Higher enrollments lift STI income by 132%

MANILA, Philippines  —STI Holdings, led by businessman Eusebio Tanco, saw profits more than double during the first half of its fiscal year amid higher enrollments since the pandemic hit.

Net income during the six-month period ending Dec. 31 last year surged 132 percent to P517.8 million, STI said in a stock exchange filing.

The company earlier said enrollment in schools “breached the six-digit mark as the number of students for school year 2023 to 2024 reached almost 120,000 compared to 94,312 enrollees in [school year] 2022 to 2023, representing an increase of 27 percent,” STI said.

It said programs regulated by the Commission on Higher Education also registered a 25-percent spike.

These figures suggest private school enrollments remained robust even as the government’s broader public school system fell short of its targets, mainly due to economic difficulties faced by families amid soaring inflation.

The Department of Education earlier announced that enrollments for school year 2023 to 2024 reached 26.3 million—below its target of 28.8 million students.

READ: STI July-Dec profit surges by almost 300%

Meanwhile, STI said earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization ended at P934.6 million, an increase from the previous year’s P607.2 million.

STI Holdings’ financial year follows the academic calendar which begins on July 1 and concludes on June 30 of the following year.

For the second quarter alone, it said gross revenues increased 39 percent to P1.3 billion.

It also recorded a net income of P498.1 million for the quarter, almost double the P271 million recorded for the three-month period ending December 31, 2022