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By Katrina Mennen A. Valdez, Reporter
STATE-RUN National Development Co. (NDC) is set
to enter into a joint venture with a local publicly-listed company
for possible investments abroad.
“NDC wants to take advantage of some of the
good investment prospects abroad in order for the agency to have
good returns,” Trade Secretary Peter B. Favila, who chairs the
state-owned firm, told reporters.
Favila declined to name the private partner
since it is publicly-listed, but assured that NDC is close to
finalizing the deal.
“This investment is seriously big,” he said,
adding negotiations are 80 percent through.
“The NDC will be a supporting partner.
Definitely, the local con-glomerate will take on the biggest
stake,” he added.
“This is not the first time that the NDC
entered into a joint venture. It already had one in Malaysia. With
this forthcoming partnership, NDC will take the role of Temasek
Holdings of Singapore,” Favila said, referring to the Singaporean
state-owned company that has embarked on a number of big ticket
invest-ments abroad.
Temasek Holdings manages a diversified global
portfolio of $129 billion, principally in Singapore, Asia and in
member economies of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and
Deve-lopment, which groups the world’s biggest industrialized
countries such as the US.
The Singaporean company has been the model for
similar ventures by state-run firms in China and other emerging
economies. The rush for state-owned companies to invest abroad comes
at a time when emerging economies especially in Asia have
accumulated huge dollar reserves owing to rapid export-led growth.
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