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2008 crisis: Foreign and internal causes

Several important bankers in Romania, brokers and investors on the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) have commented for the Cotidianul and Business Standard dailies the global financial crisis which emerged from the collapse of the high risk real estate loans in the US, trying in the same time to anticipate the possible effects over the business environment in Romania.

The businessmen, who were interviewed by the two papers, said that in Romania the instability in the euro-leu exchange rate is to be felt no sooner than in six months, with the Stock Exchange having thus the chance to recover, that the access to loans will become more difficult and the real estate market will be affected. The foreign financing cost of any entity on the domestic market might slightly increase, with possible relocations to happen in Romania on a medium term, of some foreign companies, Manfred Wimmer, CEO with the Romanian Commercial Bank (BCR - the biggest bank in the system) said. The level of certain indicators point a continuous economic growth in 2008, even if the growth rate might result under the level last year. The BCR official considers the effect of the international financial turbulence over Romania will be less obvious in the second half of 2008. A good year in the agriculture field and an improvement in the performances of certain sectors of the industry might put up in the end the foundation for a positive macroeconomic growth, Wimmer said. Patrick Gelin, President and General Manager of BRD-GSC (Romanian Development Bank -Groupe Societe Generale) thinks that a first effect of the crisis was seen in Romania once with the rise in the costs of the foreign financing. This effect was followed by the drop in the shares on the BVB and by the depreciation of the leu (the Romanian national currency) against euro. Such things happen also because of the local macroeconomic foundation, Patrick Gelin says. The subprime crisis in the US will not directly affect Romania as, except from the Citibank, none of the parent-banks of the main players on the Romanian market was significantly damaged by the crisis, Dan Pascariu, chairman of the Unicredit Tiriac board of directors. On the other hand, he said he was convinced many of the financial institutions operating on the Romanian market under the impulse from the parent-bank are to harden their risk management policy and, in the same time, due to the other economic factors, the loans will be more expensive in lei and in euro both. Mihai Bogza, the chairman of the Bancpost board of directors thinks that the effects of the subprime international crisis will become visible during the year, being to disappear gradually most probably next year. With regard to Romania, he thinks that the stock exchange suffered certain corrections as compared with the probably too high levels recorded and probably such correction is to be limited in the future, with the volatility of the national currency to perpetuate in the second quarter of the year and with movements of the exchange rate towards both directions. 'The Romanian National Bank (BNR) has the capacity and the necessary instruments to keep under control the evolution of the volatility of the course and, in certain conditions, the impact on the Romanian banking system will be minimum. We thinks that the main provocation this year for Romania will be the effects of the international liquidity crisis, which will limit and make more expensive the access of the Romanian banks to foreign sources of financing, restraining their capacity to continue expanding,' Bogza said. Sursa: http://www.rompress.ro

Tags: romanian crisis exchange foreign romania brd bnr bvb euro bcr

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