The Market Monitor Minding the Nation's Business

Listed phone giant Globe Telecom remains optimistic on the growing demand for home broadband Internet amid the latest Akamai Report that showed improvement of broadband speed and adoption in the country. 

Unilever Philippines has signed an agreement with Lopez group power arm First Gen Corp. through its licensed Retail Electricity Supplier, First Gen Energy Solution Inc., for the supply of renewable energy to Unilever’s Paco and Pasig facilities. 

By Riza Lozada Property developer Cebu Landmasters Inc. (CLI) targets to double its land assets following the success of its initial public offering (IPO), which allowed the property developer to raise P2.9 billion. 

Mini bank branches which extensively uses automated services will be liberalized to allow more Filipinos to access financial services, Deputy Governor and incoming Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Governor Nestor Espenilla Jr. said. 

The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) will play a central role in realizing the Philippines “economic breakout” which requires an improvement in both tax administration and policy reforms in the agency to ensure a steady revenue stream for the Duterte administration’s ambitious program to modernize the country’s infrastructure backbone and accelerate poverty reduction, Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III said. 

By Riza Lozada An increase in domestic borrowings bumped up the national government’s (NG) outstanding debt in April by 8.3 percent to P6.37 trillion, Bureau of Treasury (BTr) data showed. 

The government should first address the bottlenecks in the implementation of infrastructure projects thru Public-Private Partnership (PPP) to fully take advantage of the benefits of tapping the private sector’s efficiency and innovativeness. 

Property consultancy firm Santos Knight Frank, formerly CBRE Philippines, sees a growing demand for co-working spaces in the country. 

Whether a project should be pursued through government funding, ODA, PPP, or hybrid is a matter of finding the solution that best meets the government’s objective given a set of constraints, and the risks presented by each option. 

While we were closely monitoring the news about the Resorts World Manila attack that killed 38 persons, detained lawyer Jessica Lucila “Gigi” Reyes, quietly asked the Sandiganbayan to grant her bail for the plunder charges related to the alleged P10-billion pork barrel scam.