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INVESTORS on stocks listed on the Philippine Stock
Exchange want to know—if possible but which is not—when
a bull market would end and when depressed share prices
would recover. Nobody has told them yet the answers
probably because no one out there knows when is the
first sign of a market debacle that would tell investors
it was time to sell to cut or minimize their losses.
More often than not—though there is no survey to confirm
this—investors are advised only when to buy and when to
hold. They are seldom, if ever, told when to sell. Of
course, investors should be knowledgeable about the
market’s erratic behavior. They have nobody to blame for
their losses. Buyers beware remains the rule of the
game.
A year
ago, Jose Cuisia, president of Philippine American Life
Insurance Co., a unit of American Insurance Group of the
US, advised us in an interview that the time to invest
is at the age of 30. That could be too young an age for
most of us. But his was only a suggestion which he
himself followed as he told us he still keeps intact
some investments which he has not touched for years now.
Yet, he knew fully well when his money is growing—and
worst—when he was losing some of it not only to
inflation but to unpredictable crisis. Apparently, paper
losses do no worry Cuisia, who must be a strong believer
in Newton’s Law of gravity that says everything that
goes up must come down—and vice versa.
****
A stock
investor, who prefers not to be named, does not even
find time to open the web site of the Philippine Stock
Exchange for disclosures filed by listed companies. He
simply bases his investment decision on the age-old
saying that when blood is on the street, it’s time to
buy. Or on instinct that tells him to buy when the
prices are low as he did years ago—this was in late
1990s and early 2000s when he sensed share prices were
hitting bottom. (Read: Falling because no one knows when
prices in a bear market would bottom out or stop
bleeding). He had accumulated PSE shares which he bought
at less than P300. We only don’t know if he also bought
shares in Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. which
tumbled below P200 in 2001. PSE closed on Friday at P800
while PLDT closed the session at P2,595.. Probably, he
had not sold his PSE shares hoping to reap big in a
100-percent stock dividend which remains on hold. This
investor started with P1-million capital many years ago.
As a retiree, he lives on his earnings from his
investments on stocks.
He has
such a good grasp of the market: What to buy and when to
sell what he buys in the short-term. His portfolio
includes stocks for the long haul, the reason he
invested in Pilipino Telephone Corp. (Piltel), which he
hopes would soon declare dividend as promised by Manuel
V. Pangilinan, PLDT chairman and chief executive
officer. PLDT is the parent of Smart Communications
Inc., which, in turn, owns 100 percent of Piltel.
****
Note 1.
After seven years and 13 outlets in the
Philippines,
businessman Hubert U. Young is taking international what
he has developed over the years as UCC Coffee concept.
His going global started with UCC Café Coffee House 1888
in Walnut, California, which he and his partners
launched recently when he went to the US to attend a
conference organized by the Specialty Coffee Association
of America in Long Beach, as a representative of the
Specialty Coffee Association of the Philippines. After
obtaining the UCC franchise from the Japanese company,
Young put up the first UCC Vienna Café in
Quezon City.
Founded in Japan in 1933, UCC, which stands for Ueshima
Coffee Co., produces coffee beans from company-owned
plantations in Blue Mountain in Jamaica, Kona in Hawaii
and Mandheling in Indonesia.
****
Note 2.
HCCA International, a US employer of Filipino nurses,
with home office in Franklin Tennessee and offices in
the Philippines, the UAE and the UK, has been honored by
US Joint Commission of Accreditation of Healthcare
Organization (JCAHO) with the coveted Gold Seal of
Approval and Certification for its recruitment standards
and employment program. The commission is responsible
for the accreditation of US health-care organizations,
including US hospitals. Over the last 33 years, HCCA
International has deployed more than 30,000 health-care
professionals with health-care facilities around the
world and has managed more than 40 health-care
operations with more than 7,500 beds on five continents
including past projects such as the King Faisal
Specialist Hospital and Research Center in Riyadh, Saudi
Arabia, Singapore General Hospital, Brazil’s AMICO HMO
and Panama’s Centro Medico Patilla. HCCA International
currently represents 50 tertiary medical facilities from
California to Florida in the United States. HCCA
Philippines hold office at the 33K/T1, in The Enterprise
Center, at 6766 Ayala corner Paseo de Roxas with
telephone no. at 757-1000. It may be contacted through
the POEA at Edsa corner Ortigas Ave., Mandaluyong City,
Philippines at 722-1144 or 722-1155. |
