Conchita L. Manabat
Conchita L. Manabat Independent Director, Philippine Dealing System
Personal Background
Conchita L. Manabat is an independent director of the companies belonging to the Philippine Dealing System (PDS) including Philippine Dealing Systems Holdings Corp. (PDSHC), Philippine Dealing and Exchange Corp. (PDEx), Philippine Depository and Trust Corp. (PDTC), Philippine Securities Settlement Corp. (PSSC), and PCD Nominee Corporation (PCNC). As independent director, she chairs the Audit Committees of the Boards of the group and is a member of the Boards’ Executive Committees. She is also a member of the Boards’ Committees on Risk Oversight, IT Steering Committee on Nomination and Remuneration.
Dr. Manabat is a Founding Trustee and President of the Development Center for Finance, which is based at the Virata School of Business of the University of the Philippines (UP VSB), a trustee of Children’s Hour Foundation, Inc. and the Institute for Women Studies, a member of the Finance Council of the Diocese of San Pablo, Laguna, and Chair of the Advisory Council of the International Association of Finance Executives Institute (IAFEI) where she was elected in 2005 and 2006 as the first, and so far the only, woman chair of IAFEI. She is a returning member of the Board of Trustees of University of San Carlos where she previously served from 2002 to 2011 and was its first woman chair in her final year of service. She was a member of the Board of Trustees of Holy Name University of Tagbilaran, Bohol from 2011–14.
A Certified Public Accountant (CPA), holder of M.B.A. and Ph.D. degrees, and participant in executive programs, Dr. Conchita L. Manabat studied at the University of the Philippines, the Ateneo de Manila University, the Southeast Asia Interdisciplinary Development Institute, the Harvard Business School, and Pennsylvania State University. She is a Fellow of the Institute of Corporate Directors.
Dr. Manabat started her career in accountancy in the consulting practice of a major Philippine accounting firm. She was once the Chief Finance Officer of a major conglomerate with diverse business interests, the flagship company of which was listed in the Philippine Stock Exchange.
Her past foray into the academe includes founding Dean of the School of Accountancy at St. Scholastica’s College, Manila, where she was a part-time administrator and faculty member for 25 years, part-time professor at the De La Salle Graduate School of Business and Economics, and the Ateneo Graduate School of Business.
She was once the chief regulator of the accountancy profession as Chair of the Board of Accountancy of the Professional Regulation Commission (member in 1992–95 and Chair in 1995–97). Until March 2016, she was a member of the Consultative Advisory Group (CAG) of the International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (IAASB) and the CAG of the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants (IESBA) of the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC). She served as President of the Financial Executives Institute of the Philippines (FINEX) in 2002 and Chair of the FINEX Research and Development Foundation in 2003.
In 1997, she founded the accounting firm bearing her name, C.L. Manabat & Co. that got the representation of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, a “Big Four” international accounting organization, which at the time of her retirement in 2007 had become one of the top five accounting firms in the country.
An active advocate of capital market development, she served as the Chair of the Capital Market Development Council for four years, with the Secretary of Finance and the Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission as co-chairs. For two years (2007–2009), she assumed the leadership at the Market Integrity Board of the Philippine Stock Exchange as its first woman chair.
Dr. Manabat in 2005 co-authored with Dr. Lina Valcarcel a segment of the “Asian Accounting Handbook,” and published two scholarly articles in Accounting Times and Accounting Journal. She also contributes articles to several broadsheets on behalf of the Financial Executives Institute of the Philippines, namely: “Business Enterprise,” Business Mirror; “The Financial Executive,” BusinessWorld; “Beyond Bottomlines,” Philippine Star; and “Business Options,” Manila Bulletin. She also writes occasionally for the Board of Accountancy column “Debit Credit” in the Business Mirror. Her articles on finance and accountancy have been featured by Dow Jones in the electronic publication of the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) and the electronic publication of the International Association of Finance Executives Institutes (IAFEI), the IAFEI Quarterly. In 2016, two of her articles were translated into Spanish and featured in two issues of Veritas, the publication of the Colegio de Contadores Publicos de Mexico.
She was cited as an outstanding alumnus of UP VSB in 2001, prominent alumnus of the Ateneo Graduate School of Business, and outstanding Biñanense by her own hometown of Biñan, Laguna. The Philippine Institute of Certified Public Accountants (PICPA) recognized her as PICPA Honorary Life Member in 2001, the Most Outstanding CPA in Public Practice in 1995, and Most Outstanding CPA in Professional Development in 1991. The Board of Accountancy of the Professional Regulation Commission presented her a Plaque of Appreciation for Upgrading Professional Accounting Education in 1990.