PSE chief slams DENR’s closure, suspension orders vs. mining ops

Philippine Stock Exchange President and CEO Hans Sicat on Friday slammed the Environment Department for making a public announcement of the closure and suspension of several large-scale mining operations while affected firms have not yet received any formal notice on the closure orders.

In a press conference by the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry on Friday in Taguig City, Sicat described the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR)'s announcement as a "surprise, worrisome, and irresponsible" as it has sent jitters and caused confusion in the stock market.

“What we saw last week, we believe that there was a surprise announcement in media of a suspension, closure of mining firms including those companies that are publicly listed. We thought this is actually a worrisome trend, if not, a very irresponsible move from the DENR,” the local bourse chief said.

"The fact the firms didn't have a formal notice if they're being suspended or closed creates a very odd situation because these are the firms that we crossed checked with in order to make sure that what is our action as an exchange...do we suspend trading or business as usual?" he said.

In the same briefing, Chamber of Mines of the Philippines Chairman Artemio Disini said that even now none of their affected members have received any order from the DENR. 

Sicat took note that when the DENR announced the closure and suspension orders last week, global nickel prices have leapfrogged by 7 to 8 percent.

"It’s interesting that an announcement from a particular agency can move global prices. It’s not something we want to project to global investors. We always talk about consistency of policy, consistency of execution,” he said. 

"From a macro-perspective, the reason we say we're concerned is that when surprise announcements like this, which do not sync or align with the overall economic plan of the economy, it makes you wonder whether or not the policy makers have an angle on the game plan... we have a situation wherein a particular individual or groups can hijack a well-thought economic plan," he added.

A day after the DENR announced the results of its months-long, industry-wide audit, public-listed and affected mining firms asked the PSE for a voluntary trading halt of shares. —John Ted Cordero/LBG, GMA News