BIZ BUZZ: Time to stock up on ALI shares?
A lot of companies have been buying back their own shares lately with the belief that the market is undervaluing their stocks and the confidence that they’re all set for future growth.
Real estate giant Ayala Land Inc. (ALI) is one of them, with its P26-billion share buyback program still ongoing.
As of Monday, the company has bought back P20.17 billion worth of its shares from the open market since its buyback program was launched in 2020.
But this doesn’t seem to be pushing ALI’s share price higher.
Year-to-date, the Zobel family-led firm’s share price has, in fact, plunged by 34.3 percent to P22.70 each. Its free float level stood at 47.27 percent as of Monday afternoon.
This gives us the hint that ALI may need to do more than just buy back its shares and hope for a miracle.
Earlier this month, it unveiled one of its long-planned endeavors that should encourage the public to stock up on ALI shares: A $500-million five-year spending plan for its rebranded hospitality unit.
“Part of why this took too long to talk about is because we wanted our plans to be really big,” ALI leasing and hospitality head Mariana Zobel de Ayala said in a recent press briefing, noting that their shares were, indeed, undervalued.
And would the brand new Ayala Land Hospitality eventually pull up ALI’s share price? “I would hope so,” Zobel said.
That’s what we hope, too. After all, that $500-million spending plan has to bear fruit somehow.
