DT_20190709

51.00
52.00
53.00
54.00
55.00
PESO-DOLLAR RATES
8 JULY 2019
51.32
25700
25200
24700
24200
DOW JONES
8 JULY 2019
43.88
7900
7700
STOCK MARKET
7500
7300 56.55
8 JULY 2019
8 JULY 2019
INDEX SUMMARY
INDEX VALUE CHANGE % CHANGE
PSEi 8,061.39 -55.56 -0.70 ▼
All Shares 4,917.60 -28.08 -0.57 ▼
Financials 1,730.57 -11.44 -0.66 ▼
Industrial 11,966.84 -21.48 -0.18 ▼
Holding Firms 7,722.24 -74.97 -0.96 ▼
Services 1,679.13 -19.91 -1.17 ▼
Mining and Oil 7,477.60 38.31 0.52 ▲
Property 4,366.22 -13.53 -0.31 ▼
B12 BUSINESS
Tuesday, 9 July 2019
Daily Tribune
The downward adjustment of P0.1068 per kWh will mean a
decrease of around P21 in the total bill
By Alvin Murcia
The Manila Electric Company
(MERALCO) announced yesterday
the third consecutive month of lower
power rates, as overall electricity rates
for a typical household consuming
200kWh decreased to P9.9850 per kWh
this July from last month’s P10.0918
per kWh.
According to a statement released
by Meralco, the downward adjustment
of P0.1068 per kWh will mean a
decrease of around P21 in the total
bill. This third straight month of
electricity rate decrease represents a
total downward adjustment of around
P0.57 per kWh since May 2019.
From P5.4158 per kWh last month,
generation charge for July slightly
went up to P5.4227 per kWh, a slight
increase of only P0.0069 per kWh.
The slight generation charge
increase is primarily due to higher
charges from the Wholesale Electricity
Spot Market (WESM), but this was
mostly offset by the lower charges of
Independent Power Producers (IPP)
and stable charges of Power Supply
Agreements (PSA).
WESM charges increased by P1.8794
per kWh due to tight supply conditions
in the Luzon grid. Plant capacity on
outage increased as demand for power
Meralco lowers power rates again
in the grid peaked at 11,344 MW in June.
With limited supply, the number of days
on Red Alert as declared by the National
Grid Corporation of the Philippines
(NGCP) increased to 5 from 2 in May
and about one-third of the days in June
were under Yellow Alert. The share of
WESM to Meralco’s supply needs went
down to 8.1 percent.
On the other hand, cost of power
from IPP decreased by P0.2239
per kWh largely due to the peso
appreciation. About 97 percent of
IPP charges are dollar-denominated.
Cost of power from PSA is stable with
a slight increase of P0.0414 per
kWh. IPPs and PSA
provided
41.4 percent and 50.5 percent of
Meralco’s supply needs, respectively.
The overall reduction this month
was mainly brought about by a lower
transmission charge for residential
customers, which decreased by
P0.0788 per kWh, primarily due to
lower ancillary service charges.
Taxes and other charges also
decreased by P0.0349 per kWh. This
includes a reduction of P0.0731 per
kWh, in compliance with the ERC’s
directive to implement a one-time
decrease in rates for reset cost
adjustment and reflect the same as
a separate line item in electric bills.
This month’s rate also includes
an increase in the universal
China to act on cigarette
making machine smugglers
Based on previous raids conducted by the BIR, counterfeiters
manufacture fake versions of popular brands by using smaller versions
of the machines
The customs agency of China has
committed to help the Bureau of Customs
(BOC) in its efforts to stop Chinese exports
of unauthorized cigarette making machines
from entering the country.
Based on BoC Commissioner Rey Leonardo
Guerrero’s report to Finance Secretary
Carlos Dominguez III, the Commissioner
had reiterated the country’s concern over
the machines to Chinese Vice Minister of
the General Administration of Customs of
China (GACC) at the sidelines of the 28th
ASEAN Customs Directors-General Meeting
held recently in Laos.
“I asked them if they could stop such
exportations on their part because this is
creating problems as far as we’re concerned,”
said Guerrero in his report to Dominguez
during a recent Department of Finance (DoF)
Executive (Execom) meeting.
Guerrero said the Chinese customs
officials have agreed “to look into the
matter.”
Earlier, Dominguez directed the BoC
and Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR)
Commissioner Caesar Dulay that the illegal
tobacco trade
EVEN cigarette brands are being counterfeited now, but the DoF with the help of the BoC and BIR,
won’t have any of it.
Caught in the crossfire of the US-China trade
war, Chinese students are looking for alternative
study destinations — threatening to turn off
an important source of revenue for American
universities.
China accounts for nearly a third of foreign
students on US campuses who pour billions of
dollars into the economy, but in March their
numbers dropped for the first time in a decade.
Visa delays, concerns over being shut out of
research projects and safety fears have turned off
Chinese students, according to several admissions
consultancies and nearly a dozen parents and
students interviewed by AFP.
Rival education powerhouses such as Britain,
Australia and Canada are the biggest beneficiaries,
a survey by New Oriental China’s biggest private
education provider said.
Japan and South Korea — traditional study abroad
destinations for the Chinese elite — and parts of
Europe, especially Germany and Scandinavian
countries with strong engineering programs, have
also seen an uptick in applications, the survey
found.
The chilling effect started mid-last year, after
President Donald Trump’s administration slashed the
visa duration of students in science and technology
fields from five years to one in some cases.
