By her own admission, Salve Duplito, financial literacy advocate, registered financial planner, and one of the most acclaimed financial journalists in the country—former host of ANC’s On the Money, news anchor for ABS CBN News Channel, and popular teleradyo host for Panalong Serbisyo, Radyo 630—first became interested in studying money and finance because of “trauma,” she recalls.
Her earliest memory at age 5 was hearing her parents fight about money, she recounts. “I remember my dad coming down the stairs, and when he reached the bottom, my mom asked about a check that had bounced. Because of my dad’s anger, he grabbed a pail and hit my mom on the head, and she bled. I remember I was the one who took care of her, I helped her cross the street to go to my grandparents’ house.”
Then there was the time typhoon “Sisang” blew the nipa roof off their house in Legazpi in the Bicol province. “All my notebooks for school were soaked, our house was completely wet. So I asked myself, do you have the luxury of crying?” Instead, she recalls setting her concerns aside to catch the family pig—“That’s additional income, and money will be needed immediately, right?”
When she made it to Metro Manila to attend high school, Salve would live with wealthy relatives, who practically treated her like hired help.
Salve didn’t realize that such harsh experiences would lead to her lifelong advocacy of teaching people how to handle finances and manage debt. “I thought maybe if there were fewer money problems, there wouldn’t be too many separations or fights. Sometimes life is like that—you’ll struggle first, and when you look back, that’s when you realize, these are the dots connecting, this is where I’m being led.”
As a financial reporter, Salve’s first job was as a business reporter for a large newspaper “which only CEOs read, so you needed to be good in English, good at asking questions, and fearless.” Salve would approach even the biggest tycoons, never letting her insecurities get in her way, and, as she put it, never dwelling on the fact that, by contrast, she came from “a life where you eat plain rice porridge with a sprinkling of salt.”
Since then, she has worked for two decades as a financial journalist for various publications, including the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Inquirer Interactive, and BusinessWorld, and has received recognition for her work from the Jaime V. Ongpin Awards for Investigative Journalism, as EJAP/Metropacific Banking and Finance Reporter of the Year, and the Citibank Award for Excellence. She is also a consultant for financial institutions.
So many poor people
In 2009, Salve began working for development networks like the Synergeia Foundation, with the work taking her to remote areas like Basilan, Tawi-Tawi, Jolo, Sulu, and Patikul. “I saw that I wasn’t the only poor person; there were so many poor people in the Philippines.” The foundation trained school teachers in places where there were not enough classrooms, and classes had to be held as the children sat in the sun.
Her own experience of financial hardship has gifted Salve with much empathy for the people she meets, and those who seek her help and guidance. She recalls doing financial education training for Filipino househelp working in Singapore, and remembered her high school days serving in a relative’s household. “I get their difficulties. It’s heartwarming that there’s no plaque, no acknowledgment. Someone approached me and said, ‘I watched you back then, at that time I was buried in debt, now I’m investing and saving.’ I think those are the success stories that can’t be replaced by plaques and recognition.”
The challenge of making do with limited resources is a common experience, she assures. “I think every Filipino goes through a time when they lack money. Even if you study our billionaires today, they also reached a point where they struggled, right? The ones who started it all, the oligarchs, they all started from nothing. It’s a good lesson for us to understand that life has its ups and downs. Sometimes you’re up, sometimes you’re down. But what happens in between, that’s the question.”
That’s why Salve is also an advocate for plain old hard work. “Pride doesn’t pay bills. If you need to wash dishes, then wash dishes. You need to wake up early, wake up early. You need to swallow your pride and do what others tell you to do, because there’s no room for pretense here; if you want to get rich, you have to work. Prepare your mind—that’s your biggest capital.”
Salve credits her mother for teaching her discipline as well as determination. “Sometimes, because we’re poor, we don’t even try because we think, ‘This system always defeats us anyway.’ It’s that kind of thinking will defeat you.
“You’ll be fine,” she reassures those who are struggling. “You’re not alone. Many of us have been through that and are still going through it. Even those you see who always look polished, always wear nice clothes—they all cry because they fail sometimes. So when we fail, it’s okay to cry, just for five minutes. Wake up, get up, and do the work, and things will be okay.”
