BIZ BUZZ: SMC gets a GCash assist

For the strong reception to San Miguel Corp.’s (SMC) landmark P30-billion preferred share offering, tycoon Ramon Ang may have, among others, the Zobels to thank.

That’s because the Ayala Group’s fintech arm GCash helped bring SMC’s preferred shares within a few taps of Filipino retail investors through GStocks PH, the in-app stock investment platform offered by AB Capital Securities Inc.

And to say the shares were a hit on the platform would be an understatement.

Demand on GStocks PH exceeded the broker’s initial allocation across all three preferred shares offered by SMC at P75 apiece.

SMC2V, which carries an annual dividend rate of 8.0401 percent, was oversubscribed by 3.1 times. SMC2W and SMC2X (with rates of 8.3570 percent and 8.6483 percent, respectively) were oversubscribed by 1.3 times and 1.7 times.

For GCash, that strong uptake is proof that its platform has made investing more accessible to Filipino retail investors, who traditionally had to contend with the inconvenience of needing a bank account and coordinating separately with a physical broker.

Investing the GCash way also made the process more transparent. Through GStocks PH, users could see the availability of AB Capital’s allotted shares and, while those lasted, secure allocations in real time on a first-come, first-served basis.