FERDINAND K. Constantino of conglomerate San Miguel Corp. has been named as the Financial Executives Association of the Philippines’s CFO of the Year.
Constantino, 66, has been instrumental in helping steer the conglomerate, which contributes about 5 percent of the country’s economy, from a simple beer and beverage company, into a diversified company present in infrastructure, oil refinery and power generation.
“The San Miguel I joined forty-odd years ago is not the San Miguel of today,” Constantino said. “No other time in San Miguel’s history have we seen such dynamism and growth as we have in the past
10 years.”
Constantino, who also celebrated his birthday on Monday, joined the conglomerate in 1974 after a stint at the National Economic and Development Authority. He held various posts in San Miguel before he was appointed as group CFO and treasurer in 2001.
He is regarded as a walking encyclopedia of all things San Miguel-related because of the sheer time—44 years—that he spent with the company. He also lived through different eras while with San Miguel.
“Nowadays, the role of the CFO goes beyond being a bean counter, a number cruncher or a compliance manager. He is not just a strategic partner of the CEO in the organization, but also plays a key role in these times of disruption and volatility,” Hans Sicat, country manager of ING Bank Manila Branch, said.
After transforming the company into a diversified conglomerate, San Miguel is now changing again. Early this year, it decided to carve out its food and beverage businesses—Ginebra, San Miguel Brewery and Pure Foods—into one big company, San Miguel Food and Beverage Inc. (SMFB).
Incidentally, that company on Monday listed its 4.2 billion shares at the Philippine Stock Exchange to bring its public float 4 percent to about 12 percent.
“When the market improves later on in the next few years, we intend to offer more shares to the public, maybe eventually up to [a] 30-percent public float; so plus 18 percent,” San Miguel President and Chief Operating Officer Ramon S. Ang told reporters after SMFB’s listing ceremony.
“[Our] beer, food and hard liquor [businesses are] performing very well. Volume growth is so big that a lot of people are surprised,” Ang added.
SMFB’s listing pushed through despite market volatility. It only sold 400.94 million common shares, with an overallotment option of 60.14 million shares at P85 per share. The company will only raise some P39.19 billion or less than a third of the P139.86-billion proceeds that it first announced.
The company originally planned to sell some 1.02 billion worth of secondary shares at P140 apiece.
Ang said it needed to slash the price due to market volatility.
“Even at this economic situation, we are able to go out. In a bad market, only good companies can go out and do it. In fact, I think no other company can go out [and list] today,” he said.
SMFB’s shares closed slightly higher on Monday at P85 apiece.
Image credits: Nonie Reyes