The Mikey Arroyo's Magic

forwarded lang po ng kaibigan ko, ibinabahagi ko lamang po sa grupo (",) take a virtual tour na rin po sa bahay niyang binili sa 1655 Beach Park Blvd, Foster City, CA, USA

Psssssssst again Mikey, do share how your assets grew from P50,000 to P156 million in just 16 years -

Do tell, so fellow Filipinos can copy your technique. After all, you st art ed with a modest investment base of only P50,000 which you declared as the total sum of your worldly goods back in 1993.

And also because I do so love your home in sunny California . As Ellen Tordesillas, Avigail Olarte , Yvonne Chua and Luz Rimban wrote in Vera Files, I could take a virtual tour of your home at 1655 Beach Park Boulevard , Foster City , California , which you labeled an “investment” in your 2008 Statement of Assets, Liabilities and Net Worth (SALN) but did not declare as conjugal property.

Hmmmm, what's the diff?

Take the virtual tour of Mikey's lovely Beach Park home I'm sad it's now on sale once more.

I took the virtual tour and the accompanying music almost lulled me to gentle sleep. You, too, can take the tour by going to: http://www.ewalk.com/tour.cgi?id=1655

Take a peek at Mikey's lovely bathroom, master bedroom, kitchen, living room. Take the virtual tour by clicking on the words “360 Scenes”, and then the words “Front View”, “Backyard”, “Living Room”, “Family Room and Kitchen” and “Master Bedroom” - and be transported to his world.

What a peaceful, restful home. So far from Manila 's maddening media demanding to know how you could afford a million dollar home on a half a million peso yearly income as congressman.

And mainly because back in 1993, your declared assets were only worth P50,000 or the equivalent of US$1,024.59 (at current forex rate of P48.80 per US$1). Even that was a handsome sum for a young buck of 24 just out of college.

But hey, your mom had just won her first ever elective post as senator of the Philippine Republic in 1992. Rather than earn oodles of money growing your own company, you opted to serve the people by joining your mom's Senate staff. You were therefore required by law to submit your first ever SALN. I'm sure you took the filing seriously. Hence in 1993 you declared you had P50,000 pesos which you listed under the item - “cash on hand/cash in bank”.

Life was beautiful. You had no liabilities (utang).

Now let's jump to last year when your total assets (based on your December 2008 SALN) was listed at a whopping P150,253,644.95 (or US$3,078,968.13).

You're a dollar millionaire now. Wow. Gosh. How'd you do that?

Let's see now -

1993 – you worked with mom –P50,000 assets. Net worth same due to zero liabilities.

1994 – still worked with mom –P320,000 assets (of which P120,000 was cash and P200,000 personal effects). Net worth also P320,000 because of zero liabilities.

Then your assets paper trail disappeared. You must have taken some time off. From 1996 to 1997, you studied Business Administration at the University of California in Berkeley , you once told me in a 2005 one-on-one interview.

The next time your SALN surfaced was in 2001 when you got elected provincial vice-governor of Pampanga.

You also tried breaking into the movie business, appearing in mostly bit or supporting roles and a few leading roles. By2001, yourP320,000 assets had grown toP5,721,787.29, broken down as follows:

P3,327,686.12 in cash
P2,144,101.17 in shares of stock
P250,000 worth of personal effects
With zero liabilities, your net worth was the same as your assets.

It took you only four years (excluding time off for Berkeley ) for you to earn P5 million. Cool.

Now let's do a quick rundown of your total assets' amazing growth, all based on your available SALN:

1993 - P50,000 – zero liabilities
1994 – P320,000 – zero liabilities
2001 - P5,721,787.29 - zero liabilities
2002 - P5.003 million – zero liabilities
2004 - P76,531,403.96 – zero liabilities
2005 - P138,751,403.96 - P61.8 million liabilities
2006 - P167,971,403.96 – P78.4 million liabilities
2007 - P154,972,409.95 – P58,224,476.29 liabilities
2008 - P156,122,409.90 – P56,874,476.20 liabilities

The biggest jump in your assets (by roughly P71 million) was between 2002 and 2004 when you were a newly-elected congressman.

