwhile, total tenders for the 14-day papers amounted to just P8.286 billion, below the programmed volume of P10 billion and the P14.26 billion worth of bids at last week’s auction.

Banks asked for returns within 4.5%-4.7%, a tad narrower versus last week’s range of 4.5%-4.75%. This caused the average rate for the two-week tenor to decline to 4.5999% from last week’s 4.6013%.

On the other hand, the 28-day papers were met with total bids of P10.372 billion, slightly higher than the P10 billion on the auction block but below last week’s P11.145 billion. Yields sought by banks for the one-month deposits ranged from 4.5%-4.75%, steady from the previous auction’s margin, resulting in an average rate of 4.638% versus last week’s 4.6495%.

The TDF stands as the central bank’s primary tool to shore up excess funds in the financial system and to better guide market interest rates. Earlier this month, the BSP cut benchmark interest rates by 25 basis points (bp), bringing the interest rate on the central bank’s overnight reverse repurchase facility to 4.5%. The rates on the overnight lending and deposit facilities were also reduced accordingly to 5% and 4%, respectively.

BSP Monetary Board Member Felipe M. Medalla said in a text message that “tight liquidity” caused the decline in demand for the term deposits this week.

“The RRR cuts will address the problem of tight liquidity,” Mr. Medalla said.

Asked if demand for term deposits is likely to increase following the RRR cut, Mr. Medalla said: “Not necessarily. The banks may choose to deploy the funds freed by the RRR cut.”

The central bank announced last week a series of reductions in the reserve ratio of universal and commercial lenders. The current 18% rate will be reduced to 17% effective May 31, 16.5% effective June 28, and to 16% effective July 26.

The BSP estimates that each percentage cut in big banks’ RRR will release P90-P100 billion into the financial system.

BSP Governor Benjamin E. Diokno has said he wants to reduce big banks’ reserve requirement ratio to single digits by 2023 to put the rate at par with those being implemented in neighboring countries. — R.J.N. Ignacio

TikTok owner to challenge Spotify and Apple with music service

BYTEDANCE Ltd., owner of the popular video app TikTok, is developing a paid music service that will challenge industry leaders Spotify and Apple Music in emerging markets, according to people familiar with the matter.

ByteDance expects to introduce the new app as early as this fall in a handful of territories, mostly poorer countries where paid music services have yet to garner large audiences, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans haven’t been announced. The company has already secured rights from T-Series and Times Music, two of India’s largest labels, according to executives with those companies.

While the new app isn’t named after TikTok, ByteDance will try to convert some of TikTok’s audience into paying customers, the people said. TikTok and Douyin, its Chinese equivalent, have been downloaded more than 500 million times and have become two of the most influential apps in the contemporary music industry. The No. 1 song in the world for the past month, “Old Town Road,” first became popular in videos on TikTok.

ByteDance, based in Beijing, declined to comment.

NO CLONE
The new app will include a catalog of songs available on-demand, as well as video, and isn’t a clone of Spotify or Apple Music, according to the people. The app is far enough along that many music industry executives have been given demonstrations of it.

ByteDance’s plans for a paid service were previously reported by the South China Morning Post, but the story made no mention of the timing of its release or the rights deals.

ByteDance is already one of the world’s most valuable start-ups, valued at more than $75 billion in its most recent round of fundraising. The company’s first signature app was Toutiao, a news aggregation app whose name means headlines.

TIKTOK BOOM
TikTok extended ByteDance’s reach around the world, a rare feat for a Chinese technology company. It also gave it a large user base to monetize through ads. With this new paid music app, ByteDance is looking to reduce its reliance on advertising and prove subscription music can work in emerging markets.

Paid music services have boosted music sales across the world, and are now the single largest source of revenue for the global record business. But the approach is still largely a Western phenomenon.

Though Asia, the Middle East and Africa are home to the majority of the world’s population, they only account for about 10% of Spotify’s customer base. Tencent Music Entertainment, the dominant music company in China, makes six times more money from what it calls social entertainment than from subscriptions.

