Monday, June 15, 2009 [ manilatimes.net ]
The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) said that it has received several proposals from property developers to build the unified headquarters in the Bonifacio Global City.
Ismael Cruz, PSE director and building committee head, said two to three real-estate companies have already approached the local bourse officials but there are no definitive offers yet.
At present, the local exchange conducts trading in two separate locations—one at the Ayala Stock Exchange along Ayala Avenue in Makati and the other is at the Tektite Tower in Ortigas Center, Pasig City.
The future PSE office will occupy a 5,000-square-meter property near the HSBC building in Fort Bonifacio.
Earlier, the PSE board gave the go signal to proceed with a memorandum of understanding with Ayala Land Inc. (ALI) and Fort Bonifacio Development Corp. for the construction of the building where the unified trading floor and offices would be relocated.
ALI offered the PSE a new and bigger area of property in Fort Bonifacio Global City to house its future headquarters and unified trading floor, which was already presented during annual stockholders’ meeting of PSE in May.
However, the construction of the new PSE building was delayed due to few changes in the design and floor area.
ALI, which took over the development of the Bonifacio Global City from the Metro Pacific group in 2002, had again requested to defer the construction of the future PSE headquarters given the slump in the high-end property market.
The PSE had originally been promised by Metro Pacific a unified trading floor in Global City by 2004 but agreed to waive this seven years ago.
Under the present plans, Cruz said that the new building might be 12 stories high but did not divulge other specific details.
“In Shanghai for instance, they have four trading floors, all empty because everyone was switching to trading online,” he said.
Prior to the formation of PSE, the Makati Stock Exchange and Manila Stock Exchange had been separate entities for 30 years even though these were trading the same listed issues. After the unification, the PSE still maintained the two trading floors.
-- Chino S. Leyco
____________________________________________________________________________________
