Conglomerate San Miguel Corp. and food manufacturing unit San Miguel Pure Foods Inc. are ready to comply with the planned 20-percent minimum public ownership being proposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission, a top executive said Thursday.
San Miguel president and chief operating officer Ramon Ang said the conglomerate and unit SMPFC would sell some shares to comply with the public float requirement.
“Yes [we] will comply. But it will only be small because we are almost at 20 percent,” Ang said.
San Miguel’s public float is currently at 15.27 percent, while public ownership of SMPFC is 14.61 percent.
Meanwhile, San Miguel formed a wholly-owned subsidiary to engage in the business of buying and selling securities. The conglomerate said unit SMC Stock Transfer Service Corp. would acquire an existing trading right to participate in the trading of listed securities at the local bourse.
San Miguel chief finance officer Ferdinand Constantino said the venture would benefit the San Miguel group which had many listed companies. Aside from San Miguel and SMPFC, the group also owns listed firm Ginebra San Miguel Inc.
San Miguel also plans to list before the end of the year power generating unit San Miguel Global Holdings Inc. “We are planning it before the end of the year,” Ang told reporters.
The SEC in a public consultation conducted Wednesday listed 68 listed companies that needed to sell shares to comply with the 200percent public ownership requirement by 2020.
Aside from San Miguel and SMPFC, other listed companies with public float of less than 20 percent werev Filinvest Development Corp., PAL Holdings Inc., Eagle Cement Corp., Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp., Berjaya Philippines Inc. Empire East Land Holdings Inc., Global Estate Resorts Inc., Golden Haven Memorial Park Inc., Macay Holdings Inc., Integrated Microelectronics Inc. and Holcim Philippines Inc.