The Lopez Family

The Lopezes of Iloilo in Central Philippines are a landed and influential family who built their wealth from sugar plantations and shipping. But the bulk of their money is from mass media, particularly ABS-CBN Corporation, which was the leading broadcast network before it was shut down in 2020 following the rejection of its application to renew their congressional franchise.

Eugenio Lopez Sr., a fourth-generation Lopez and son of erstwhile Iloilo governor Benito Lopez and brother of former vice president Fernando Lopez, was the founder of ABS-CBN. He was a University of the Philippines and Harvard-educated lawyer and one of the heirs to the Lopez family empire.

Lopez, Sr. owned the Chronicle Broadcasting Network and later bought the Alto Broadcasting System from Antonio Quirino, brother of former president Elpidio Quirino on February 24, 1957, to put up the ABS-CBN Network.

Other family members who were the first shareholders of ABS-CBN were Lopez, Jr.’s siblings Oscar, Manuel, and Presentacion L. Psinakis, all children of Eugenio Lopez, Sr., and Oscar’s son, Federico.

The network was among the stations seized by government forces with the imposition of Martial Law in 1972. His eldest son and namesake, Eugenio “Geny” Lopez, Jr. was imprisoned for allegedly conspiring to assassinate the former president Ferdinand Marcos, Sr. The station was returned to the Lopezes by then-President Corazon Aquino after the People Power Revolution of 1986.

The Lopezes, through their network, would again find themselves in hot water, between 2016 to 2022 under the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte, who accused ABS-CBN of not airing his paid campaign advertisements while airing TV ads of his political opponents in 2016. The result was the rejection of their franchise and ultimately, the shutdown of the network in July 2020.

Eugenio “Gabby” Lopez III, Geny’s son, CEO and chairman of ABS-CBN, had already retired by this time. He was the longest-serving chairman of the corporation. Carlo L. Katigbak, nephew of Geny, and cousin of Gabby, was at the helm of the broadcast giant as Chief Executive Officer as lawmakers grilled company executives in Congress.

As of December 2023, the Lopez family is still the majority owner of ABS-CBN, with around 70.471% shares. While the bulk of their wealth is from mass media operations, the Lopezes are into other businesses that include power and energy generation and distribution, property development, financial services, and manufacturing.