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Financial & Banking
OTP Bank Romania, Eurobank Fund Management Luxembourg sign an agreement for the distribution of investment funds in Romania
Monday, December 10, 2018
OTP Bank Romania signed a partnership with Eurobank Fund Management Company (Luxembourg) for the distribution of investment funds in Romania. Thus, from December 1st, OTP Bank Romania becomes the distributor and paying agent in Romania for mutual investment funds managed by Eurobank Fund Management. “The partnership with Eurobank Fund Management Company is an opportunity to grow OTP Bank Romania’s portfolio, both in terms of investment ...
Government hit by the “invisible hand” of the market as its borrowing costs jump more than social spending
Monday, December 10, 2018
Romanian government borrowing costs rose by 25.5 percent during the first ten months of this year up to RON 11.2 billion (EUR 2.4 billion) as it pays higher interest rates in order to cover its soaring spending on wages and pensions, according to official data consulted by Business Review. in January-October 2017, interest expenses of the government amounted RON 8.9 billion. Interest expenses growth rate outpaced during the ...
Isarescu: Over 13 bln euro worth of EIB financing extended to Romania since early 1990s
Monday, December 10, 2018
The European Investment Bank (EIB) has provided Romania with over 13 billion euro worth of financing for almost 130 projects since the start of their cooperation in the early 1990s, being an important pillar for the country's economic strategic development, governor of the National Bank of Romania (BNR) Mugur Isarescu told the conference on Investment and Investment Finance in Romania organized on the 60th anniversary of the EIB.2018 was a year rich in lessons for ...
Alpha Bank to launch EUR 1 bln mortgage bonds in Romania
Monday, December 10, 2018
The Greek financial group Alpha Bank prepares the launch of the first mortgage bonds program in Romania, according to the bank. In 2001, Alpha Bank Romania launched its first real estate loan, opening the market of financing for the purchase of housing through bank credit. The general meeting of shareholders of Alpha Bank Romania approved the ...
EIB: Romania has plenty of sources of financing; the lack of projects is the issue
Monday, December 10, 2018
Andrew McDowell, the vice president of the European Investment Bank (EIB), said that obtaining financing for projects is not an issue for Romania, as there are plenty of sources, but that the issue is the insufficient effort put into projects, which thus can’t attract more European money, both when it comes to public as well as private investments. In this regard, Romania ranks among the last places in the European Union, according to the ...
ECOFIN warns Romania to limit increase in net primary govt. spending
Monday, December 10, 2018
The EU Council of Economic and Financial Affairs (ECOFIN) on December 6 officially warned the Romanian Government not to allow the net primary government expenditures (the primary general government budget) to rise more than 4.5% compared to 2018, romania-insider.com informs. The structural fiscal balance would thus decrease by 1pp (from 3.3% of GDP estimated for this year), according to ...
Ebury: More than 85 percent of Romanian companies never hedged against FX risk
Monday, December 10, 2018
More than 85 percent of Romanian companies never hedged against foreign exchange (FX) risk and few companies manage FX risk in a structured way, Johan Gabriëls, country manager for Romania and Bulgaria at Ebury said on Wednesday quoted by http://business-review.eu. “More than 85 percent of Romanian companies never hedged against FX risk and few companies manage FX risk in a structured way. Romanian exporters are aware of FX and agree FX ...
Isarescu: Committee for Preparing Changeover to Euro, to release two reports
Monday, December 3, 2018
The Committee for Preparing the Changeover to the Euro will release two reports in December, the documents are highly technical though and are 300-page long and we have strived to translate the document from Romanian into Romanian, so as to say things in an acceptable language, National Bank of Romania (BNR) Governor Mugur Isarescu stated on Wednesday. "In December, The Committee for Preparing the Changeover to the Euro will publish the two documents, a ...
Romania’s public deficit rose 3.2 times in January-October to EUR 4.5 bln
Monday, December 3, 2018
Romania’s general consolidated budget, which includes fiscal and social budgets of the government, registered after the first ten months of this year a deficit of RON 21 billion (EUR 4.5 billion), or 2.2 percent of estimated GDP, being 3.2 times bigger compared with the same period of 2017, according to the Finance minister Eugen Teodorovici, http://business-review.eu reads. The minister claims that the ...
Non-governmental loan balance up 0.8pct in October; loans in lei up 0.9pct
Monday, December 3, 2018
The balance of non-governmental loan granted by credit institutions increased by 0.8 per cent in October 2018 (0.3 per cent in real terms) compared with September, up to 249.622 billion lei, according to a press release of the National Bank of Romania (BNR) ."The loan in lei increased by 0.9 per cent (0.4 per cent in real terms) and the loan in foreign currency increased by 0.6 per cent (expressed in euro, the loan in foreign currency increased by 0.5 per cent). ...