The most popular online music services in Asia, such as Tencent’s QQ Music and Google’s YouTube, are available for free. YouTube has had particular success in markets like India, Indonesia and the Philippines. TikTok was the most downloaded free app in India in the first quarter of the year.

The new paid service will increase the competition between ByteDance and Tencent, which owns WeChat, China’s most popular app. At home, ByteDance and Tencent are already locked in a fierce competition to gain more attention from China’s smartphone-savvy young people. Douyin has become one of the biggest challengers to WeChat, spurring the latter to block Douyin links on its platform.

Tencent’s music services are focused on China at the moment, but could expand in the years ahead.

RECORD LABELS
ByteDance has yet to secure rights from the world’s three largest music groups: Universal, Warner and Sony. Their catalogs account for a minority of listening in most emerging markets, but would be vital if ByteDance wanted to expand anywhere in Europe, Latin America or North America.

Another paid service will be music to the record labels’ ears. Universal, Warner and Sony have tried to limited the availability of music for free on the internet. It also presents an opportunity to squeeze ByteDance for extra money. They credit their songs with boosting TikTok’s popularity, and have demanded hundreds of millions of dollars to renew their current rights deals. Those companies won’t grant the rights for the paid music service without sorting out the rights for TikTok as well, the people said. — Bloomberg

Sony’s deal with Microsoft blindsided its own PlayStation team

WHEN Sony Corp. unveiled a cloud gaming pact with arch-rival Microsoft Corp., it surprised the industry. Perhaps no one was more shocked than employees of Sony’s PlayStation division, who have spent almost two decades fighting the US software giant in the $38 billion video game console market.

Last week, the companies announced a strategic partnership to co-develop game streaming technology and host some of PlayStation’s online services on the Redmond-based company’s Azure cloud platform. It comes after PlayStation spent seven years developing its own cloud gaming offering, with limited success.

Negotiations with Microsoft began last year and were handled directly by Sony’s senior management in Tokyo, largely without the involvement of the PlayStation unit, according to people familiar with the matter. Staff at the gaming division were caught off-guard by the news. Managers had to calm workers and assure them that plans for the company’s next-generation console weren’t affected, said the people, asking not to be identified discussing private matters.

That difficult moment is part of a painful lesson that Sony and many other technology companies are facing as the world’s leading cloud-computing providers become more powerful. If you aren’t spending billions of dollars a year on data centers, servers and network gear, you can’t keep up.

Faster internet speeds are starting to allow games to be played remotely without the need for a local machine. That’s a threat to PlayStation, which generates a third of Sony’s profits. Microsoft’s Xbox faces a similar risk, but the software giant has the second-largest cloud service, so it has a strategic answer. The other leading cloud providers, Google and Amazon.com Inc., are building their own cloud-gaming services.

Realizing that his home-grown cloud service isn’t going to cut it, Sony Chief Executive Officer Kenichiro Yoshida is being forced to collaborate, rather than confront his old gaming nemesis.

“Sony feels threatened by this trend and the mighty Google, and has decided to leave its network infrastructure build-up to Microsoft,” said Asymmetric Advisors strategist Amir Anvarzadeh. “Why would they sleep with the enemy unless they feel threatened?”

Sony jumped 9.9% on Friday, the most in 18 months. The company also announced a record share buyback, but analysts pointed to Yoshida’s speed in responding to a shifting video-game industry as a positive factor.

This shows “a new Sony” and should be applauded by investors, SMBC Nikko Securities Inc. analyst Ryosuke Katsura wrote in a report. “Management is adapting rapidly to change.”

A Sony spokesman confirmed that talks with Microsoft began last year, but declined to provide further details. On Tuesday, executives including PlayStation head Jim Ryan will update shareholders on strategy during the company’s annual investor day.

Sony became the first big video game company to enter cloud gaming when it bought US start-up Gaikai Inc. in 2012 for $380 million. Three years later, it rolled out PlayStation Now, letting users play games hosted on servers miles from their living rooms. The service has since attracted 700,000 paying subscribers, but a decision to host it in-house has led to on-going complaints about choppy connectivity.

