MANILA, Philippines – LT Group Incorporated (LTG), the conglomerate owned by the Chinese entrepreneur Lucio Tan, incurred a net income increase to 10.83 billion pesos by 15%, resulting from the development in its tobacco and banking business.
Among LTG’s different segments of the business, Philippine National Bank (PNB) contributed 45% or 4.83 billion pesos of the overall attributable income. Following PNB is tobacco, having 40% contribution to the total or 4.39 billion pesos.
Tanduay Distillers Incorporated accounted for 6% or 631 million pesos. On the other hand, Asia Brewery Incorporated (ABI) contributed 5% or 551 million pesos. Eton Properties Philippines delivered 3% or 348 million pesos.
Meanwhile, the 30.9% stake of the LTG in Victorias Milling Company (VMC) also provided 2% or 174 million pesos.
PNB recorded an 8.56 billion pesos net income last year, which is 16% higher compared to the record of 7.38 billion pesos in 2016. This resulted from the higher net interest income (NII), net income from service fee, as well as from the higher profit from the trading of Real and Other Property Acquired (ROPA).
As for the tobacco business, its income garnered 4.4 billion pesos last year from 2.59 billion pesos, as net earnings equity hit 4.37 billion pesos from its PMFTC Incorporated (PMFTC) stake of 49.6%.
This was due to the better pricing, as well as the enhanced product mix that contributed to the progress as PMFTC increased the Marlboro price since 2013 for the 1st time.
The overall volume of the tobacco business was calculated to have lowered to 74.9 billion number of sticks, mainly because of the excise tax which led to price hikes. This was further strengthened by trade filling up toward the closing of 2017, in expectation of the further increase in prices while levy was raised further at the start of 2018.
Meanwhile, Tanduay Distillers Inc. recorded a 631 million pesos net income last year, which is lower by 31% despite the higher revenues from liquor, which increased by 20% to 15.19 billion pesos.
Using the estimates of Nielsen as a basis, the market share of TDI as of December last year was 61% in Visayas and 65% in Mindanao.
Ethanol revenues, however, dropped by 31% to 1.6 billion pesos while volume fell 21% and trading prices dropped lower.
The net income of Asia Brewery Incorporated also dropped to 552 million pesos mainly because of the new products’ higher expenditures.
Nonetheless, revenues were higher by 17% at 13.89 billion pesos from 11.85 billion pesos. This was largely affected by the higher contribution collected from soymilk, bottled water, and packaging partially offset as a result of the decline of sales from energy drinks.
Cobra Energy Drink and Vitamilk lead the market continuously. At the same time, the two bottled water brands – Absolute and Summit – holds the second largest share in the market.
The property business, Eton Properties Philippines Incorporated (Eton), also published a net revenue of 348 million pesos, which was lower by 42 million pesos or 11% compared to the 390 million pesos profit in 2016.
Likewise, revenues decreased by 21% at 2.23 billion pesos because of the lower sales.
Revenues for its leasing business increased 9% to 1.39 billion pesos with the commencement of the 2,100 sqm of additional space for retail in Eton Tower Makati and higher rates of the lease. The BPO office premises of Eton had a 99% take-up rate by the end of 2017.
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