PDS Group service income up, net income down

The Philippine Dealing System Holdings Corp. (PDS Group) has recorded a service income of P148.3 million for 2005 almost 70 percent better than the P87.4 million the year before.

However, it was not enough to cover expenses and development costs resulting in a net loss of P32 million, albeit lower than the projected loss of P50 million.

The PDS Group is composed of three operating companies, which are the Philippine Dealing & Exchange Corp. (PDEx), the Philippine Depository & Trust Corp. (PDTC), and the Philippine Securities Settlement Corp. (PSSC).

In a statement, the PDS Group said that the loss is attributable mainly to PDEx, which suffered from delays in program implementation. The delays in implementation consequently resulted in foregone revenues which could have prevented losses.

In contrast, the PDTC registered a net income of P26.8 million and PSSC a net income of P7.2 million.

PDEx earned service income of P20.1 million, PDTC recorded P84.1 million, and PSSC, P44.1 million.

Resources reached P496.1 million, while capital stood at P444 million in 2005 slightly lower than the P475.3 million the year before. Group operating expenses and development cost increased significantly to P185.6 million, higher by P99.2 million than the previous year.

"This reflected the capacity building and start-up stage of operations, which required hiring of competent professionals and setting of strict standards for a safe, efficient, and reliable technology infrastructure for the debt market," it said.

The PDS Group reiterated its continuing commitment to the development of the country’s debt and the capital markets as part of the capital market reform program.

PDEx launched the Fixed-Income Interdealer Negotiated Trading System in the first quarter of 2005, and closed the year with the launch of the Fixed-Income Interdealer Order Driven Platform.

PDTC, the only SEC-licensed central securities depository also started custody operations under its trust license granted by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) in 2005. It ended the year with equity holdings in Book Entry System (BES) registering a value of P551.2 billion, higher by 31 percent from previous year level.

The PSSC facilitated the interconnection and interface of the system of the PDS Group with the Bureau of Treasury to enable operation of its groundbreaking Straight-Through Processing or STP.

PSSC has been delivering services for interbank dollar transfers using the Philippine Domestic Dollar Transfer System (PDDTS) since June 1999 and the Payment versus Payment system (PvP) for US Dollar/Philippine Peso transaction between banks since November 2003.