“Now there’s a lot of uncertainty on whether
they can even finish their studies,” said Gu Huini,
founder of boutique college consultancy Zoom In.
Over one third of the roughly 360,000 Chinese
students in the US study in “STEM fields” — science,
technology, engineering and mathematics — according
to the Institute of International Education in New
York.
But the number of Chinese students in the US
dipped by two percent in March compared to the
previous year, the first drop since 2009, data from
the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement shows.
Melissa Zhang, a high school senior in Beijing,
said she has abandoned plans to go to the US and
was instead taking German lessons, in the hope of
getting into a robotics program in Dresden. AFP
has shifted from smuggling cigarettes to
producing locally counterfeit brands using
undocumented cigarette-making machines
acquired from China.
Based on previous raids conducted by
the BIR, counterfeiters manufacture fake
versions of popular brands by using smaller
versions of the machines.
Just last 29 May, the BIR Strike Team
tasked to crack down on illicit tobacco trade
conducted an inventory of machines, finished
goods, raw materials and counterfeit tax stamps
seized by the National Bureau of Investigations
(NBI) at a factory in Marilao, Bulacan.
Erring traders have apparently switched to
manufacturing their own counterfeit cigarettes
in lieu of smuggling legitimate products
following the heightened BIR-BoC drive
against suppliers of tobacco products with
fake tax stamps, which was in compliance
with Dominguez’s earlier orders.
Dominguez has underscored the need for
heightened government vigilance against
the illicit manufacture and sale of tobacco
products, given the increase in excise tax
of tobacco products which has compelled
illegal traders to resort to smuggling and
evading taxes.
He said the destruction last January of
several machines used for manufacturing
is part of President Duterte’s
administration’s relentless campaign
against manufacturers of these products.,
as effectively demonstrated in 2017 when
the DoF, through the BIR and BoC, cracked
down on the “biggest fish,” namely, Mighty
Corporation.
Taking down Mighty Corporation for
using counterfeit excise stamps led to a
tax settlement amounting to P30 billion,
which was the biggest tax settlement in
the country’s history.
Consequently, Mighty Corp. was
forced to get out of the cigarette
business.
Joshua Lao
charge-stranded contract cost amounting
to P0.0543 per kWh to be recovered for
12 months. This was recently approved
by the ERC.
Meralco’s distribution,
supply, and metering
charges, meanwhile, have
remained unchanged for
48 months, after these
registered reductions in
July 2015.
In a statement,
THE Meralco headquarters in Mandaluyong City. The lower electricity rates were brought about by a lower transmission charge for residential customers.
Chinese students eye other universities
Meralco reiterated that it does
not earn from the pass-through
charges, such as the generation and
transmission charges. Payment for
the generation charge goes to the
power suppliers, while paymen for the
transmission charge goes to the NGCP.
Taxes and other public policy charges
like the FIT-All rate are remitted to
the government.
Asian markets retreat
Asian markets retreated Monday and the dollar held gains after
a blockbuster US jobs report dashed hopes that the Federal Reserve
would slash interest rates this month.
Labor Department data showed that despite recent disappointing
indicators, the world’s top economy continues to show resilience as
it created far more posts than expected in June.
The news took traders by surprise and sent all three main indexes
on Wall Street falling from record highs, while the dollar bounced
against its main peers.
But the strong labor market has many questions whether
we will see just two rate cuts in 2019 and not what some
call the required three to see US stocks make another 3-5
percent push higher into uncharted territory.
Investors had been hoping the Fed would cut borrowing costs by
as much as 50 basis points at its next policy meeting at the end of
the month but Friday’s report reduced the chances of that happening.
And Asian investors extended the selling, with Hong Kong down
1.8 percent, Shanghai 2.4 percent lower and Tokyo off 0.9 percent.
Sydney shed one percent, Seoul dropped 1.7 percent and Singapore
was off 0.9 percent. Manila, Wellington, Taipei and Jakarta were
also lower.
“Markets remain convinced the Fed will cut rates at the end of
the month,” said OANDA senior market analyst Edward Moya.
“But the strong labor market has many questions whether we will
see just two rate cuts in 2019 and not what some call the required
three to see US stocks make another 3-5 percent push higher into
uncharted territory.”
He added that the focus will now turn on Fed boss Jerome Powell’s
congressional testimony this week, with investors hoping he will
provide some forward guidance on the bank’s plans.
“The testimony this week will be crucial around how they are
seeing the evolution of the US economy,” Anne Anderson, at UBS
Asset Management, told Bloomberg TV.
Also, up this week is the release of minutes from the Fed’s June
meeting, while US and Chinese officials are working to schedule
top-level trade talks.
On currency markets the dollar-maintained Friday’s gains against
the yen, pound and euro.
And it surged more than 3 percent on the Turkish lira after
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sacked the head of the country’s
central bank following months of tensions over high borrowing costs.
Erdogan, who is battling to boost the struggling economy, has
repeatedly railed against high interest rates and called for them to
be lowered to stimulate growth.
The removal of Murat Cetinkaya at the weekend filled speculation
the bank will slash borrowing costs.
Win Thin, global head of currency strategy at Brown Brothers
Harriman & Co, wrote in a note: “Deputy governor Murat Uysal was
named as the replacement, though we all know who really controls
monetary policy now.”
AFP
BUSINESSMEN walk in front of an electronic stock indicator flashing Tokyo’s closing rate. Tokyo was off 0.9 percent,
Hong Kong down 1.8 percent, Shanghai 2.4 percent lower.
AFP