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By Luis Leoncio As President Aquino moves toward the homestretch of his six-year term, more and more leaders of the local business sector are coming out to dispute his claimed achievements, citing “missed opportunities” that they say defined his term.

By Dean dela Paz (First of two parts) This commentary is occasioned by recent events where the financial assets and bank deposits of the Vice President and other individuals being linked to him were frozen by the courts.

By Lito U. Gagni Dr. Cezar T. Quiambao is a visionary who has accomplished many firsts in the annals of the country’s economic development.  He set up the country’s first infra Public-Private Partnership project, the $514-million Metro Manila Skyway project  and its companion $57-million Southern Tagalog Arterial Road (STAR) tollway that resulted in an unprecedented  economic boom in areas south of Metro Manila.

Excess liquidity among domestic banks has become a limiting factor for the growth of the local capital markets, making them seem small and obscure compared to the country’s neighbors, the Oxford Business Group (OBG) said in its recent report on the Philippines.

By Riza Lozada Three tax experts, including Internal Revenue Commissioner Kim Jacinto-Henares, for different reasons, agree that the tax system in the Philippines is not ideal and needs to be reformed.

By Luis Leoncio “Immediately upon being advised of my appointment as commissioner of the Bureau of Customs, I met with the directors and officers of all my companies and announced my resignation from the chairmanship and vacated my seat as director of all the companies comprising the Lina Group,” Customs Commissioner Alberto Lina said in a statement to The Market …

By Jerry Maglunog Lack of paved roads is turning off investors, despite the Philippines’s steady economic growth, an official of a Malaysian conglomerate said. Luzon may have seven expressways, but this is not the case in the Visayas and Mindanao, said the civil engineering expert who has taken part in building ambitious and expensive projects in different parts of the …

By Luis Leoncio The unholy alliance between a huge freight/cargo forwarding firm and a multinational tobacco company has been defrauding the government of billions of pesos in taxes, but despite documents detailing the collusion, the government has not lifted a finger to stop it, Deputy Speaker Sergio Apostol has told The Market Monitor in an interview.

A paradox awaits the next administration: How to raise more money to fund government programs while heeding the public clamor to make the tax system equitable by lowering individual income-tax rates? Former Budget Secretary Banjamin Diokno, now a faculty member of the University of the Philippines (UP) School of Economics, said the “harsh reality” is that the next administration would …

American boxer Floyd “Money” Mayweather Jr. proved that conditioning, speed and determination to win are not enough anymore to win in a modern-day boxing match where guile now is a necessity, a fact that Filipino icon Manny “Pacman” Pacquiao learned the hard way.