Lucio Co firm eyes energy venture

Retail magnate Lucio Co’s newly-acquired publicly listed company, Mariwasa Siam Holdings Inc., has officially transformed itself into Da Vinci Capital Holdings Inc. after getting regulatory approvals to overhaul its charter and extend its corporate life by another 50 years.

None of the firm’s existing investors unloaded shares at the end of the Co group’s tender offer to acquire minority shares in what was then Mariwasa on April 24. This did not come as a surprise as the tender offer price of 30.59 centavos was much lower than the market pricing of the shares, which meant that the minority stockholders accounting for 15 percent of total stocks were better off holding on to their shares.

As of Thursday, shares of Mariwasa (the Philippine Stock Exchange has yet to reflect the change in corporate name) closed at P3.59 per share, down by 0.55 percent, giving it a market capitalization of P4.06 billion.

Co’s group—through an entity called Invescap Inc.—last March acquired 85 percent of Mariwasa, widely believed to be a prospective platform for energy ventures. This has thus become Co’s third publicly listed company after successfully taking retailing business Puregold Price Club Inc. public and creating a new holding firm Cosco Capital out of mining/oil arm Alcorn Gold Resources Corp. (APM).

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange on Thursday, Mariwasa said the Securities and Exchange Commission had approved amendments to its articles of incorporation to change its name to “Da Vinci Capital” and extend its corporate term for another 50 years from Nov. 5, 2013.

The bylaws were also changed to halve the number of directors to seven, the disclosure said.

It was earlier reported—and confirmed—that Mariwasa had been pledged to Co’s group. The group that sold the controlling stake to Co comprised the following investors: Alfonso Anggala, Glenn Paul Garcia, Gilpatrick Garcia and Klarence Dy.

Co has yet to officially announce his plans for Da Vinci but stock pundits expect Co to infuse energy-related businesses. His group’s privately held Union Energy Corp. earlier announced a partnership with renewable energy developer Sta. Clara Power Corp for an 8-megawatt mini-hyropower project in Oriental Mindoro costing about P1.9 billion. Union Energy is likewise undertaking a P1-billion investment in a 9.9-megawatt rice husk biomass power plant in San Jose City, Nueva Ecija. Doris C. Dumlao