BNR: Deposits of non-government resident customers advance 0.9 percent on a monthly basis in October 2018
Monday, December 3, 2018
Deposits of non-government resident customers went up 0.9 percent month on month to 317,399.9 million lei in October 2018. At end-October 2018, deposits of non-government resident customers grew by 9.2 percent (4.7 percent in real terms) over the same year-ago period, according to data posted on Monday by the National Bank of Romania (BNR).RON-denominated household deposits moved up 1.3 percent to 116,277.6 million lei. At end-October 2018, household ...
Overdue lei-denominated loans, up 0.9pct, forex-denominated 1.53pct in October 2018
Monday, December 3, 2018
Overdue loans denominated in lei (RON) of households and companies were standing at 5,017 billion lei in late October 2018, up 0.9pct on a monthly basis, while overdue forex loans increased by 1.53pct, to the equivalent of 3.175 billion lei, according to a report by the National Bank of Romania (BNR) released on Tuesday.Total RON loans reached RON 163.76 billion in October (0.92pct more than in the previous month), of which 65.846 billion lei were taken out by ...
BNR official: Commercial banks cannot loan more money to the state
Monday, December 3, 2018
Romania has no more room to increase the debt by accumulating budget deficits, given that the maximum level that the local economy can sustain is 40-45% of GDP at the most. The local banking system, the largest financier of the public debt, is already overexposed on state bonds, Eugen Radulescu, director of the Directorate for Financial Stability with the National Bank of Romania (BNR) said on Monday. “The maximum level of debt that the Romanian ...
Romania challenges EC fine for not implementing anti-money laundering directive
Monday, December 3, 2018
Romania is trying to convince the European Court of Justice (CJEU) to reject the fine that the European Commission wants to impose on Romania for not implementing the European directive against money laundering, romania-insider.com informs. The European Commission referred Romania to the European Court of Justice in August this year, ...
Bittnet's third corporate bond issue, worth 4.7 million lei, listed on BVB
Monday, December 3, 2018
Bittnet (BNET), the first IT company in Romania that was listed on the AeRO market operated by the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) had on Wednesday its third issue of corporate bond, worth 4.7 million lei, which entered trading within the BSE's Alternative Trading System, a BVB press release informs."We arrived on the stock market in 2015 as a company with interests in the area of technology and education and with several courageous promises and plans of ...
Romanian has second-lowest tax-to-GDP ratio in the EU
Monday, December 3, 2018
The overall tax-to-GDP ratio, meaning the sum of taxes and net social contributions as a percentage of GDP, rose to 40.2 percent in the EU in 2017, from 39.9 percent in 2016, http://business-review.eu reports. Romania has the second-lowest ratio in the EU of 25.8 percent of GDP, after Ireland (23.5 percent). The tax-to-GDP ratio varies significantly between Member States, with the highest share of taxes and ...
First Bank officially opens its first branch in Romania
Monday, December 3, 2018
First Bank, the former Piraeus Bank, Wednesday opened its first branch on the local market under a new identity, U.S. Ambassador Hans Klemm joining the event, which took place at the bank’s headquarters on Nicolae Titulescu Boulevard in Bucharest, along with Dominic Bruynseels, Executive President First Bank Romania and Alexandru Petrescu, Minister of Communications, romaniajournal.ro informs. According to the financial institution’s ...
OTP Leasing Romania gets RON 5.5 million capital increase
Monday, December 3, 2018
The shareholders of OTP Leasing Romania, OTP Bank Romania and Merkantil Bank Hungary, approved a capital increase of RON 5.52 million. The capital increase was made through additional cash contribution, fully paid in RON in the company’s main account, opened with OTP Bank Romania. The shareholders contributed to the capital increase, based on their own participation in the share capital, as follows: OTP Bank Romania ...
European Commission proposes Romania annual structural adjustment of at least 1pct of GDP
Monday, November 26, 2018
The European Commission has established that no effective action was taken by Romania in response to the council recommendation of June and proposes that the council adopts a revised recommendation to Romania to correct its significant deviation from the adjustment path towards the medium-term budgetary objective.In June 2018, the council issued a recommendation of an annual structural adjustment of 0.8 percent of GDP in both 2018 and 2019 to Romania under the ...
Isarescu: Worse than moving slowly on the road to convergence, is to miss the way. We are at risk
Monday, November 26, 2018
“Worse than progressing slowly on the road of convergence, or stepping on the spot, is to miss the road. We are at risk. Being and staying on the right track in the approach to recover the gaps should be our permanent concern, if we want to preserve the coherence of the economic integration process,” National Bank Governor, Mugur Isarescu, said on Wednesday at the conference ‘Romania 2030: How do we recover the gaps to Western ...