BIZ BUZZ: Easy $10B for Maharlika

When the Marcos administration was conceptualizing the Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF), the President was told by people familiar with such an investment vehicle that he need not bother going to Congress to create such a sovereign wealth fund.

So why not just do it through an EO (executive order) and quickly get it done and over with?

But sources close to Malacañang said it was the President himself who wanted it legislated.

“I want to hear what they are thinking of. I want to perfect it,” one source quoted the President as saying.

President Marcos thus insisted that an enabling law be passed and the framework be opened to deliberations.

A similar initiative was started during the term of former President Rodrigo Duterte, which is why Finance Secretary Benjamin Diokno (who had served as budget secretary and then Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas governor) had already studied it extensively, our source said.

Ergo, the President has certified the MIF bill as urgent because he is really ready to launch it in a big way.

Also, with the series of discussions about Maharlika and the interest generated among investors, one well-placed source said that once the Philippine sovereign wealth fund is opened to external investors, Mr. Marcos’ team can easily raise as much as $10 billion from big foreign investors. —Doris Dumlao-Abadilla