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LISTED
holding firm iVantage Corp. plans to list, by way of
introduction, the shares of its unit Yehey! Corp. at the
stock exchange this month.
Yehey!
is a leading web portal in the Philippines, known for
its flagship product yehey.com.
At the
sidelines of the company’s annual stockholders meeting
Friday, president and chief operating officer Edmundo P.
Bunyi Jr. said they opted to do a listing by way of
introduction first because Yehey! does not require fresh
capital at this time.
Companies that have no immediate need to generate
additional money usually go for introductory listing;
and shares of these companies are widely distributed.
Companies that went for this strategy include the
Philippine Stock Exchange, Vista Land and PetroEnergy
Resources Corp.
According to Bunyi, Yehey! has enough capital to finance
its operations.
To carry
out the company’s listing, iVantage declared a
five-percent property dividend and payable in the form
of Yehey! common shares to stockholders on record as of
last May 18. The dividend amounted to P89.42 million.
The
dividend was culled from iVantage’s unrestricted
earnings of P1.25 billion as of December 31, 2006.
The
dividend payout watered down iVantage’s ownership in
Yehey! from 98 percent to 66 percent, Bunyi said.
This
year, Yehey! will launch its own instant messaging
system and a product similar to Friendster.
Meanwhile, Bunyi disclosed plans of iVantage to look for
strategic investment opportunities in companies within
the financial services industry. To support these new
investments, the company will use the P2.9-billion
proceeds it generated from the sale of its entire stake
in International Exchange Bank to Union Bank last year.
“We aim
to increase the value of our company’s war chest and
prepare for strategic investment opportunities that may
arise in the coming years,” he said.
The
company recently acquired a majority stake in mutual
funds manager Philequity Management Inc., which manages
almost P3 billion in assets.
Last
year, iVantage’s net income amounted to P1.9 billion
from P220 million a year earlier. Growth was came from
the one-time sale of its iBank shares. The stronger
performance of its subsidiaries and the company’s active
management of equity and fixed-income portfolios also
helped improve bottom line.
Its
remittance services subsidiary eBusiness Services Inc.,
for instance, recorded gross revenues of P393 million in
2006, up 55percent from a year earlier. Gains came
largely from more service outlets its money changing
operations. |
