MJC Investments meets minimum public float rule of PSE

Property developer MJC Investments Corp. (MIC) sold additional shares through the local bourse on Monday to ensure the firm’s compliance with the Philippine Stock Exchange’s (PSE) public ownership requirements.

In a disclosure, MIC, the hotel and tourism estate unit of the Manila Jockey Club group, said it issued 73.5 million common shares to “non-related parties to comply with the 10-percent public float requirement of the Exchange.”

These were on top of the 15.17 million non-public shares that were sold through the exchange on Monday, also done to ensure the firm’s compliance with the PSE rule, which was strictly implemented at the start of the year.

Last Friday, MIC’s parent firm, the Manila Jockey Club, sold 33 percent of the former to a Hong Kong-based consortium for P450 million, divided into 450 million common shares at P1 each. The said shares will be locked up for two years.

The MJC group described the Hong Kong investor consortium as having a diverse portfolio of global investments and led by Cheah Teik Sing, managing director of ECM Libra Financial Group Berhad, a listed boutique financial services group based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Sing previously served as managing director of BNP Paribas Hong Kong and has more than 20 years of international investment banking experience. He also serves as an independent non-executive director of Malayan Banking Berhad.

The transaction is seen providing MIC with fresh funds to construct its first project, a five-star hotel, tourism and entertainment hub on a 7,500-square-meter site at the San Lazaro Tourism and Business Park, which is home to a high-end residential condominium project jointly developed by Ayala Land Inc. and MJC as well as the SM San Lazaro mall.

The hotel project will offer 160 suites, a column-less ballroom that can accommodate more than 1,000 persons, 5,000 square meters of event space and 1,000 parking slots.

The company is grooming the area to attract East Asian tourists and local visitors who have long clamored for world-class accommodations, entertainment and recreational facilities in the high-density greater Chinatown area.