“PlayStation Now has been a very limited service,” said David Cole, founder and chief executive officer of DFC Intelligence.

The company’s other online game service and main cash cow, PlayStation Network, enables multiplayer matches of games running on PlayStation 4 consoles. For now that is still hosted by the other giant of cloud computing: Amazon Web Services. Sony and Amazon held talks last year for a deeper collaboration on cloud gaming, but couldn’t agree on commercial terms, according to a person familiar with the matter. That led to Sony’s discussions with Microsoft, the person said. Amazon is currently developing its own cloud gaming service, the Information reported last year.

The pivot toward Microsoft was preceded by several key personnel changes at Sony, including moving some senior PlayStation Now staff to other divisions, the person said. John Kodera, who rose through the ranks running the network side, was also replaced as PlayStation boss in February, a little more than a year after taking the top job.

The key question is who really wins from the partnership. Most analysts agree that, at least in the short-to-medium term, it’s a positive for Sony. Cloud gaming isn’t ready for prime time yet. When Google unveiled Stadia in March, some users reported mixed results including delays in registering actions and reduced graphics quality.

Cloud gaming will account for just 2% of the industry’s revenue by 2023, according to IHS Markit. That’s why Sony and Microsoft are moving ahead with their next-gen consoles, expected next year. Securing access to Azure gives Yoshida a powerful hedge against a future scenario where cloud gaming does end up making consoles obsolete.

Microsoft may come out an even bigger winner. The Xbox unit continues to churn out games and consoles, but is now increasing focus on ways to sell more cloud software. In March, it announced a lineup of services for game development and cloud hosting that it’s hawking to game companies of all sizes. Landing console king Sony makes it more likely that Azure, and not Amazon or Google, becomes the industry standard for cloud deployment.

“Microsoft is the clear winner that Sony picked their technology even though they are a direct competitor in the gaming space,” said DFC’s Cole.

Over the long-term, some are warning Sony could be the loser. Currently it charges publishers like Electronic Arts Inc. and Capcom Co. up to 30% of sales made through PlayStation consoles. But if streaming takes off, it will have to compete against Microsoft while paying its rival for cloud access. That could leave Sony struggling to stand out both on technical and pricing terms.

“This move raises some serious questions about its future dominance,” Mr. Anvarzadeh said.

It’s also unclear how antitrust regulators will respond to two of the three players in the console market teaming up to develop a key technology, especially as it involves the world’s largest company by market value. Cooperation by the No. 1 and No. 2 in any industry — say AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. — to the deferment of rivals would likely prompt push-back.

Regardless of when and if cloud gaming takes off, securing exclusive titles will continue to be critical for Sony, according to Piers Harding-Rolls, IHS Markit’s head of games research. Similar to how Netflix Inc. fights Prime Video while relying on Amazon for cloud hosting, and how Apple Inc. competes against Samsung Electronics Co. while buying its components, Sony’s core strategy of accumulating a strong lineup of games remains unchanged.

“Exclusive content remains key,” said Harding-Rolls. — Bloomberg

DTI highlights the Premium 7 food products at this years IFEX

THE International Food Exchange (IFEX), is going to run from May 24 to 26 in the World Trade Center Manila, and if you are going remember the following seven words: banana, cacao, coffee, coconut, mango, pineapple, and tuna. These, according to the Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions (CITEM), are the country’s Premium 7. The Premium 7 were selected as the country’s top food exports, based on supply, according to CITEM’s Executive Director Pauline Juan.

The products were presented at a degustacion last week at the Philippine International Convention Center, prepared by chef Bea Nitard of Via Mare who wanted the flavors to be immediately recognizable to buyers and the buying public at an installation by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) when IFEX opens later this week. The dishes included clasics such as champorrado (sweet chocolate rice porridge), rice and inasal (barbecued chicken), crab fat with rice, turon (fried banana roll), puto bumbong (a rice cake), an open-faced mango salad, spicy chocolate ginger bombs, all capped with a cup of civet coffee.

The theme for this year is “Nxtfood Asia,” with Ms. Juan saying, “We are hoping to sell Philippines cuisine as the next big Asian food trend.”

