Power distributor Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) said Friday that Philippine Depository and Trust Corp. (PDTC) had isolated disputed Meralco shares, the paving the way for resumption of Meralco stock trading after almost a month of suspension.

Meralco corporate secretary Emmanuel Sison, in a letter-agreement addressed to PDTC chairman and chief executive Vicente Castillo, said disputed shares, in the name of an agrarian reform claimant, Josefina Lubrica, should no longer be an obstacle to trading resumption.

He said that of the 42 million disputed shares, 40.6 million were lodged by Lubrica with PDTC and the remaining 1.4 million remained certificated in Lubrica?s name and not lodged with the PDTC.

Of the 40.6 million PDTC-lodged disputed shares, close to 3.4 million are traded on the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) and settled through the Securities Clearing Corporation of the Philippines, and are no longer in accounts of PDTC lodging brokers, he said.

More than 37.2 million shares remain in the depository accounts of PDTC lodging brokers have been subjected to PDTC quarantine procedures, he added.

?PDTC has declared that the non-fungibility of all Meralco shares lodged in the depository has been cured and that, therefore, the Meralco shares lodged in the depository have once again become ready and fit for use in the settlement of trades in the PSE and other depository transactions,? Sison said in a statement.

?In consideration of such declaration, Meralco, through [Securities Transfer Services Inc.], shall not authorize the lodgment of any or all of these quarantined shares, except in accordance with a final and/or executory order issued by the proper government agency or instrumentality or court of competent jurisdiction resolving the dispute,? he added.

Upon PDTC?s conformity to Meralco?s letter agreement, Meralco shares should again become eligible for trading on the PSE, Sison said.

PSE president Francis Lim earlier said PSE management would work with Meralco and PDTC to resume trading in shares not involved in the dispute between Lubrica and state-owned Land Bank of the Philippines, which handles the financial aspects of the government?s agrarian reform program.

Meralco late last year canceled more than 42 million Meralco stock certificates held by Land Bank and issued new ones to one Lubrica.

Lubrica is an assignee of Federico Suntay, who is among claimants of a piece of agricultural land in the province Occidental Mindoro that had been expropriated under the agrarian reform program and valued by the Department of Agrarian Reform at P4.25 million. Edited by INQUIRER.net