THE Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) said it plans to make public-private partnership-derived securities available beginning around June this year.
PSE COO Roel Refran said PPP securities will be available both to individual and institutional investors, or those entities that hold, manage and invest funds, such as government financial institutions, retirement funds, mutual funds and sovereign funds.
“We only have to meet and discuss with the new PPP Center Executive Director Andre Palacios, after Cosette Canilao resigned. We just have to make sure that our vision and our timeline are aligned with his,” Refran said.
“These PPP securities will be available to ordinary investors. This is actually a good investment because, besides realizing income from these kinds of investments, they actually see tangible results. They would see their investments in roads, railways, bridges and even airports,” Refran said.
PPP securities will be more attractive to retail investors, since such securities are much easier to monetize.
They can be sold in the open market like any ordinary securities vis-á-vis over-the-counter securities, which are not quoted and cannot be disposed of immediately. The PPP securities, he said, will be taxed at the rate similar to that of registered and traded stocks at one half of 1 percent.
Refran said although Canilao resigned last week, the PSE is optimistic there will be no substantial delays in materializing their plan to have the securities available in the market by the second half of the year.
“Raj [Palacios] is very much on the loop. I do not think there would be a substantial delay in our timeline. We just have to get his inputs to ensure that they are aligned with ours,” he said.
Refran added that pending the approval of the proposed merger of the PSE and PDS Holdings Inc., the PPP securities will be offered in the form of stocks.
“Since the merger has yet to be approved, we cannot still offer PPP securities in the form of investment bonds,” he said. PPP securities will be offered by corporations, including joint ventures and consortia, which have won the public PPP project biddings.