[Vantage Point] The ghostly P1.7-trillion market plunge

The Philippines’ alleged P1.7-trillion market meltdown which dominated the conversation in traditional and social media should have already shook down business, and could have spiraled into unimaginable crash. It didn’t because it wasn’t true. 

But in the minds of many, including equities players I held in esteem, the news somehow gained significant credibility. Surprisingly, no one cared to verify the claim, allowing the narrative to flourish with people sharing and discussing it at length as if it were gospel truth. 

It actually started as whispers in coffee shops. My friends deep inside the military establishment early on warned me that it could be part of a destabilization plot intended to take advantage of public anger about the infamous flood control scandal. I, for one, took the assertion for granted because the amount involved was too humongous to be believable. Moreover, the narrative was that the market loss happened in just three weeks!

Unfortunately, the claim received more plausibility when Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Francis Lim virtually confirmed its veracity in a public forum: “The flood control project scandal has shaken public confidence, wiping out an extraordinary P1.7 trillion in market value of our publicly listed companies in just three weeks, despite rising corporate earnings. Investors aren’t fleeing because of weak fundamentals; they’re fleeing because of weak integrity. It’s a stark reminder that corruption is a weapon of mass wealth destruction.”

Malacañang pushed back, branding the claim as fake news. 

In a media statement, Lim clarified that his speech before the Financial Executives Institute of the Philippines (FINEX) on October 7,  “in which I cited a report claiming that recent corruption issues had wiped out about ₱1.7 trillion in market value of publicly listed companies” was sourced from “information, which had been circulating within business circles and cited by some media outlets, [which I believed at the time was] a credible industry report.” He added that he has since discovered the report to be fictitious. “I deeply regret any confusion or concern that my statement may have caused. My sole intent was to underscore the vital importance of integrity in our markets and the devastating impact corruption can have on investor confidence.”

In a Viber message to Vantage Point, Lim said: “I really don’t know where [the claim] originated. As stated in my statement, it had been going around in some business orgs and was also mentioned in some news sources. But whatever it is, I take responsibility.”

The numbers speak

To get to the bottom of the issue, I did some forensic number-crunching. And this is what I found out:

At least for one week in mid-September, the market cap rose ~1.91 % week over week. I gathered some weekly market cap figures:

Jul 7-11, 2025: ₱19.513 Trillion (T)

Aug 25-29, 2025: ₱19.014 T

Sep 15-19, 2025: ₱19.497 T

Using these data as rough proxies:

July → Aug (7-11 → 25-29)

Aug → Sep (25-29 August → 15-19 September)

So, roughly, over those approximate month spans: –2.6 % drop from July to August, then +2.5 % gain from late August into mid-September. (These are estimates based on weekly snapshots, not precise month‐end data.)

I pulled the Philippine Stock Exchange’s (PSE) own Weekly Reports for July-September 2025 and computed the week-on-week (WoW) and month-on-month (MoM) moves in Total Market Capitalization.

Week-on-Week (Total Market Cap, ₱ trillion)

Week 27 (Jun 30–Jul 4): ₱19.540 T → baseline. PSE Documents

Week 28 (Jul 7–11): ₱19.514 T (–0.14% WoW). PSE Documents

Week 29 (Jul 14–18): ₱19.330 T (–0.94% WoW). PSE Documents

Week 30 (Jul 21–25): ₱19.449 T (+0.62% WoW). PSE Documents

Week 35 (Aug 25–29): ₱19.014 T (–2.24% WoW vs. Week 30). PSE Documents

Week 36 (Sep 1–5): ₱19.037 T (+0.12% WoW). PSE Documents

Week 37 (Sep 8–12): ₱19.193 T (+0.82% WoW). PSE Documents

Week 38 (Sep 15–19): ₱19.497 T (+1.58% WoW). PSE Documents

Week 40 (Sep 29–Oct 3): ₱19.220 T (+0.03% WoW from Week 39; serves as end-Sept proxy). PSE Documents

Month-on-Month (using last full week of each month)

End-July → End-August: ₱19.449 T → ₱19.014 T = –2.24% MoM. PSE Documents+1

End-August → End-September (using Sep 29–Oct 3 week as end-Sept proxy): ₱19.014 T → ₱19.220 T = +1.09% MoM. PSE Documents+1

What the computations show

The largest weekly drop in the period was –2.24% (Week 30 → Week 35). PSE Documents+1

After the late-August low, September showed a recovery (+0.12%, +0.82%, +1.58% WoW in Weeks 36–38). PSE Documents+2PSE Documents+2

On a monthly basis, July→August was down ~2.24%, then August→September up ~1.09%. PSE Documents+2PSE Documents+2

The forensic data from the PSE Weekly Reports itself effectively debunks the narrative that the market “lost ₱1.7 trillion in three weeks.”