There will be quite a number of exhibitors this year, clocking in at about 520. A large chunk of the exhibitors would be MSMEs (micro, small, medium enterprises), as per a thrust of the DTI. There will also be a small contingent of international vendors, especially from the region. “We really extended all support for MSMEs,” noted Ms. Juan. “Our biggest exporters come from the food sector,” she also pointed out.

While the government has many programs in place to help MSMEs (Ms. Juan, for example, mentions projects that directly benefit cacao and coconut farmers), what can the normal consumer do to contribute to that economy? The answer is simple: spend.

“If there’s no demand from consumers, then our MSMEs as suppliers will not have any [reason] to sell.”

IFEX will run from May 24 to 26, from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Trade buyers and government employees can enter for free, while admission is P100 for the public, save for students, PWDs, and senior citizens, with tickets priced at P80. — J.L. Garcia

Federal Reserve may cut rates if inflation weakens

FURTHER weakness in inflation may cause the US Federal Reserve to ease. — WIKIPEDIA.ORG

HONG KONG — Further weakness in inflation could prompt the US Federal Reserve to cut interest rates, even if economic growth maintains its momentum, James Bullard, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, said on Wednesday.

The risk of the Fed missing its 2% inflation target and the trade war were two key macroeconomic challenges to the policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), he said in a presentation prepared for an audience at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club (FCC) in Hong Kong.

The Fed held interest rates steady earlier in May, when Chairman Jerome Powell said there was “no strong case” for either a cut or hike in interest rates.

But Bullard said on Wednesday “a downward policy rate adjustment even with relatively good real economic performance may help maintain the credibility of the FOMC’s inflation target going forward.”

“A policy rate move of this sort may become a more attractive option if inflation data continue to disappoint,” he said.

Bullard and Chicago Fed’s Charles Evans, both voting members of the FOMC, have in recent days expressed concerns over the Fed’s failure to meet its target. Bullard said on Wednesday that another ‘low-side miss’ is on the horizon in 2019.

Bullard said any policy adjustment going forward would be in response to incoming data, and not a continuation of the rate normalisation process which has stopped earlier this year after 225 basis points worth of hikes from near zero levels.

He remained upbeat about growth prospects.

Bullard drew comparisons with 2-1/2 decades ago — when rates were increased by 300 basis points between early 1994 and early 1995, and the economy still boomed during the second half of the 1990s — to stress that rate normalization can be accomplished without damaging prospects for an extended period of growth.

The next FOMC meeting will convene on June 18.

TRADE RISKS
Bullard expects agreements on trade will be reached in the near term, but warned that a failure to do so, with substantial barriers “erected and maintained,” could alter “global trading patterns over the medium term.”

These unresolved trade disputes and the below-target inflation “suggest that the FOMC needs to tread carefully in order to help sustain the economic expansion,” he said.

Bullard said that from a macroeconomic perspective, China should agree to “everything that’s being asked” in the negotiations because it would lead to a domestic economic boom.

“They will establish credibility on trade inside China, and will reassure foreign investors that they can invest in China and be treated appropriately. If that occurs, I would see blue skies ahead for the Chinese economy,” Bullard said.

“It’s not just the US that’s doubting Chinese credibility. Many global players all around the world have found that it’s a difficult place to do business.”

In an interview with Bloomberg TV earlier on Wednesday, Bullard said tariffs would have to stay on for “something like six months” with no prospect of a resolution in sight to weigh on Fed policy.

In his FCC remarks, he added China selling its large stock of US Treasuries was not “as big of a threat as it’s being made out to be” as it would be hard to replace them with other assets. — Reuters

Tunneling work on Metro Manila subway to start next year

TUNNELING work on the Metro Manila Subway Project is not expected to begin until next year, but the Department of Transportation (DoTr) is already considering bidding out to real estate developers the soil and rock that will be excavated.

Transportation Secretary Arthur P. Tugade told reporters Monday that parts of the tunnel boring machine are starting to arrive piece by piece from Japan, with the cutter head already here in the Philippines.

