The Republic Act 9994 or the Expanded Senior Citizens Act of 2010 was finally signed into law, giving our senior citizens additional benefits. Among them is their exemption from the 12% value-added tax (VAT), as stated in the implementing rules and regulations signed last Friday by the Deparment of Social Works and Development (DSWD). This exemption however, will start on July 6.

With the implementing guidelines, senior citizens can now fully avail of the 20% discount on essential good and services, which include food, medicines and doctors’ fees. Before, they were only able to enjoy an 8% from the supposed 20% because of the 12% VAT.

The expanded law also provides senior citizens discounts on fares for land, air and sea travel, as well as in recreations expenses, such as hotel stays, movie houses and and other leisure activities.

They are also provided by the new law a 5% discount on their monthly utility bills, provided that their household meters are registered in their name, and their consumption does not exceed 100 per kilowatt hour for electricity, and 30 cubic meters for water.

Additional benefits are also given to indigent or non-pensioner senior citizens. They would be entitled to a monthly pension of P500, plus a free medical insurance and disability insurance through Philhealth, and a buriall assistance of P2,000.

Indigent or non-pensioner senior citizens will also be entitled to a monthly pension of P500, free medical insurance and disability insurance through PhilHealth, and burial assitance worth P2,000.

The country’s finance officials were earlier concerned that senior citizens’ exemption from the VAT could reduce government revenues needed to limit the budget deficit.

A new remittance system that will allow for a safer, faster and cheaper remittances by OFWs (overseas Filipino workers) will be implemented by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) starting on the third quarter of the year.

This is the new Philippine Payments and Settlements System or Philpass Remit System. Under this new system, the fee will be reduced to P50 per remittance transaction, resulting to savings of P100 to P500, as the current system charges ranges from P150 to P550.

BSP said the Philpass Remit System ensures safer, faster and cheaper means of remittance transaction.

The system involves the use of the BSP-Philpass as the local clearinghouse for the transfer of remittances from a local bank to another bank where the OFW beneficiary maintains an account.

This project was undertaken jointly by the BSP with the Association of Bank Remittance Officers Inc. (ABROI) through a memorandum of agreement signed last December.

The scheduled implementation of the project was supposed in the first quarter of the year, however, only one bank was able to migrate to the new system since the MOA was signed.

The central bank said they will need to wait for the other member banks to resolve their issues on hardware and system connectivity, so they can finally migrate before the new remittance system will be fully operational.

More employment opportunities in Taiwan await Filipino jobseekers, the Philippine Star reported today.

In its business page, the local newspaper said that according to local recruiters, there are at least 30,000 jobs awaiting Filipino workers in Taiwan.

Pilipino Manpower Association of Taiwan, Inc. (PILMAT) president Jackson Gan said that factories in Taiwan are still in dire need of Filipinos and other foreign workers.

“Companies in Taiwan continue to hire workers and we have thousands of job orders that are yet to be filled up until this time,” Gan said, adding that  Taiwan has bounced back from last year’s financial crisis and is hiring more workers than in past years.

He said, however, that they are having difficulty recruiting skilled workers to fill up the vacancies because of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) secretary-general’s warning that “the forging of an economic cooperation agreement between Taiwan and China would adversely affect the employment of OFWs.”

Gan stressed that NEDA’s fear is baseless since Taiwanese employers still prefer Filipinos compared to other workers from other countries.

He said that while Taiwan hires other nationalities like Vietnamese and Indonesians, overseas Filipino workers still have the advantage because Filipinos can speak the English language unlike other nationalities. He also noted that Taiwan hires an average of 40,000 Filipino workers, including factory workers and caregivers, annually.

Gan stressed “NEDA is sounding an alarm without basis that could jeopardize the country’s economic stability. Its warning that thousands of OFWs may lose jobs is far-fetched.”

$500 million retail treasury bonds will be auctioned by the government on April 21. These RTB were intended for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).

National Treasurer Roberto Tan is confident that they would be able to sell the whole $500 million after conducting a series of successful briefing in different parts of the globe.

Tan said that they were very pleased with the warm reception from OFWs from the United States, Europe and some parts of Asia.

