PALO, Leyte – The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) made its services accessible to Eastern Visayas with the opening of its Tacloban Extension Office (EO) on Thursday, May 11.
SECURITIES and Exchange Commission Chairman Emilio Aquino (right) thanks the National Economic Development Authority-8 and House Speaker Martin Romualdez for making the SEC Tacloban Extension Office possible after four decades. (Marie Marticio)
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The SEC Tacloban EO is located on the second floor of the National Economic and Development Authority Regional Office VIII building at the Government Center in Barangay Baras here.
It aims to address the business registration needs and investment activities in the region, given the rising level of economic activity and the presence of economic zones.
As of May 2023, 10,456 corporations are registered with the SEC in Eastern Visayas but they had to travel to the SEC Cebu EO to avail of the commission's services.
"Today, we are not only celebrating the inauguration of the SEC Tacloban Extension Office but also ushering in an even more conducive and more robust environment for business and investment in Eastern Visayas," SEC chairperson Emilio Aquino said.
He added that under the SEC's mandate of championing the corporate sector, the SEC Tacloban Extension Office will serve as a gateway to doing business in Eastern Visayas.
"We will prove ourselves worthy to be here. This is four decades of yearning and now we're finally here," he said.
The opening of the new EO follows the recommendation of House Speaker Ferdinand Martin G. Romualdez who cited Tacloban City's potential as one of the most competitive and highly urbanized cities in the region.
SEC Tacloban EO is the commission's 10th extension office in the country after Baguio, Tarlac, Legazpi, Cebu, Bacolod, Iloilo, Zamboanga, Davao, and Cagayan de Oro. It is also the fourth in the Visayas and the first to operate with the digital environment.
Its opening is part of the commission's goal of expanding its services across the country, as it pursues its mandate as the national government regulatory agency charged with supervision over the corporate sector, the capital market participants, the securities and investment instruments market, and the protection of the investing public.
The presence of SEC extension offices in the regions ensures the efficient delivery of public services and effective enforcement of laws concerning the capital market, financing and lending companies, and the overall corporate sector.