Food Conglomerate, San Miguel Inc, has announced that they are buying 50.1% of Ashmore Investment Management Ltd’s stake in Petron.
Ashmore, a company incorporated in the UK, recently bought from the Philippine government their 40% stake in the Oil giant at P6.85/share. The total cost of sale would be around P25.7 B. This year also they had bought the 40% stake of Saudi Aramco in Petron giving them a 50% stake in the company prior to their acquisition of the Philippine government’s shares.
Previously, the board of San Miguel Inc approved plans for the group to diversify from their core business of food and beverage. They announced plans to enter into power generation or transmission, water and other utilities, mining and infrastructure.
They were also courting the idea of entering the bioethanol business when Ginebra San Miguel Inc filed a letter of intent with the Department of Energy signifying their interest in entering the biofuels sector.
This October they had also acquired the government’s 27% stake in Meralco, who is responsible to distributing electricity to Metro Manila.
I always said before that San Miguel has what it takes to enter into the biofuels business because of their long experience in brewing alcoholic beverages as well as in their vast agricultural farms.
With the transfer of the government’s shares of Petron to the private sector. Some sectors have raised concern as to the price of oil, on whether the government can still directly stop the oil companies from raising the prices of gasoline unjustly.
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Category: Oil, Oil Price, San Miguel
