MANILA – Seven out of 10 Filipinos own a house or other sort of real estate, but most do not have the financial security of holding bank savings, making them more vulnerable to the ‘rainy days’ or lean season. This was found in a survey conducted by the Banko Sentral Pilipinas, where Consumer Finance Survey said the most common assets of an average Filipinos are own residence, home appliance and retirement insurance, with 68.8 percent owning their house and lot, while 30.8 percent own only their house.

Thirteen percent pay house rent while 18 percent do not own nor rent a house, a minority or 0.2 percent declined to answer. Housing is largely paid through cash payment or inheritance, or gift, while 6.7 percent borrowed money for their housing, mostly through government housing institutions.

BDO Leasing positive
on 2012 performance

MANILA – BDO Leasing, a subsidiary of Banco de Oro Unibank, eyes a good performance this year given the positive developments in the country boosted by the strong economic fundamentals.

In a disclosure with the Philippine Stock Exchange yesterday, BDO Leasing and Finance Corporation president Georgiana Gamboa, said the company is optimistic on their growth this year given the strong demand for capital expenditure from the transportation, construction, mining, energy, logistics and healthcare industries.

She explained that recent positive developments on the economy “would mean leasing opportunities through its extensive portfolio of equipment or machineries.”

2GO Travel sees
2.8M passengers

MANILA – 2GO Travel, the country’s biggest shipping line, is aggressively exploring new routes especially tourist destination, as it targets to carry 2.8 million passengers this 2012.

Stephen Rey Tagud, 2GO Travel Chief Commercial Officer for Passage, said the company expects to carry 2.8 million passengers this year, helped by aggressive tourism promotions.

2GO Travel, the consolidated passenger ships and fast ferries of Negros Navigation, SuperFerry, SuperCat and Cebu Ferries has the biggest fleet that operate in routes linking Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao. The ships carry over two million passengers every year.