MPIC unit to hike NLEX stake

MANILA, Philippines - The flagship tollroad arm of infrastructure giant Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC) is looking at further increasing its stake in the operator of the 85-kilometer North Luzon expressway by buying additional shares from its French partner.

Metro Pacific Tollways Corp. president Ramoncito Fernandez said Metro Pacific Tollways Development Corp. (MPTDC) is buying another 4.6-percent interest from its French partner Egis Projects SA in Manila North Tollways Corp. (MNTC) over the next three months.

Fernandez said this would be the second tranche in the series of transactions wherein the first tranche involving the 3.9-percent stake of Egis in MNTC was consummated last January.

“There is a next tranche of 4.6 percent, it will happen in the next three months,” he revealed.

After the second transaction, he pointed out that MPTDC would end up owning a little over 75 percent of MNTC while the stake of the French firm would be reduced to about five percent.

MPTDC, a subsidiary of MPTC, is exercising its right of first refusal on the sale of MNTC shares by Egis.

MPTDC and Egis entered into an agreement last Jan. 10 covering the first tranche covering 692,640 shares representing 3.9-percent outstanding shares of MNTC owned by Egis. The shares were acquired by MPTDC at P2,056.68 per share for a total consideration of P1.42 billion.

With the transaction, the stake of MPTDC in MNTC increased to about 71 percent from a little over 67 percent while the interest of the French partner was reduced to 9.2 percent from 13.1 percent.

After the second transaction, Fernandez said the French firm is still open to further divesting its stake in the operator of NLEX.

“They are still open (to selling more) but that would be another transaction, if ever,” he added pointing out that Egis is a tollroad operator and not a concessionaire.

MPTC operates 64 percent of the existing 300 kilometers of toll roads in the country including the 94-km Subic-Clark-Tarlac expressway (SCTEX), the 85-km NLEX, and the 14-km Manila-Cavite Toll Expressway (Cavitex).

Fernandez earlier said major players intend to double the country’s existing toll road network of 300 kilometers that is way less compared to Malaysia’s 1,500 kilometers, Indonesia’s 700 kilometers, among others.

He said the company expects to take a 50 percent to 60 percent share of the proposed doubling in the country’s toll road network and is now looking at toll road projects in the Visayas and Mindanao.