First Philippine Holdings income drops 40% in 2017

MANILA, Philippines — Lopez-led First Philippine Holdings Corp. (FPH) reported a 40 percent drop in net earnings last year mainly due to non-recurring losses of its energy subsidiary First Gen Corp.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, FPH said net income attributable to the parent fell from P9.9 billion in 2016 to P5.9 billion in 2017 on account of its “share in one-off losses related to First Gen group’s debt prepayments.”

FPH booked non-recurring gains last year mainly arising from San Gabriel’s liquidated damages and First Philec Group’s arbitration settlement.

Without the non-recurring items, core net income rose 15 percent from P5.9 billion to P6.8 billion.

“The growth was driven by the stronger recurring earnings from the energy, real estate, and manufacturing sectors,” FPH said.

Total revenues rose 14 percent from P91.9 billion in 2016 to P104.9 billion last year, which was primarily driven by the higher revenues from sale of electricity following the full year contributions of the Avion and San Gabriel gas plants, and from the real estate business on account of higher completion and sales booking of Rockwell’s projects.

First Gen’s revenue from the sale of electricity increased by nine percent, of which 61 percent came from its natural gas portfolio, namely the 1,000-megawatt (MW) Santa Rita, the 500-MW San Lorenzo,97-MW Avion peaking and 414-MW San Gabriel mid-merit gas power plants.

Earlier this year, FPH chairman and CEO Federico Lopez affirmed the group’s commitment to continue building clean energy power projects to provide more flexibility and faster capacity ramp-up to the power grid as well as to displace coal-fired power plants.

Apart from the four natural gas-fired power plants under First Gen, its clean energy platform includes renewable energy projects.

First Gen’s subsidiary, First Gen Hydro Power Corp. (FG Hydro), also owns and operates the 132-MW Pantabangan-Masiway hydroelectric power plant complex (PMHEP) in Nueva Ecija.

Another subsidiary, Energy Development Corp. owns and operates several geothermal power plants as well as a wind and solar power plant.

It has 12 integrated geothermal power stations across Leyte, Bicol, Negros Island and North Cotabato, while its wind and solar farms are located in Burgos, Ilocos Norte.