Former banker Aurelio Montinola III, has resigned his post as independent director at Roxas and Co. (RCI).
In a disclosure, Montinola tendered his resignation Monday, 6 May this year effective immediately. He was independent director at RCI since 2017.
In a regulatory filing, RCI said the acquisition of Montinola’s wife, Gizela Gonzalez-Montinola, of the company’s treasury shares, “consequently disqualifies him from serving the company as an independent director”.
Stonebridge Corp., a company chaired by Gizela, bought 250 million RCI shares equal more or less 9 percent of the holding company of the Roxas Group for P500 million.
Stonebridge told the regulator, the Philippine Stock Exchange, the shares were bought for P2 each.
Montinola’s purchase represent a 47 percent discount to the closing price of the shares at P3.75 on 6 May. Based on this, the discounted share sale allowed Montinola to generate net gains of P437.5 million.
This also made the Montinola family the third largest group of shareholders at RCI following the founding Roxas-Elizalde families and solar entrepreneur Leandro Antonio L. Leviste.
“The acquisition of the securities of RCI will allow Stonebridge to increase its presence in the real estate sector,” the company said in a regulatory filing.
RCI has sold a total 767.5 million treasury shares to date as part of the company’s fundraising program, including the 7 March sale of 75 million shares at P0.69 per share, the 20 February sale of 75 million shares at P0.65 per share and the 17 January sale of 66.9 million shares at P0.44 per share.
Based on latest financial statements, RCI has P1.5 billion current liabilities in excess of current assets, with the largest portion of unpaid loans due the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) where Aurelio Montinola is an independent director.
