The Securities and Exchange Commission said it will evaluate the separate bids of the Philippine Stock Exchange and Land Bank of the Philippines to acquire Philippine Dealing System and Holdings Corp., the owner and operator of the country’s fixed income exchange
SEC chairman Teresita Herbosa said in an interview she was surprised with the move of LandBank to acquire PDS and compete with the PSE.
Herbosa said LandBank had not yet filed an “exemptive relief” from the SEC.
“… in the capital markets especially when it comes to functions like providing platform for an exchange buying and selling stock and fixed income securities, there are really a lot of public interest involved,” Herbosa said.
“The more there are entities interested in going into the business, the better for us and the investing public,” she said.
The SEC will assess which proposal will benefit the investing public, especially in terms of lower fees.
Herbosa noted that 98 percent of the country’s fixed income securities were government securities and two percent were corporate debts.
“If ever it would be coming to the point both PSE and LandBank were applying for exemptive relief, assuming they have the same go signal with PDS shareholders to acquire PDS, we have to consider a lot of these factors,” Herbosa said.
The PSE and Landbank must obtain exemptive relief from the SEC regarding their planned acquisition of PDS.
Under the Securities Regulation Code, no single industry should own more than 20 percent of an exchange.
LandBank last month announced its plan to acquire PDS.
The PSE, which has been working on PDS acquisition for the past several years, has signed several share purchase agreements with several PDS shareholders, including Bankers Association of the Philippines, Whistler Technologies Services Inc., San Miguel Corp., Investment Houses Association of the Philippines and Financial Executives Association of the Philippines.
The closing of the SPAs are subject to government approvals and securing exemptive relief from the SEC.