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COUNTRY INSIGHTS

Political noise and its more serious impact
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 29 Nov 2024

It started with unity, and it might as well end up in one single stroke to rock the Philippine economy. The political situation in the Philippines seems to be getting more explosive from an economic standpoint. Indeed, the unity team of President Bongbong Marcos and Vice President Sara Duterte wa...

Trump win: Philippines' gain or loss?
PHILIPPINES · Report · 25 Nov 2024

On November 5, 2024, the United States held its 60th quadrennial presidential election, with Donald Trump emerging as the 47th US president by a decisive majority. Trump, together with his vice president, JD Vance, are scheduled to be inaugurated on January 20, 2025. With a change in the ruling p...

The War on Drugs: Did Duterte testify against himself?
PHILIPPINES · Report · 04 Nov 2024

As a cornerstone of his presidential campaign, former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, in his inaugural address on June 30, 2016, vowed to exert relentless and sustained efforts in the campaign against drugs and criminality. This appeared to be his priority as he delegated the formulation o...

Challenges in going digital while future-proofing banknotes
PHILIPPINES · Report · 28 Oct 2024

Working for greater digitalization, the BSP initiated the formulation and implementation of key policies and regulations, including the creation of the National Payment Retail System as well as the establishment of automated clearing houses (ACH), namely, InstaPay and PESONET, electronic fund tra...

Another weather devastation hits Manila
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 26 Oct 2024

Despite the government of President Bongbong Marcos spending about half a trillion pesos for flood control projects in just over two years, and there are about 5,000 of them, nothing seems to have come out of such massive public spending. Those projects were nothing to tropical storm Kristine, wi...

As fiscal space compresses, borrowings bloat
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 17 Oct 2024

It’s not surprising that the Philippine National Government (NG) should further increase its borrowings both from the local and external capital markets. With revenue collections amounting to P2.993 trillion for the first eight months of 2024, equivalent to 17.1% of GDP, and expenditures totaling...

More opposition to diversion of P89.9 billion to PhilHealth
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 30 Sep 2024

A couple of days ago, former high-ranking officials including former cabinet secretaries joined the broadening section of Philippine society by issuing a statement opposing the diversion of P89.9 billion of the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) funds to the National Treasury to...

POGO Operations in the Philippines: A case of violating Philippine laws
PHILIPPINES · Report · 20 Sep 2024

For the past several months, Filipinos have been closely monitoring what is now considered as an extraordinary case involving a Chinese national who seemed to have succeeded in securing Filipino citizenship, conducting business in the northern province of Tarlac and managing to win an elective po...

Some issues in the labor market
PHILIPPINES · Report · 09 Sep 2024

Some economists and market watchers have raised the issue that when inflation rate was 4.4% in July 2024 in the Philippines, unemployment rate was 3.1%. However, when inflation rate decelerated to 3.3% in August 2024, unemployment rate was reported to have swelled to 4.7%. This is not exactly inc...

Sequestering "unused" funds, a case of bad fiscal management
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 09 Sep 2024

It is easy to abstract the issue surrounding the Philippines’ Department of Finance circular directing all government owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs) including the Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) to remit what it called excess funds back to the Bureau of the Treasur...

Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW) remittances: a continuing mitigant in the Philippine economy
PHILIPPINES · Report · 26 Aug 2024

It should be obvious by now that there is no territory in the world where there is no Filipino worker. Globalization has made the world a smaller place to live and work. This is also true for Filipino workers who go abroad on contract or as migrant workers. Diversified across the globe, OFW remit...

Are Philippine flood problems being addressed with inappropriate solutions?
PHILIPPINES · Report · 21 Aug 2024

An answer seems emerging to the question Filipinos ask every year without fail during typhoon season—how long should we have to wait until the flooding problem is finally solved? In Metropolitan Manila, at least, it would take 23 years. Yes, 23 years! This is no exaggeration considering that this...

BSP: Listening to the sirens' song this week?
PHILIPPINES · Report · 13 Aug 2024

In our view, the BSP was right in its decision to keep its policy rates steady despite the preponderance of downside risks to inflation at its June 2024 policy meeting. If the BSP had eased monetary policy two months ago, its decision would have been awkward in the face of the 4.4% July inflation...

The Philippine Maharlika Investment Fund: More delays?
PHILIPPINES · Report · 05 Aug 2024

A little over a year after Republic Act (RA) No. 11954 or the Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF) Act was signed into law on July 18, 2023, the Philippines has yet to witness the MIF engaged in its first investment activity. The MIF, the country’s first version of a sovereign wealth fund, was contemp...

Anti-Financial Account Scamming Act (AFASA) signed into law
PHILIPPINES · Report · 25 Jul 2024

The Philippines is coming down hard on financial scams. President Marcos Jr signed into law the Anti-Financial Account Scamming Act or AFASA. The law consolidates three Senate resolutions, four Senate bills and a House Bill, and is aimed at deterring and penalizing financial cyber crimes, providi...

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