PSE to honor good governance firms

MANILA, Philippines - Listed firms that practice good corporate governance will be recognized anew next month.

The Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) said outstanding companies will be honored in the 2013 PSE Bell Award, which highlights listed firms’ transparency and investor protection efforts.

“By formally recognizing listed companies and trading participants through the Bell Awards, we would like to emphasize the need to uphold good governance practices and to show that the PSE is a co-advocate of corporate governance together with the government and the private sector,” said PSE president and CEO Hans B. Sicat.

“Corporate governance is integral to what we do here at the PSE,” Sicat said. The 2013 PSE Bell Awards ceremony is scheduled on Nov. 19 at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel in Makati City.

The Bell Awards is a recognition given to publicly-listed companies and trading participants that comply with high standards of corporate governance.

PSE defines corporate governance as “the framework of rules, systems and processes that governs the performance by the board of directors and management of their respective duties and responsibilities to the stockholders, with due regard to the stakeholders.”

Public firms are evaluated on how well they adopt and incorporate the PSE’s Corporate Governance Guidelines for Listed Companies. PSE also takes note of listed companies’ compliance to Listing and Disclosure rules.

Trading participants, for their part, are assessed based on their performance in regulatory audits and compliance with Market Regulations and Trading Rules.

The first Bell Awards was launched last year in tandem with the 20th Anniversary Celebration of the PSE.

Public companies recognized during the 2012 PSE Bell Awards were from the Ayala and SM conglomerates. Specifically, PSE honored Ayala Group’s Globe Telecoms Inc. Manila Water Company Inc. and Ayala Land Inc., and SM Group’s China Banking Corp. and SM Prime Holdings.

The trading participants that received the award were CLSA Philippines, COL Financial Group and Macquarie Securities Philippines for the large trading participants category.

Armstrong Securities, PCIB Securities and Tri-State Securities were the awardees for the small trading participants category.

The Corporate Governance Watch 2012 report of investment house CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets increased the corporate governance score of the Philippines by four percentage points to 41 percent, allowing it to overtake Indonesia, which landed at the bottom of the list.

The 2010 Corporate Governance Report of ACGA and CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets placed the Philippines last among 11 Asian countries in terms of adherence to corporate governance standards.