Pala-isip

As the Eurozone crisis continues, many Europeans are now looking for opportunities in emerging economies like the Philippines.

For the first time in over a decade, the Philippine economy is on the upswing and the Filipino people are realizing their potential. The world watches as the Philippines moves forward. A business feature produced by Asia Business Channel and broadcast on Channel News Asia in 2013. Featuring interviews with prominent Filipino figures such as President Benigno Aquino, Jaime Zobel de Ayala, Ramon del Rosario Jr., Rene Almendras and Ramon Jimenez. This program discusses recent developments in the Southeast Asian republic along with the successes and challenges it faces halfway into the Aquino administration. Producer/Director/Writer: Francisco "Kit" Reyes (Shutter Republic) Director of Photography: Stefan Herbruger (Shutter Republic) Post-Production: Underground Logic Narrator: Trevor Jones Shot on location in The Philippines. An Asia Business Channel Production for Channel News Asia/Mediacorp. © 2012

Do you agree with this video or is the current economic boom of the Philippines just due to hot money investing in the stock market?

We have been in a global financial crisis since 2008 and luckily, the Philippines was pretty much spared. Except for exporters to the United States, the Philippine economy in general was largely spared from the crisis unlike Europe and the US. The Philippine economy however is hardly what you would call great. Unlike China and other countries in Asia, the poverty rate is still rising and the only people making real money are the ones who are already rich. The majority of Filipino students wants to go into nursing or call center jobs. The hopes of going abroad has diverted a lot of students from studying to be engineers, architects or pharmacist. But because of the bad US economy, a lot of nurses are unable to go abroad and find work now. If you look at the Philippines economy, it has gone from agriculture, to manufacturing to a service economy. During the Ramos administration, a lot of land was sold because of a real estate bubble and most of these land was converted into subdi...

Today is May 16, 2007 and I'm in the Philippines right now for a vacation. I was looking around about the real estate market and the general economy and here are some of my observations. As you may or may not know, the real estate market is booming. A lot of new developments are coming up and it looks like 1986 again. I was talking to a banker friend of mine and she said that the economy is doing very well because of the E-VAT. The budget is at a surplus, lending by the government is down so the new bond issues are at a lower interest rate. Hence, the increasing bond prices which made the UITF go up in value a lot. Now that it has stabilized, the UITFs are not returning as much anymore. Prime lending rate is at around 8% so it is pretty low since I recall about 3 to 5 years ago that rates are above 12%. Since lending rates is so low, this will help spur lending to buy homes and cars. Interest rates for savings is at around 3% and since the stock market is doing better. More investo...