Suntrust Home Developers Inc, a firm involved in the creation of the Westside City scheme (pictured) including a casino hotel, in the Philippine capital Manila, has formally been renamed as Suntrust Resort Holdings Inc, and has appointed former banker Sutha Kandiah as its new chief financial officer (CFO).
Tuesday’s annual meeting of shareholders also gave the board the green light to more than double the company’s capital stock, to 50 billion shares, “to provide additional funds for the construction of the main hotel casino” at the Westside City complex.
As of August, the casino at Westside City was scheduled to start operating in the year 2023.
The firm told the Philippine Stock Exchange on Tuesday, that Mr Kandiah’s appointment was still dependent “upon the issuance of the requisite work permit by the relevant government agencies”, including the Bureau of Immigration and the Department of Labor and Employment.
According to a document also sent to the stock exchange, Mr Kandiah “structured and executed over 250 transactions” in industries including hospitality and gaming, during more than 25 years as a finance executive in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Japan.
The document says he is currently an advisor to the board of directors at Digipay, a digital payments and financial services application brand based in the Philippines.
Each of the new Suntrust shares will have a par value of PHP1.00 (US$0.02). The current authorised capital stock of the firm is PHP23 billion.
At the close of business on Tuesday, the firm’s publicly-traded shares were valued at PHP1.53 apiece, according to Reuters data.
In June last year, the group said it had changed its primary purpose from real estate development to “tourism-related businesses”, and would seek a name change to reflect that.
Suntrust is controlled by Hong Kong-listed Suncity Group Holdings Ltd, which is led by Macau junket entrepreneur Alvin Chau Cheok Wa.
In late August, Suncity Group Holdings reported a CNY209.0-million (US$32.3-million) first-half profit attributable to shareholders, supported by money raised from disposal of a mainland China property company.
