PLDT-Digitel merger woes drag down stock market

MANILA, Philippines – Local stocks pulled back sharply on Tuesday, led by telecom giant PLDT which was battered by concerns over rising opposition to its acquisition of Digitel.

The Philippine Stock Exchange index lost 50.60 points or 1.18 percent to finish at 4,244.64.

Turnover was heavy at P7.67 billion, about P1 billion of which consisted of trades on PLDT, which was the most active stock on the exchange.

The share price of index heavyweight PLDT, which has a 14.07 percent bearing on the main index, fell by 4.98 percent to P2,328 per share. Dealers said this was due to rising opposition to its takeover of Digitel – a deal, which had brought good tidings to the overall market since end-March.

But despite the overall index decline, there were 76 advancers that edged out 58 decliners while 46 stocks were unchanged.

The holding firm and mining/oil counters managed to buck the day’s downturn.

Other blue chips Ayala Corp., Metrobank, Ayala Land, URC, BPI, SM Investments, SM Prime and Jollibee fell alongside non-index stock Vista Land.

On the other hand, the stocks that avoided the downturn were BDO, San Miguel Corp., AEV, Aboitiz Power, EDC, DMCI Holdings, Megaworld, Cebu Air, AGI and Lepanto “A.”