Early to bed

The best way to cozy up to Internal Revenue Commissioner Guillermo Parayno Jr. is to learn how to play either tennis or badminton.

Then again, Willy Parayno is currently all over the place, with very little time for sports. You see, he has the Herculean job of trying to convince taxpayers to pay their correct taxes and tax collectors to, well, collect more taxes (specially from professionals and corporations).

* * *

First Generation Holdings Corp. president Federico Lopez is close to losing his voice. You see, Piki Lopez has been conducting briefings on the current energy situation to anybody willing to listen.

Mr. Lopez isn’t even picky about the venue or the kind of audience. The talk is he’s willing to do one-on-one if that is what it takes to get the message – that the country has an energy problem and what can be done – across.

* * *

Robinsons Convenience Stores, Inc. executive vice-president Johnson Go Jr. plans to put up 80 Mini Stop stores this year and another 80 next year in an effort to outpace Philippine Seven Corp.’s 7-Eleven by end-2005.

Mini Stop, a Japanese brand, currently has 100 stores in the country, close to half the 204 outlets of market leader, Philippine Seven Corp., which is now majority owned by Taiwanese investors after the divestment of former Finance Secretary Jose Pardo.

* * *

Bank notes 1: It looked like a meeting of the Bankers Association of the Philippines last Wednesday at the Development Bank of the Philippines head office.

You see, DBP president and chief executive officer Simon Paterno wrote and signed individual letters inviting his counterparts in banks (which are participating financial institutions or loan conduits of DBP’s wholesale funds from multilateral and bilateral financial institutions such as the Japan Bank for International Cooperation) to attend this year’s awarding ceremonies.

* * *

Bank notes 2: HSBC (Phils), chief executive officer Warner Manning is sleeping early tonight because he’s running (a marathon, silly) tomorrow at 5 a.m.

Dubbed "Walk with Warner", Mr. Manning will run from the first HSBC branch opened in the country more than a 100 years ago – this is the Binondo branch – to the bank’s newest branch at Bonifacio Global City.

Aside from being a unique way of opening a branch, the run also allows Mr. Manning to raise money for his favorite charity.

The deal here is friends are betting Mr. Manning will make it to the finish line. If he does (and he has been training for this daily after work at the Manila Polo Club), these friends ante up a pre-agreed amount to charity. If he doesn’t, then Mr. Manning will put up the pre-agreed money to charity.