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Thursday, June 16, 2022 Vol. 17 No. 251
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HOME $2.4B, A 5-MO HIGH IT-BPO group to FIRB: Revisit tax perks halt for RTO noncompliance
B C U. O @caiordinario
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EMITTANCES sent by Filipinos abroad to their families in the Philippines increased to a five-month high in April this year, according to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP). The BSP said cash remittances coursed through banks reached $2.395 billion in April 2022, some 3.9 percent higher than the $2.305 billion posted in the same month in 2021. The Central Bank’s data showed this growth was the highest since November 2021 when cash remittances posted growth of 5.1 percent. “The expansion in cash remittances was due to the growth in receipts from land-based and seabased workers, which increased by 4.7 percent [to $1.863 billion from $1.779 billion] and 1.4 percent [to $533 million from $526 million], respectively,” the BSP said. On a year-to-date basis, BSP data showed that cash remittances grew by 2.7 percent to $10.167 billion from $9.898 billion registered in the comparable period last year. The data showed the growth in cash remittances from the United States (US), Saudi Arabia, Japan, Taiwan, and Singapore contributed largely to the increase in remittances in January-April of 2022. Meanwhile, in terms of country sources, the US registered the highest share of overall remittances at 41.2 percent in the first four months of 2022, followed by Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, Qatar, South Korea, and Taiwan. “The combined remittances from these top 10 countries accounted for 79.2 percent of total cash remittances during the period,” the BSP said. Meanwhile, Personal remittances from Overseas Filipinos (OFs) grew by 3.8 percent year-on-year to reach $2.671 billion in April 2022 from $2.574 billion recorded in the same month last year.
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LONG JOURNEY Buses that will ply the Parañaque-Davao route are seen at the Parañaque Integrated Terminal Exchange in Parañaque City on Wednesday, June 15, 2022. Travel time is estimated at three days and
two nights. NONIE REYES
AYING it threatens the IT and Business Process Management (IT-BPM) industry’s growth, the IT Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP) urged the Fiscal Incentives Review Board (FIRB) to reconsider its decision suspending income tax incentives for every month of a registered business enterprise (RBE)’s non-compliance with the 100-percent return-to-office directive. In a statement on Wednesday, IBPAP, the flagship organization of the IT-BPM industry in the Philippines, stressed that “even at the risk of being meted with penalties imposed by the FIRB on companies who are unable to comply with the RTO, some of these registered business enterprises will choose to allow employees to continue working from home.” IBPAP noted that the decision of IT-BPM RBEs to forego their income tax perks is a “difficult interim measure” to address the needs of their employees and meet the demand of clients who prefer workfrom-home (WFH) or hybrid work arrangements. While there may be investors S “IT-BPO,” A
COVID CLAIMS PAYOUTS HAVE HIT NEARLY P20B B B D. N @BNicolasBM
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OTAL Covid-19 claims paid by the insurance industry, health maintenance organizations (HMOs), and mutual benefit associations (MBAs) have already ballooned to nearly P20 billion since the health crisis started until the first quarter of this year. The Insurance Commission (IC) reported on Wednesday that total Covid-19 claims payouts have reached P19.64 billion, of which P2.93 billion was paid in the first quarter of this year, P12.82 billion in 2021, and P3.89 billion in 2020, based on the regulator’s survey results. Leading the pack among indus-
tries with the biggest amount of claims paid so far are life insurers with P10.84 billion. This is followed by the HMO industry (P7.39 billion), MBAs (P882 million), and the non-life industry (P527 million). Despite the “large payouts” for Covid-19-related claims, Insurance Commissioner Dennis B. Funa said life and non-life insurance sectors as well as the HMOs and the MBAs “remain resilient” amid the pandemic. “We noted in comparison that the P2.93 billion Covid-19-related claims paid by said industries only constituted 2 percent of the P172.5 billion total benefit payments made by these industries in 2021. While it may be argued that Covid-
19-related claims only account for a small portion of benefits paid by our regulated entities, the impact of these benefit payments was undoubtedly felt by our fellow Filipinos especially when they needed these benefits,” Funa said. The Insurance Commission also said that the amount of Covid-19 claims paid from January to March this year was more than double the amount in the same period last year. In the first quarter of this year, the life insurance industry cornered 61 percent of the total Covid claim payouts, or P1.79 billion. Next to the life insurance industry are HMOs with P948 million, S “C,” A
S “O,” A
PESO EXCHANGE RATES
■ US 53.2730 ■ JAPAN 0.3930 ■ UK 63.9329 ■ HK 6.7864 ■ SINGAPORE 38.2159 ■ AUSTRALIA 36.6145 ■ SAUDI ARABIA 14.1993 ■ EU 55.4998 ■ CHINA 7.9011
Source: BSP (June 15, 2022)