By Chino S. Leyco
Dividends remittance of state-owned companies to breach the actual collections from last year amid strong revenues of the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corp. (Pagcor), Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), the Department of Finance (DOF) said.
Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III (Bloomberg photo)
In a statement, Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III said the P40.17-billion actual dividends remitted last year will be “easily” surpassed this year after the government already raised P38.9 billion from government-owned and -controlled corporations (GOCCs) as early as May.
Dominguez said the mid-May dividends remittance is only three percent short compared with full-year 2018.
Given the robust trend in the first five months of the year alone, Dominguez said the 2019 dividend collections will easily surpass the previous year’s figures, setting the stage for a new unprecedented amount of dividend contributions from GOCCs.
The P40.17 billion collected in 2018 was the highest amount ever collected so far for an entire year since the law requiring state firms to hand over 50 percent of their annual net earnings to the national government was enacted in 1994.
In her report to Dominguez, Finance Undersecretary Antonette Tionko said the dividend collections of P38.9 billion from January to May 16 this year was 45 percent higher than the 2018 collections of P26.8 billion for the same period.
A total of 46 GOCCs remitted dividends as of May 16 this year.
Tionko said the highest dividend contributor as of May 16 this year was Pagcor with P16.17 billion; followed by PDIC with P4.58 billion; and the BSP with P4 billion.
The rest of the Top 10 dividend contributors were the Philippine Ports Authority (P3.51 billion); Manila International Airport Authority (P3.42 billion); National Power Corp. (P842 million); Clark Development Corp. (P815 million); Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (P744 billion); PNOC Exploration Corp. (P699 million); and Philippine Economic Zone Authority (P650 million).