Clash of the Titans

A little bird who spends too much time near the power grid tells Nosy Tarsee the next big boardroom drama in energy will not feature a hostile takeover. It will be a very polite, very expensive staring contest.

The story begins with a tycoon who just walked away with a controlling 60 percent of a famous family-linked firm’s natural gas crown jewel for a cool P50 billion, involving the gas-fired plants clustered in one coastal Southern Luzon city and the gas infrastructure. The competition regulator gave the deal its blessing.

Enter the second titan — the conglomerate chief who made his name selling nearly everything else, including roads, airports, fuel and electricity. Barely had the ink dried on the first deal when he separately bought a hefty quarter-plus stake in the very parent holding company that sits atop the family empire.

The shares came from one branch of the clan, the one associated with a certain broadcast network that ceased to be a household name on free TV.

Here is where the plot thickens. The gas buyer now sits in the engine room of the family’s power business. The everything-man now sits in the parent’s shareholder register, with a stake big enough to demand a seat at the table, a copy of the minutes, and, we are told, a very detailed financial sheet. Control of the parent, for now, remains with the other family branches, who suddenly find themselves refereeing between the two taipans.

When the newly arrived minority giant, which runs its own power plants, sits in on parent-level discussions about the remaining energy assets, what exactly is it allowed to hear?

When the gas man’s plants need to sell electricity, and everything-man’s plants want to sell electricity too, who is buying and at what price?

A corporate lawyer who has seen this movie before reminded us that “conflict of interest” is a phrase usually whispered about in energy deals after the fact, at roughly the time the first complaint lands on someone’s desk.

Meanwhile, the family members still holding the steering wheel are said to be smiling through gritted teeth, polishing their governance manuals, and reminding everyone that the dividing walls are, of course, very tall and very thick.

Nosy Tarsee hears a gentlemen’s agreement is already being drafted but, regrettably, one side is not in the habit of honoring gentlemen’s agreements.