Strong residential push gives Meralco better sales in 2019

THE Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) registered “better” electricity sales last year versus a year ago, a company official said.

“Energy sales in 2019 was better than last 2018’s 5.3-percent growth,” said Meralco First Vice President and Head of Customer Retail Services and Corporate Communications Victor Emmanuel Genuino in a text message.

The utility firm’s 2019 sales volume, along with its financial performance, will be released late next month.

“It was higher than last year. Residential sales are very strong,” he added, without providing figures.

At end-September last year, Meralco’s sales volume grew by 6.3 percent to 35,005 gigawatt hours while customer count increased by 4.2 percent to 6.82 million. Residential energy sales, which accounted for 31 percent of the total consolidated energy sales volume, grew strongest at 8 percent, followed by commercial energy sales volume growing at 6 percent with 39-percent share of the total sales volume and growth by industrial at 5.1 percent.

Demand within its franchise area peaked at 7,740 megawatts, recorded on June 4, 2019.

Meralco President Ray Espinosa earlier said that in the last five comparative nine-month period is the shift between the second and third quarter in terms of highest sales volume, which reflects variability due to either temperature in the second quarter, frequency and extent of weather disturbances, or manufacturers beginning to ramp up production to stock up in the third quarter in preparation for the holiday sales.

Also, Meralco Chairman Manuel Pangilinan said the company expects sustained growth from the country’s continued overall economic expansion, as well as growth that will follow the government’s ongoing infrastructure development program.

“There is no doubt that there will be significant domestic economic expansion with the expected improvement in government public investments in the coming months, in addition to the inflow from remittance of our overseas Filipino workers,” Pangilinan said, while adding that manageable inflation and increased liquidity in the financial system provides opportunities for growth across all customer segments.

Pangilinan earlier said Meralco is “quite likely” to post “north of P23 billion” in core income for 2019.

“For the first nine months, the actual core was about P18.5 billion, so it is, likely, we will achieve the P23-billion-plus core net income for the full-year 2019,” he said last year.

Image Credits: Roy Domingo