Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) will hold a special shareholders’ meeting on 22 March to seek approval for the creation of new preferred shares.
The move, which would address accusations of violations of foreign investment rules by…
Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) will hold a special shareholders’ meeting on 22 March to seek approval for the creation of new preferred shares.
The move, which would address accusations of violations of foreign investment rules by diluting the shareholding of non-Philippine nationals, was announced in a stock exchange statement.
PLDT will ask existing shareholders to approve the creation of 150 million voting preferred shares with a par value of PhP1.00 (US$0.023) and 807.5 million shares of non-voting serial preferred stock with a par value of Php10.00 (US$0.23) each.
Foreign investment in Philippine telcos is limited to 40% by law, and the company has been accused in the past of violating this ownership restriction.
In July last year, the PLDT board of directors decided to issue preferred shares with full voting rights to Philippine nationals in order to ease the concerns. PLDT is now seeking approval by shareholders for last year’s board decision.
“When the voting preferred shares are issued, the resulting capital structure of PLDT will be aligned with, and identical to, the current capital structure of many listed Philippine companies engaged in businesses such as the operation of public utilities, mining and land development,” the company said in a statement in early July 2011.