“Dumadating ’yun then ia-assemble. Pero ’yung cutter head nandito na… Ang actual drilling, next year [The parts of the boring machine will be assembled, but the cutter head is already here… The actual drilling will be next year],” he said.

Mr. Tugade noted around five million cubic meters of soil, equivalent to 2,500 Olympic-sized pools, will be excavated for the project.

“Kaya ang gagawin ko ngayon…ipapa-bid ko. Ang daming lupa nun eh. Kung sinong may kailangan, kunin niyo lahat dito [What I will do is bid that out to whoever needs it],” he added.

The construction of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)-funded Metro Manila Subway started in February, which signaled the beginning of preparation works for the 36-kilometer underground railway system.

The subway will have 15 stations from Quirino Highway to Bicutan, with an optional extension from Lawton West to the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).

The first phase of the project will be built by Japanese consortium Shimizu Joint Venture (Shimizu Corp., Fujita Corp., Takenaka Civil Engineering Co., Ltd. and EEI Corp.), which the DoTr signed a P51-billion contract with in February. The contract also involves the construction of the subway’s depot and the Philippine Railways Institute.

Five more contracts for the subway project are expected to be bid out and awarded by middle of next year. The underground train line is scheduled to be partially operational by 2022, and to be fully operational by 2025.

Upon partial operations, around 100,000 daily passengers are expected to benefit from the project, and some 370,000 daily passengers by its full completion. — Denise A. Valdez

China’s NetEase to launch first official Pokémon game in China

GUANGZHOU — Chinese gaming giant NetEase said on Monday that it would partner with The Pokémon Company and Marvel to release new games for the domestic market, as it looks to add more foreign content to its roster and shore up revenue.

A local version of Pokémon Quest will mark the first official Pokemon mobile game release for China, set to arrive nearly three years after Pokémon Go first hit the global market.

“The Pokémon Quest partnership is a new start and highly anticipated,” NetEase VP Ethan Wang said at an industry event.

NetEase will release the game in China in partnership with Japan’s Game Freak, the Pokémon developer.

NetEase did not reveal a release date for the game. Pokémon Quest first hit app stores globally in the summer of 2018.

The company said it had formed a separate partnership with Marvel to release “five or six” mobile games by the end of this year.

The partnership with Marvel will include a global product, Wang said, adding NetEase hopes overseas revenue to account for 30% of its total in three years, versus 10% now.

NetEase, along with rival Tencent and other gaming firms, came under pressure last year as China stopped approving game licenses. NetEase shares plunged about 30% in 2018.

The stock has recovered since December after China resumed approvals. In March, regulators greenlit titles from NetEase.

Wang was he was hopeful the Marvel games will receive approval in time for a release by the end of the year.

“My understanding is now we are gradually getting back to the right track,” he said. — Reuters

10 business establishments ordered closed in Boracay island

THE Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) on Tuesday ordered the closure of 10 foreign-owned business establishments for operating in Boracay island without government permits.

The Boracay Inter-Agency Task Force (BIATF), through the local government of Malay, Aklan, shuttered Bella’s Bar and Restaurant, Old Captain Cuisine, Ken Minimart, Ken St., Island Staff Restaurant, Coco Spa, Kim Ji Man, W Hostel Boracay Dragon, VIP Souvenir Shop, and YH World Network Service, Inc.

“I once said that Boracay will never be a ‘cesspool’ again, but we need all the support and cooperation of everybody to sustain the gains we have made from the massive rehabilitation we have done to the island. Let us continue to be guardians of the island and prevent it from sliding back,” Environment Secretary Roy A. Cimatu said in a statement on Wednesday.

Mr. Cimatu earlier ordered the crackdown on business establishments in Boracay, after receiving reports there have been an increase in the number of Chinese-owned businesses catering exclusively to Chinese tourists.

In a statement, Natividad Y. Bernardino, general manager of BIATF, said a committee was formed to look into possible violations of foreign-run businesses, as well as foreigners working in Boracay without valid work permits and visa.

