Ayala Land buys three hectares of ABS-CBN property in Quezon City

ABS-CBN Corp. is selling about 70 percent of its 4.4-hectare prime property in Quezon City to real estate developer Ayala Land Inc. (ALI) for P6.24 billion to raise funds to pay off loans.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, ABS-CBN said it signed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) with ALI to sell a portion of its property that houses its headquarters and most of its remaining operations.

The sale covers 30,000 square meters (sqm) out of the total 44,027.3 sqm of the property, which houses several buildings, including production facilities. Once the bulk of the property is sold to ALI, ABS-CBN will consolidate its operations in the remaining 1.4 ha.

The sale will be on an installment basis based on the mutually agreed valuation by the parties following arms-length negotiations and proper due diligence review.

The downpayment shall be placed in an escrow account to be released to ABS-CBN upon completion of certain conditions precedent and signing of the deed of absolute sale. The balance shall be payable in installments over 10 years.

Proceeds of the sale of the property will be used to pre-pay ABS-CBN’s outstanding bank loans partially. The sale is subject to certain conditions precedent, including Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) clearance.

Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation Chief Economist Michael L. Ricafort said "property prices are still relatively high and favorable for the sellers to monetize, especially to pay some loans that incur interest expenses. So, (ABS-CBN is) getting the best of both worlds financially to realize or lock in gains in the property."

ABS-CBN reported a consolidated net loss of %u20B12.6 billion for the first nine months of 2024, an improvement of 22 percent versus the loss of %u20B13.3 billion in the same period in 2023.

For its content production and distribution business, the firm said there was a 27 percent improvement from a net loss of %u20B12.96 billion in the first nine months of 2023 to %u20B12.17 billion in 2024.

For cable TV and broadband, net loss was %u20B1418 million, higher by 13 percent compared to 2023.

Consolidated revenues for the first nine months of 2024 declined 10 percent to %u20B112.1 billion from the previous year’s %u20B113.5 billion, primarily due to the decline in cable TV and broadband revenues.

Revenues from content production and distribution were almost flat at %u20B18 billion, while revenues from cable TV and broadband were 24 percent lower at %u20B14.1 billion, mainly due to the decline in subscribers.