Tan led of delegate composed of government officials and issue underwriters. They went to different countries conducting “financial literacy seminars” for OFWs to discuss the benefits of investing in the said OFW bonds.

The bonds, which are also known as the Fixed Rate Multicurrency Retail Treasury Bond, will be offered to investors from April 21 to April 27. First Metro Investment Corp. (FMIC), BPI Capital Corp., Development Bank of the Philippines, PNB Capital & Investment Corp., and BDO Capital & Investment Corp. were tapped as issue managers of the RTBs.

The investment instruments are available in three and five year bonds, comprising of $400 million in dollar denominated bonds and 75 million in euro-denominated bonds.

At least 20 percent of the $500 million bonds are intended for retail investors, and the rest are for institutional investors. Investments ranging from $100 to $100,000 will be considered retail.

To encourage OFWs to invest in the multi-currency bonds, the government is offering them exemption from the 20 percent tax usually slapped on said instruments. This is in line with the governments thrust to provide overseas Filipinos an investment facility for their earnings.

By December of this year, we could be having new designs on our peso bills. The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) would begin circulating by December the new peso bills, while coins will follow suit after two years.

According to the BSP, aside from having new designs, the new bills and coins will also have new security features which would make it easier to detect counterfeit money.

BSP in its primer said, “As a matter of practice, central banks regularly change the designs of their money – whether coins or banknotes – to guard against counterfeiter. By making it very difficult and costly for counterfeiters to produce exact copies of our money, we protect the integrity of our currency against criminals.”

The peso bills, from the 20-peso to the 1,000-peso, and coins from the one-centavo to the 10-peso, are all up for a facelift. Once the new designs have begun circulating, BSP said the existing peso bills would remain valid and legal tender in the next three years, after which they will be phased out.

“Based on previous currency retirement or demonization program of the BSP, this will give enough time for the public to make a full transition to our new generation currency,” BSP said, adding that there would be a separate schedule for the coins.

The new bills will feature historically important Filipinos, heritage sites and natural wonders. Among the revision in the design is the inclusion of the image of the late former President Corazon C. Aquino in the P500 bill, which already features husband Benigno Aquino, Jr.

The coins will be having national symbols in the new design.

Globe Asiatique gets the green light from Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for its planned initial public offering (IPO). The SEC approved the IPO of of Globe Asiatique Realty Holdings Corp. which is seen to raise up to P3.05 billion in fresh capital.

Globe Asiatique, on its statement filed with the SEC, said it will issue 136.36 million shares through a primary offering, with an overallotment option of up to 168.7 million shares. The price ranges from P6.50 to P10 apiece.

The shares that will be covered by the IPO would account for 15-26 percent of the issued and outstanding capital of the company. Aside from the public offering, the company is also selling 34.09 million shares through a secondary offering.

The company tapped the services of BDO Capital & Investment Corp. as its issue manager and lead underwriter for the public offering.

Globe Asiatique will use the funds from the IPO for the construction of GA Sky Suites and Corporate Tower in Quezon Avenue, which would  be the tallest building along EDSA, and also several other residential subdivisions, as well as pay down of its bank loans.

The company has lined up housing projects in Bacolod, Subic, Mindoro and Angeles City, Pampanga to take advantage of the estimated shortage of 3.8 million housing units in the country, primarily in the socialized and low-cost housing category.

It has been working with the state-run Home Development Mutual Fund or Pag-Ibig Fund to provide end-user financing options to company’s clients.

Prakriti Sofat, an economist from leading global investment house Barclays Capital said the peso could reach 44 to the dollar level by the end of the year because of recovery in exports and the steady inflows of remittances.

In the report from Philippine Star, Sofat said the outlook for Philippine exports remains positive given the strong turnaround in the global electronics cycle.

Lead indicators such as the US manufacturing survey and semi-conductor book-to-bill ratio, according to Sofat, remain supporting to growth. She also noted that movements in the region remain favorable, with both Korea and Taiwan seeing strong exports prints in February and China remaining in expansionary territory.

“Our 12-month forecast for the dollar to the pesos is P44,” Sofat said. The Bangko Sentra ng Pilipinas, for its part, expects the pesos to hit a range of 46-49 against the dollar this year.