The committee inspected 49 establishments from May 7-9, and 10 were found to be operating without permits from the mayor’s office. Another 14 were found to have incomplete requirements from the local government unit and the Bureau of Fire Protection.

“We cannot allow flagrant violation by foreign nationals of our country’s laws and regulations, especially in the island which we have painstakingly rehabilitated,” Department of Interior and Local Government Undersecretary Epimaco Densing III said. — VMPG

The Thai Connection

THE Dusit Thani Hotel Manila pulled off a wine dinner coup of sorts recently when it held Epicurean, a Thai gastronomic journey, at its top-rated and critically acclaimed Benjarong restaurant. This was the first wine dinner of its kind in the country, where both an established Michelin star restaurant chef and a winemaker from Thailand, came over to collaborate on a six-course Thai wine-pairing dinner. While wine dinners are obviously nothing new, it was the concept of going all-authentic Thai that made this unique.

The visiting guest chef, Thanintorn “Chef Noom” Chantharawan, is the chef of Siam Wisdom, a Bangkok Michelin-star restaurant, while all the wines were from GranMonte, a winery from the Khao Yai district in Nakhon Ratchasima Province, northeast of Bangkok, which has been making a name for itself in international wine competitions. It was represented by Visootha “Nikki” Lohitnavy, the winemaker and general manager. The dinner was a collaboration between Chef Noom, Nikki, and Benjarong in-house chef Watcharaphon “Chef Ja” Yongbanthom.

And, YES, Thailand makes wines.

THAI WINERY GRANMONTE
Gran monte means “great mountain” in Spanish, and the location of the winery and its vineyards are in Khao Yai, which in Thai language also means “large mountain.” Khao Yai is roughly 180 kilometers away (just over a two-hour drive) from Bangkok. Khao Yai is already known for its very popular local park (of the same name) and for being part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Khao Yai is undisputed as the best Thai district with the right growing conditions for vineyards. As visiting winemaker Nikki Lohitnavy revealed, the “average evening temperature in Khao Yai is just 12°C and the altitude ranges from 350 to 600 meters above sea level.”

Aside from GranMonte, Khao Yai also hosts Village Farm and PB-Valley Khao Yai Winery, among others. GranMonte may not be the first Thai winery — that distinction goes to Chateau de Loie, operating out of Loie province and credited with the first commercially released Thai wine in the mid-1990s — neither is GranMonte the first winery in Khao Yai as that recognition goes to PB-Valley Winery. However, GranMonte is riding high on the recent wave of Thai wine interest and has done very well in export.

The winery has also won various international awards as proof of its acceptance in the international wine scene. Recently, its wines were imported by Philippine Wine Merchants for distribution exclusively at the Dusit Thani hotels in the country, which includes Makati City, Cebu, and Davao hotels.

A TETE-A-TETE WITH NIKKI
GranMonte’s Nikki Lohitnavy best exemplifies the future of the Thai wine industry. She is young, passionate, well-educated and very driven. She finished a bachelor’s degree in oenology from the University of Adelaide in Australia, and is as engaging and smart as any veteran winemaker I have met and interviewed from around the world.

Q: GranMonte is your family’s business. How did it start? Is your dad like a huge oenophile and he just wanted to pursue this wine venture to chase his dream?

A: My parents like wines, but they are not really into serious wine collections. They just enjoy drinking wines. My father actually just wanted to do something in his retirement. As a start, he planted a little bit of vineyard. And when we started making wines, there was kind of a good demand for the wines. And then my father slowly expanded and made this into a serious business.

I sort of grew up in the vineyards. I really liked it a lot, though initially I wanted to be a botanist, which really is not much different from oenology, except on the winemaking part.

Q: Can you tell me a little bit about your vineyard size, your present volumes and expansion plans?

A: We started with around 14 hectares of vineyards from our original site (20 years ago), but we have added three extra sites in the last few years, also within Khao Yai. Our present volume is around 7,500 cases (of nine liters), but we expect to triple that in the next five years. Since there are really no existing wine grape growers in Thailand, it really takes time. We have to plan and plant the vineyards from scratch.

Q: How many different wines do you do at present, and what are your most grown grape varietals?