Could it have been due to your budding movie career? But it wasn't that great, according to well-known entertainment columnist Ricky Lo who interviewed you in July 2003. He wrote afterwards: “As an actor, he’s tagged as a "TH" (as in Trying Hard) and critics of GMA (your mom) and her administration had a field day poking fun at Mikey and his mom (poor GMA!) when his starrer called Di Kita Ma-Reach finished at the tail end of the Metro Manila Film Festival three years ago.”

In 2002, you married your second cousin, Maria Angela. Perhaps she brought in the fortune?

Last year you listed her as board director in five companies owned and run by her family years before you two got married. These are:

H.M. Montenegro Co. Inc
Pacific Activated Carbon Co. Inc
Pacific Activated Carbon Co. Intl.
Titan Megatiles Industrial Corp
Titan Mega Bags Industrial Corp. .
Mustang Security Agency

A quick check with the Securities and Exchange Commission shows most of these companies are in bad shape.

H.M. Montenegro Co. Inc, also listed as H.M. Montenegro and Asso. Inc., is the holding company for eight family-owned firms.

Two of the companies earned modest amounts: Titan Mega Bags Industrial Corporation' s last financial statement was for the year 2000: listing P576 million in assets. But its net operating income before tax that year was a negative P5.55 million. “Other income” raised this to P24.3 million.

The last financial statement filed byTitan Megatiles Industrial Corp was for 2002 when it declared operational losses of P7.988 million. But earnings outside operations gave it a P6.48 million net income.

Pacific Activated Carbon Co., Inc earned a net income of P30.6 million in 2002. Again between2004 and 2005, your assets grew by some P62 million or from P76.5 million to P138.75 million.

In 2005, according to Vera Files, you sold a condominium in California for US$900,000 – something that wasn't disclosed in your 2004 SALN.

The following year, California land records showed you transferring THE lovely Beach Park property in your wife's name. Lucky wife.

And so your conjugal assets kept growing Let's assume this jump in assets was due to borrowings and not to kickbacks from the illegal gambling game jueteng - which you were accused of in 2005. Which you told me was a lie.

You said then: “When you are the incumbent president's son, many sectors want to see you fail rather than succeed. Oppositors to my mom, if they can't hit her they hit me.”

This week you attributed malice, ignorance and recklessness to Ellen, Yvonne, Avigail and Luz of Vera Files. You said they never called you but they said you refused to answer their mobile text messages and calls.

I've covered beats with Ellen and Yvonne and I know how they can be very persistent in nailing stories. In fact your mom, President Arroyo, held the same opinion back in October 2005 when she was being asked if she would pursue criminal charges against then President Joseph Estrada if he resigned.

She replied: “Right now I'm already hearing many suggestions about that. Neal Cruz has his suggestions. Ellen Tordesillas keeps asking me about that with very suggestive questions... .So I'm listening to the consensus that's being formulated.”

Last year you declared debts worth P56,874,476. 20. Let's just do some mental exercise. If we assume you had topay 8% yearly interest on that, you would have to shell out P4.55 million in interest payments alone for that year. No problem. You had P51.6 million in cash.

Never mind if as a legislator you only earn P420,000 a year. Do tell how you managed to generate all that cash that has enabled you to afford your debt, build a mansion in La Vista, Quezon City, buy a million dollar property in California and still maintain a wealthy lifestyle.

I even heard one of your government-paid bodyguards has the job of making sure your Phillipe Patek watch isn't snatched from your wrist. I haven't verified that. Perhaps you could.

Is it like this one below? But here's the thing, your parents declared in 2008 assets worth P171.843 million pesos after nearly a lifetime of working.

How did you manage to nearly equal their worth in just 15 years without ever being a corporate CEO? Yeah, you are the president of Mikey's Horseman Bar and Grill Inc st art ing 2006. That must be a lot of barbecue you grilled.

You've beaten all the odds. And so I wanna know. Please, please, I wanna know.