MANILA, Philippines—A popular news website that has been critical of the government of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was shut down by the country’s securities regulator, a move the company called harassment.

The nation’s Securities and Exchange Commission said in a statement published on its website Monday that it had found Rappler Inc. liable for violating constitutional requirements on foreign-ownership limits and revoked the company’s certificate of incorporation.

The case against Rappler has been highly contentious in the Philippines, where Mr. Duterte and his supporters have hit out repeatedly against mainstream media companies he says have unfairly covered a bloody war on drugs that has killed thousands of people in the past year and a half.

In an online statement addressed to readers, Rappler said the SEC’s actions were “pure and simple harassment, the seeming coup de grace to the relentless and malicious attacks against us since 2016.” The company said it had been consistently transparent and complied with SEC regulations, submitting requirements “even at the risk of exposing our corporate data to irresponsible hands with an agenda.”

Rappler said it would contest the SEC’s ruling.


The government said in a statement that it respected the SEC’s decision and that Rappler was free to exhaust “all available legal remedies” in contesting the regulator’s actions.

The six-year-old news company, founded by local media executive Maria Ressa and others, had achieved unusual success with its online news offerings in the Philippines and Indonesia, geared toward a young, social-media-savvy readership. But since Mr. Duterte was elected in 2016, the online-only publication has come under sustained attack by pro-government bloggers, on social media, and by Mr. Duterte himself.

In his State of the Nation address last year, Mr. Duterte said Rappler was “fully owned” by Americans and in violation of the Philippine constitution, which prevents foreign ownership of local news companies.

Rappler denied these allegations at the time, saying that its foreign investor, a fund called Omidyar Network, created by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, had invested via a legal financial instrument called a Philippine Depositary Receipt. Rappler said the instrument allowed Omidyar to invest but didn’t grant it voting rights or a say in daily management of the firm.


The SEC said in its statement that it would void the receipts owned by Omidyar, which didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Rappler isn’t the only media company to come under attack since Mr. Duterte took office. Last year the owner of one of the country’s largest national newspapers, the Philippine Daily Inquirer, said it would sell its stake in the firm to a Filipino billionaire and political ally of Mr. Duterte, a move seen locally as capitulating to the president’s criticism of the newspaper’s coverage.

Mr. Duterte has also threatened to withhold the franchise renewal of ABS-CBN, a broadcast outlet that has also been critical of the government.

Write to Jake Maxwell Watts at jake.watts@wsj.com