PSALM cuts payables to P449.4B as of June

The Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (PSALM) has reduced its obligations by close to two thirds to P449.4 billion as of June from P1.24 trillion when the state firm was created 15 years ago.

Also, PSALM said in a statement it had also privatized P918.5 billion worth of assets, of which 59 percent or P545.3 billion had been collected.

The state firm said that as of June 30, its remaining principal debt was pegged at P246.73 billion while the remaining obligations under its independent power producer (IPP) contracts amount to P202.70 billion.

“PSALM adheres to full transparency,” PSALM president and chief executive Irene Joy Besido-Garcia said. “Its records show that privatization proceeds are utilized to pay its financial obligations. The Commission on Audit validates PSALM’s books.”

Garcia earlier this week presented the data to the Senate committee on energy during a hearing related a bill on the proposal to use the Malampaya funds for settling PSALM’s obligations.

Garcia’s report also touched on the cost of borrowings that PSALM is shouldering while awaiting regulators’ action on its current petitions for the recovery of stranded cost and stranded debt through the “universal charge” portion of electricity consumers’ bills.

The Energy Regulatory Commission—which does not have a quorum, with two commissioners having retired last month and two others suspended from holding office—has given out notices for hearings on PSALM’s latest petitions.