Let’s summarize the evidence clearly.

What the official numbers show

From the PSE’s own published weekly total market capitalization, the changes are:

Period (2025)Market Cap (₱ Trillion)Change (₱ B)% ChangeJul 7–1119.513 T——Aug 25–2919.014 T–499 B–2.56 %Aug 25–2919.014 T–499 B–2.56 %Sep 29–Oct 319.220 T–277 B–1.42 %Aug 11–29 (3 weeks)19.200 T → 19.014 T–186 B–0.97 %

From the table, we can see that:

Largest three-week drop: ≈ ₱186 billion (not ₱1.7 trillion).

Largest intra-quarter drawdown (Jul→Aug low): ≈ ₱499 billion ≈ –2.6 %.

Recovery in September: +2.5 % or ≈ ₱480 billion regained.

Why ₱1.7 trillion doesn’t add up

Total market cap during the period hovered around ₱19 trillion.

A ₱1.7 trillion loss would be equivalent to –8.9 %, which would imply a full-blown market crash.

Yet the PSE Index fell only ~1.5 % between August 11 and 29 — consistent with a ₱180 billion to ₱200 billion paper loss, not a ₱1.7 trillion collapse.

Trading volumes and broker reports during those weeks show no mass liquidation; volatility stayed within the normal 1–2 % daily band.

Cross-validation

The real decline

The ₱1.7 trillion “wiped-out value” claim cannot be substantiated by any verifiable PSE data.

The real decline was ₱180 billion to ₱500 billion, depending on the window examined — roughly 1% to 3 % of total capitalization.

So there. The forensic evidence from the exchange itself disproves the ₱1.7 trillion loss narrative. I’m starting to be convinced that this could be what my friends in the military were describing as an attempt at economic destabilization.

How did we come to this?

There’s a ghost haunting the Philippines — not of the dead, but of deceit. It drifts through newsfeeds, lurks in headlines, and seeps into coffee-shop talk. The ₱1.7-trillion plunge in three weeks was a phantom loss — spectacular, terrifying, and utterly unreal.

No such collapse happened. The numbers were twisted shadows of truth, distorted by echo chambers hungry for drama. Yet the ghost of that story walked through trading floors, spooking investors and citizens alike. It fed on our greatest weakness: our disbelief in those who govern us. Because when the living institutions no longer inspire trust, the ghosts of falsehood rise to fill the void.

That is the real tragedy. The same spirit of suspicion haunts the ongoing flood control scandal — an investigation that promised cleansing, but which is turning out to be a séance of self-interest. Every revelation feels pre-scripted, every “witness” seems conjured, and every pronouncement reeks of political necromancy. Instead of exorcising corruption, our leaders are raising old ghosts for partisan gain.

We used to believe in evidence, in process, in due diligence. Now we believe in what sounds dramatic. The ₱1.7-trillion ghost story spread faster than any official correction because truth has become the weaker spirit. The bureaucracy speaks in technicalities, the politicians speak in riddles, and the people — tired of decoding lies — cling to whatever version of reality feeds their outrage.

This is the new governance curse: when credibility dies, myths inherit the throne.

The flood control probe should have been a beacon of reform; instead, it is a fog machine. Each hearing spawns new specters of accusation, while genuine accountability remains invisible. And like the stock-market scare, this pattern reveals a deeper malaise — not just corruption, but the erosion of public faith.

Governance without trust is a haunted house. Every press release, every Senate statement, every “exclusive” leak creaks with suspicion. Even facts, when uttered by officials, sound like apparitions rehearsed to deceive.

We must learn to exorcise these ghosts — not by burning effigies or silencing critics, but by reviving transparency and integrity in governance. Truth must once again stand solid, not give rise to the spectral.

Until then, we remain a nation haunted — by phantoms of corruption, by specters of falsehood, and by the chilling realization that the most dangerous ghosts are the ones we keep believing in.

There is still time to break the spell, but it requires courage from both leaders and people. The government must dare to confront its own ghosts — the culture of impunity, the comfort of secrecy, the tolerance for mediocrity. The people must dare to confront their ghosts — the addiction to outrage, the laziness of blind belief, the refusal to verify before sharing.

Truth is not dead. It is merely buried beneath layers of clamor, neglect, and apathy. To resurrect the truth, we must become a nation of exorcists — each of us must be committed to dispelling lies, not spreading them.

Until then, we remain a haunted republic: our markets shaken by illusions, our politics ruled by phantoms, and our collective soul chained to skepticism.

The ghost that shook the market is not just an economic apparition — it is the spirit of our own surrender. And unless we learn to face it, it will keep returning, whispering the same warning: A nation that no longer believes in truth is already halfway to its grave. – Rappler.com