NHMFC delays sale of P14-B bad housing loans till after elections

The National Home Mortgage Fund Corp. (NHMFC) has delayed the sale of its P14-billion worth of bad housing loans until after the May elections.

The NHMFC said yesterday that the public auction would be held on May 18 instead of the end of April because the prospective bidders had asked for more time to evaluate the changes in the terms of reference.

According to NHMFC president Angelico Salud, the bidders requested for the extension following the agency’s decision to revise its proposed ownership structure of the asset management company (AMC) that would take over the portfolio.

The ownership structure of the AMC was the main point of conflict that led to the failure of the NHMFC’s first attempt to unload the portfolio last February.

According to Salud, the NHMFC has agreed to increase it’s interest in the AMC from 25 percent to 49 percent in order to justify the amount of control that it wanted to retain in the management of the bad loans portfolio.

Originally, the NHMFC wanted a 25-percent share while retaining significant management control over the AMC. To make the term more acceptable, however, Salud said the NHMFC instead agreed on a 49-51 ownership structure.

The May 18 auction, according to Salud, would be open to all interested parties that have been pre-qualified to bid for the NHMFC portfolio.

The NHMFC had earlier pre-qualified four groups: Goldman Sachs, Lone Star, Lehman Brothers and Deutsche Bank. At the first auction, however, only two bids were submitted to the bidding committee.