Healthy growth numbers for property developers amid foreign investor anxiety over extra-judicial killings
Duterte remains a controversial figure
Domestic real estate businesses in the Philippines have recorded healthy growth trajectories for the first half of the year.
Foreign investors, on the other hand, appear to be treading lightly in the country amid the spate of killings allegedly being carried out by law enforcers and vigilantes under President Rodrigo Duterte’s polarising “war on drugs.”
In a forum on Thursday, the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines revealed a sense of “hesitation” among potential investors in the country, which lured USD5.724 billion in foreign direct investments last year.
“This is basically what we see and what we feel when we talk to international business trying to set up in the Philippines,” chamber president Guenter Taus told the Nikkei Asian Review. “Everybody waits and sees what the human rights commission comes up with.”
Duterte has been engaged in recent days in a verbal imbroglio with Senator Leila de Lima, the former commissioner on human rights, over drug trade in Philippine prisons.
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In an assessment of Duterte’s first 50 days as president, Taus expressed more optimism, telling the Philippine Star that his administration shows a propensity for “creating change.”
Showing a rosy outlook at the final months of the year, property developer Ayala Land is looking to infuse PHP40 billion (USD858 million) into the residential market, matching its outlay for the first half of the year. Real estate and banking drove H1 net profits of the Ayala conglomerate to a 32.4 percent growth, the Nikkei Asian Review reported.
Rival conglomerate SM Investments also finished the first half strong with an 11.12 percent rise in net income, driven by its property, retail, and banking arms.
Duterte, the “most powerful Philippine president in recent memory,” has been accused of 1,800 casualties in an extra-judicial crusade against drug trafficking that has drawn rebuke from the United Nations and other international organisations.
The following video sees Duterte questioned on the topic of the killings:
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Source : property-report.com
Read more…Real estate projects forge ahead in the Philippines despite killings
