The Philippine Stock Exchange said Wednesday it approved the one-year voluntary suspension of a brokerage firm over financial incapacity.
PSE president Ramon Monzon said in a memorandum King’s Power Securities Inc. applied for voluntary suspension because of financial incapacity brought about by the decreased trading transactions and the impact of pandemic on operations.
The one-year voluntary suspension will be effective beginning Jan. 1, 2021 until Dec. 31, 2021.
It said the application for voluntary suspension was approved after King’s Power’s complied with the relevant rules and regulations of the exchange and Capital Markets Integrity Corp.
The PSE said with the suspension of operations, the client accounts of King’s Power were transferred to COL Financial Group Inc., Solar Securities Inc. and Quality Investments & Securities Corp.
Average daily average value turnover slightly improved to P7.35 billion in 2020 from the P7.29-billion average in 2019. Foreign selling, however, increased to P128.65 billion from P14.26 billion last year.
“This year is truly unprecedented for the stock market with the circuit breaker triggered three times and with the PSEi recording its steepest intraday drop in PSE history. The main index may have failed to return to pre-pandemic levels but it’s good to see that it managed to stay above the 7,100 level,” said Monzon.
The PSE index ended 2020 at 7,139.71, down 8.6 percent year-on-year. The index, however, climbed 54.4 percent from its lowest closing level in 2020 of 4,623.42 on March 19.
The all-share index also finished lower year-on-year, down by 8.1 percent. Among the sector indices, only mining and oil closed in the green, up by 17.8 percent. The financials sector was down the most by 22.3 percent year-on-year.
“It is tempting to write off 2020, but we cannot disregard the achievements accomplished this year. We had the listing of the first Real Estate Investment Trust after more than a decade-long wait. Even with the pandemic, we had a decent capital raising pipeline, including the listing of the biggest IPO ever in the history of PSE. Our trading system was up 100 percent during the enhanced community quarantine period when we had to close the trading floor,” Monzon said.
“As we end the year, let us continue to inspire each other to remain steadfast and to persevere despite the challenges and to do more for the development of the capital market in the coming year,” Monzon said.
