Public investors are in the market for dividends
Emeterio Sd. Perez
WHAT for is a seminar for executives of listed companies if it only emphasizes net profit as the main objective of their bosses in going into business?
The public investors, who trade on listed common shares, should not mind at all if executives of Semirara Mining and Power Corp. (SCC) attended “A Conference on GRI and Sustainability: Strategies for future-proofing Sustainable Business” conducted by University of Asia and the Pacific.
To the public, who happen to own SCC common shares, nothing is more important than dividends, either in cash or in stock, that results from sustained profitability.
Semirara has 4.265 billion common shares listed on the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE). The number of outstanding common shares may be misleading as Semirara reported having 4.251 billion outstanding common shares, but has 4.265 billion common shares that are both listed and issued.
This can be explained by reading Semirara’s public ownership report (POR) in which the company’s issued common shares totaled 4,264,609,290, which when reduced by 14,061,670 treasury shares equals 4,250,547,620 common shares.
The public investors may find themselves mystified by these numbers when they should not. As a matter of fact, including 14,061,670 SCC treasury shares in the number of listed and issued shares means Semirara hasn’t retired them.
Treasury shares
For comparison, let us look at San Miguel Corp. (SMC), which has 2,378,524,978 outstanding common shares but has 3,245,734,226 listed common shares and 3,283,277,515 as issued common shares.
In its POR as of June 30, 2018, SMC reported 3,287,300,306 as issued common shares, minus 904,752,537 treasury shares equals 2,382,547,769 outstanding common shares. These numbers reflect what the company reported on PSE website although they vary, which means the difference resulted from either buying back SMC common shares or issuing additional common shares.
Being traded by public investors does not necessarily make a company public. If one would examine the daily trading which can be accessed at www.pe.com.ph, he would learn that few common shares change ownership daily, that is, from Monday to Friday, except legal holidays, even if the entire outstanding common shares are listed.
It is not only Semirara that has listed all outstanding common shares. The postings made by SMC show the public that all its 2.379 billion outstanding common shares are among the company’s listed and issued common shares.
Again, what do the reported number of outstanding common shares, treasury common shares, listed common shares and issued common shares tell the public?
Due Diligencer’s take
Of Semirara’s 4.265 billion listed common shares, only 1.44 million common shares were traded on Sept. 18, 2018.
The stock opened and hit a high of P28.60, fell to a session’s low of P27.60 and closed a little bit higher at P27.90.
In the last 30 days, SCC reached a high of P32.90 but dropped to a month’s low of P27.60, which was on
Sept.18, 2018.
As posted, SCC peaked in 52 weeks at P47.85 but recorded a year’s low of P27.50.
Semirara’s outstanding common shares carry par value of P1 per common share of 10 billion authorized capital stock consisting only of common shares.
Of Semirara’s 10 billion authorized capital stock (ACS), 693 Filipinos and 10 foreigners subscribed and paid for 3.96 billion common shares and 295.679 million common shares for total paid up capital stock of 4.256 billion.
At P27.90 per SCC common share on Sept. 18, 2018, Semirara’s 4.256 billion common shares had market value of P118.742 billion.
Why don’t the public ask the Gotianuns who are Semirara’s controlling stockholders. By the way, is Semirara a good investment? Just asking.
esdperez@gmail.com
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