The 42.5 percent rise in the Philippine exports in January was a 15-year high, it was even higher than Barclays Capital’s forecast of 36-percent bounce. The total receipts reached $3.6  billion.

“On a seasonally-adjusted basis, exports rose by 4.8 percent month-on-month following on from a 0.4-percent decline in December and a 6.2-percent increase in November,” Sofat explained.

She also added, “we expect the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to keep the overnight borrowing rate unchanged at four percent at the upcoming meeting given relatively contained inflation and cautious outlook on growth.”

Now, here’s a good suggestion. Presidential aspirant Gilberto “Gibo” Teodoro Jr. wanted bets bank accounts bared.

The Lakas-Kampi-CMD standard-bearer said that the bank secrecy law should be lifted or at least be reviewed to help unmask the financial activities of politicians who are suspected to have links to the illegal drug trade.

Gibo was reacting to the report of the US State Department that some candidates in the coming national elections are receiving funding from drug syndicates. “That situation is very dangerous as drug syndicates can easily help a candidate win through their money,” he said.

The bank secrecy laws were meant to protect the privacy of good individuals, Gibo said. Unfortunately, the same law also provided a blanket for drug lords and corrupt government officials.

The bank secrecy law, Republic Act 1405, was passed in 1955 and sought to encourage people to deposit their money in a bank and discourage hoarding, which was a common practice during the Japanese occupation.

The law states that all deposits with banks and banking institutions are considered to be “absolutely confidential” and “may not be inquired or looked into by any person, subject to some exceptions.”

Through the years, exceptions and amendments were added to the bank secrecy law.

At the closing of the week’s trade this Friday, Peso inches up further as it closed at 46.05 against the US dollar, which is stronger than Thursday closing which is 46.09.

The peso continued to appreciate as favorable investor sentiment boosted appetite for currencies of emerging Asian economies. Volume of Friday’s trade went up to $73.1 million from only $611.44 million on Thursday.

This upward trend may continue next week, according to traders, as optimism for Asian developing countries is sustained by encouraging macroeconomic indicators. They said, emerging markets from Asia are seen to lead growth of the global economy this year. It is even predicted by some analysts that the peso may breach into the 45-to-a-dollar territory in the coming week.

Factors that brought about this appreciation include the sustained growth in remittances and modest rise in foreign investments like the direct placements in the business process outsourcing industry (BPO).

But not all sectors are happy with the upward trend of the value of peso. Exporters are complaining that the appreciation of peso is hurting the competitiveness of Philippine-made products.

Because of this, the export sector is asking the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) to deliberately weaken the peso, particularly by buying more dollars from the foreign exchange market.

For its part, the BSP said it is intervening in the foreign exchange from time to time, but it is only to avoid very sharp and sudden rise of the local currency.

The Home Development Mutual Fund (HDMF), commonly known as the Pag-IBIG, will be having a P12-billion bond offering starting next month.

In an investors’ meeting held recently were the bonds were launched, HDMF chief executive officer Jaime Fabiaña said the proceeds of the bonds would be used to refinance in maturing P7 billion loan in May, and the rest would be used to add up to their funds.

“The bonds are tax free and enjoy the full and unconditional guarantee of the government through the Home Guaranty Corp.,” said Fabiaña who noted that the bonds have enough sweeteners to attract investors.

Maturing in five years and one day time, the bonds can also serve as alternative compliance by banks with the Agri-Agra Law and qualify as reserve assets of insurance companies and can count as compliance with the Urban Housing Development Act.

Target investors of the bonds are banks, insurance firms and property developers. Development Bank of the Philippines and First Metro Investment Corp., the investment-banking arm of the Metrobank Group has been tapped as arrangers of the investment instrument.

Land Bank of the Philippines joins the two as joint lead underwriters while the Bureau of Treasury will serve as facility agent and registrar.

The Land Bank of the Philppines joins the DBP and the FMIC as joint lead underwriters while the Bureau of the Treasury serves as facility agent and registrar.

In 2009, Pag-IBIG was able to release P46 billion in end-user financing to its more than 74,000 members nationwide.