A: We do 13 different wines at the moment, and we grow several varietals in our vineyards, ranging from syrah, cabernet sauvignon, chenin blanc, durif, merlot, grenache, verdelho, semillon, muscat and viognier. We are even experimenting with cabernet franc now. Forty percent of all our vineyards are growing syrah, followed by cabernet sauvignon and chenin blanc.

Q: Given the relatively small volume of your production and vineyard size, is the idea to produce many wines simply to test the market on what works and what does not, and then eventually to concentrate on a few wines and varietals?

A: Not really. To me it is very important for us to have many different wines. This industry in our country is quite new and we need to explore what varietals we can grow, what varietals suit our climate and soil best, what style of wine we can make, and, eventually, what to drink. Also, this makes my job challenging and not boring. I really do not see myself making only four different wines. I want to grow different varietals and make them into our wines.

Q: We all know that Thailand has one of the world’s highest tax rates levied on wines. Is there therefore an advantage for GranMonte, being local produced as against imported wines?

A: Actually, we do not enjoy much of an advantage against imported wines. The bulk of the wine tax is based on excise tax as a luxury product, and not on import duty. It is, sadly, kind of unfair as the wine tax law has been enforced for like 40 years already. When this law was created during those times, wine was not popular among local drinkers and there were no Thai wineries too back then.

This is therefore quite remarkable. A Thai-made wine competing head-on with imported wines at almost a level playing field and is still succeeding both domestically and even exporting. As a parting shot, I asked winemaker Nikki what her wine influences are, whether she likes Burgundy or Bordeaux wines, and her answer was quite succinct: “I just like Thai wines.”

There you have it. The Thai wine industry is in good hands and the future looks really bright with dedicated hardcore Thai winemakers like Nikki leading the charge.

The author is a member of UK-based Circle of Wine Writers. For comments, inquiries, wine event coverage, and other wine-related concerns, e-mail the author at protegeinc@yahoo.com. He is also on Twitter at twitter.com/sherwinlao.

Insular Life books double-digit growth in revenues, premiums

INSULAR LIFE Assurance Co., Ltd. (InLife) posted double-digit growth in revenues and insurance premiums in 2018 on the back of the strong performance of its bancassurance channel and agency force.

In a statement sent to reporters on Wednesday, InLife said it booked P22.2 billion in consolidated revenues last year, up 13% from P19.71 billion tallied in 2017.

Net insurance revenues climbed 18% to P14.38 billion in 2018 from the P12.2 billion booked the previous year, while operating revenues stood at P7.8 billion, 4% higher than the P7.5 billion tallied in the comparable year-ago period.

InLife’s operating revenues came from investment income, dividend income, property rentals, sale of assets, as well as other forms of income.

“There were challenges along the way, such as the rapid spike in inflation rates, but thankfully, our revenue sources still posted growth rates,” InLife President and Chief Executive Officer Mona Lisa B. De la Cruz was quoted as saying in the statement.

Meanwhile, insurance premiums grew 18% to P13.98 billion in 2018 from P11.85 billion the previous year.

Ms. De la Cruz added that the insurer’s bancassurance channel with the Aboitiz-led UnionBank of the Philippines, Inc. is “now delivering results” on its first full year of implementation.

“Our bancassurance production grew by 53 percent versus the 10 percent it recorded from year-ago levels,” she said.

The life insurance firm added that its agency force ended 2018 “with a strong push” amid its improvements in technology.

“Our continuing enhancements on our automated underwriting system, which remains to be the only such technology in the domestic market, enabled our financial advisers to adapt this technology, which in turn exponentially increased our underwriting capacity,” Ms. De la Cruz said. “And this is one of the major contributors to the 19 percent growth of our agency production in first year premiums.”

Based on the data from the Insurance Commission, InLife ranked second among life insurers in 2018 in terms of net worth with P37 billion, third in assets with P130.4 billion and fifth in net income with P2.3 billion. — K.A.N. Vidal

Can domestic savings cover increasing investment needs?

Can domestic savings cover increasing investment needs?

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