By John Carlo Tria Readers have asked me why despite the quarterly GDP drop that mirrors the fall in neighboring economies like Malaysia (17% GDP drop) and Thailand (12% GDP drop), the local stock market still performs rather well, and that a number of companies reported first-half earnings. I am sharing with you an
August 29, 2020
By John Carlo Tria A lot of discussion had emerged out of the recent announcement of global finance firm Goldman Sachs that the current economic crisis is four times worse than the 2008 housing crisis, and of the International Monetary Fund’s announcement of a recession worse than the great depression of the 1930s. In truth,
April 17, 2020
By John Carlo Tria Yes, as they have many times before. We have been through SARS, MERS COV, Dengue. Even the Iran conflict retreated from feared armageddon and the fires in Australia stopped burning. All within the month of January. Thus, no matter how disruptive the situation may be, things always taper off or cease.
February 19, 2020
By John Carlo Tria So says the latest Social Weather Station Survey. Taken from their press release, the group said that the “Fourth Quarter 2019 Social Weather Survey, conducted from December 13-16, 2019, found 82% of adult Filipinos satisfied, 8% undecided, and 10% dissatisfied with the performance of Rodrigo R. Duterte as President. Compared to
January 23, 2020
By: John Carlo Tria The facts about agriculture have stared us in the face for far too long. Philippine agriculture grew at an average of only 1.1 percent for the past 10 years. This, despite an overall gross domestic product growth (GDP) of 6.2 percent. What these numbers show is that this vital sector’s growth
December 27, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria Recent news about the yearend growth of the Philippines shows that despite the lowering of growth for Asia, the country remains at 6%, better than our ASEAN peers do and higher than the region. The Asian Development Bank is the latest institution to affirm this growth, a figure that has defied
December 13, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria Ensuring the 6% growth that economists have predicted for us this year is no easy task when you consider that our neighbors are slowing their own projections in the face of the global slowdown in trade. There are three important items going for us to keep our growth up: the consumption
November 27, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria “Trade openness is a policy that we have been late to adopt relative to our neighbors, whose outward orientation and trade openness impelled the strengthening of their farm sectors. Meanwhile, we wasted decades falsely believing that trade protection would strengthen ours.” This was related by the eminent economist Cielito Habito in
October 31, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria THE latest economic numbers show that projected economic growth is expected to hover at the same 6%, making our economic growth story a consistent one since the start if of the current decade- among Asia’s best performers. Not even the global economic slowdown affecting other economies seems to substantially harm our
October 24, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria YOU may not notice it, but our cavendish bananas, which constitute our largest agricultural exports, are set to hit an all-time high this year. This, despite two major factors that would have caused it to slow down: the dreaded fungal Panama disease, and the Trump-China trade war. The September 25, 2019,
October 7, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria “Global champion na po tayo, sa inuman. But that is not something we should be proud of. Maging champion sana tayo sa sports katulad ni Senador Manny Pacquiao o sa darating na South East Asian Games. Pero wag naman sa inuman,” – Senator Pia Cayetano. Fellow UP alumnus Pia Cayetano could not have been more frank. We are a country
September 28, 2019
By: John Carlo Tria THE announcement of Panhua steel’s manufacturing plant and Heibei Steel’s plan to establish an integrated steel mills in Misamis Oriental and Batangas, respectively, have led other Chinese companies in their drive to seek neutral countries where United States 200% tariffs will not affect their competitiveness. They and scores of companies are
September 20, 2019