BIZ BUZZ: With ‘The Boy’ gone, Smart Money 2.0 goes pfft

With the departure of telecom veteran Anastacio “Boy” Martirez as chief operating officer of Smart Communications effective Oct. 21, there’s one platform that may no longer see the light of day.

We’re talking about the much-anticipated revival of e-wallet Smart Money, Martirez’s comeback pet project.

Since making Smart Money available for downloading via App Store and Google Play in December 2024 (a big launch had been originally planned then), the e-wallet has yet to go live to date. Everyone who downloaded the app are still on the “waitlist.”

With Martirez now out of the picture after only a year back in the saddle, Smart Money 2.0 has been orphaned.

This means that in the PLDT universe led by tycoon Manuel Pangilinan—who has said there could only be one of such fintech backed by the group—Maya wins by default.

Pangilinan previously said that while Smart Money and Maya could coexist, only one of them would remain standing.

Maya’s parent firm Voyager Innovations remains PLDT’s fintech arm, albeit the telco giant’s stake in the latter has been diluted to a minority position.

And as earlier pointed out here, Maya’s business has evolved beyond the e-wallet model. It has become a bigger player in merchant acquisition than consumer-to-consumer payments. With a digital bank license, it has deposit-taking ability (ergo, access to low-cost funding). It has also become a credit card issuer, thus gaining access to a high-margin lending business.

Earlier, Pangilinan himself hailed Maya’s turnaround, estimating that profit may hit P1 billion this year.

If and when private equity KKR decides to exit Maya (wire reports suggest it’s considering to do so), Pangilinan’s group has a chance to vie for an additional stake in the fintech unicorn. —Doris Dumlao-Abadilla