[Vantage Point] The P33-million question: Tracing the Duterte wealth trail - Rappler

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Sara Duterte’s declared net worth reportedly reached P98 million in 2025, up P33 million since she became Vice President. SEC testimony before Congress and P33.26 million in Davao City contracts now give prosecutors a money trail worth pursuing.

For years, the Duterte name has carried an aura of untouchability in Philippine politics. But in the ongoing Senate impeachment trial, that aura is colliding with cold, hard corporate ledgers.

Vice President Sara Duterte’s declared net worth reached P98.66 million in 2025. That is a significant leap from the P65.04 million she declared in 2021, her final full year before assuming the vice-presidency. 

This raises a fundamental question of accountability: what lawful income fueled this P33-plus million growth? Compounding the mystery is a glaring anomaly revealed by prosecutors during the trial: Duterte has declared absolutely zero cash on hand or in the bank since 2019. How does a public official’s net worth balloon by tens of millions without a single peso in the bank?

The prosecution’s search for answers hinges on the corporate records authenticated by Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Director Gerardo del Rosario. Out of 18 companies linked to Duterte and her husband, Manases Carpio, SEC records show 10 declared no dividends. 

To understand why this is a massive red flag, we need to view a corporation as a locked vault. Even if a business makes hundreds of millions in sales, that money belongs exclusively to the company, not to the owners’ personal pockets. 

The primary, legal key to open that vault and move profits to shareholders is a “dividend”. When a company declares zero dividends, that front door is shut tight. 

There is nothing inherently illegal about zero dividends; businesses routinely retain earnings to reinvest or pay debts. However, if these companies are supposedly the engine behind the couple’s surging personal wealth, how did the money legally escape the corporate vault? 

If dividends weren’t used, the money must have flowed through alternative routes like salaries, directors’ fees, advances, or asset sales. Every single one of these alternative routes is required by law to leave a taxable paper trail in company books and personal Statements of Assets Liabilities and Net worth (SALNs). Zero dividends do not automatically prove corruption, but they eliminate the most innocent explanation for how a politician got richer, leaving investigators to demand: show us the receipts. 

GenCorp Industries perfectly illustrates the prosecution’s strongest angle. Duterte listed GenCorp as a business interest in her recent SALNs, yet her name does not appear anywhere in its SEC incorporation papers or General Information Sheets (GIS). 

During Monday’s, September 21 trial, the SEC witness revealed a vital missing link: a man named Jaime T. Cruz. Cruz represents the largest subscriber in GenCorp, and he just so happens to be the biggest shareholder alongside Duterte in another company, Metro City Chow Foods Corp.

Between 2021 and 2024, GenCorp booked a staggering P1.04 billion in sales, but netted only P8 million. Crucially, the SEC confirmed GenCorp had unrestricted retained earnings available—meaning it had the money to legally pay dividends—yet it paid out zero. Massive revenue yielded virtually no official shareholder payout. 

This makes GenCorp’s government contracts highly suspicious. Davao City Mayor Sebastian “Baste” Duterte confirmed that GenCorp secured 19 contracts from his city government starting in 2022, totaling P33.26 million. 

Only four were publicly auctioned, with the rest passing through alternative small-value procurement. The mayor claimed ignorance of his sister’s ties to the firm, noting her name wasn’t on the procurement documents. But that defense highlights the contradiction: the Vice President swore to the public she had an interest in the firm, while hiding her name from the SEC and the city that paid it millions. 

Then there is Metro City Chow, which introduces a severe constitutional problem. The Philippine Constitution strictly prohibits the Vice President from participating, directly or indirectly, in any business. 

SEC records list Duterte as a continuing director and compensation committee member of Metro City Chow through 2025—three full years into her term. Furthermore, the SEC testified this week that Duterte has failed to transfer ownership of her business interests in all but two corporations. There is no deed of sale or divestment on file for Metro City Chow. 

While the defense might attempt to write this off as a clerical oversight, four years of official corporate filings cannot be casually brushed aside, especially for the second-highest official in the land. 

Public officials who project an image of invincibility often stumble not on grand conspiracies, but on basic accounting.

Prosecutors must not overreach by claiming all corporate revenues are Duterte’s personal wealth. But they now have the framework of a devastating case: unexplained wealth growth, zero cash in the bank, millions in un-bidded city contracts awarded to a firm she claims but doesn’t officially own, and clear evidence she failed to divest from private business as required by the Constitution. 

If her wealth is clean, the ledgers will logically align. If they do not, the untouchable facade will crumble under the weight of her own financial trail. – Rappler.com