TODAY’S NEWS
ECONOMY & COMPANIES
-Hungary’s OTP Bank Group, one of the largest independent financial service providers in Central and Eastern Europe, has started to discreetly probe the market to assess interest from other banks to buy OTP Bank Romania, Ziarul Financiar reported citing banking sources.
–Austrian banking group Raiffeisen posted RON414 million net profit in Romania in the first quarter of 2023, up 90% y-o-y, amid intense lending activity for all business segments, the good risk profile of customers and in the context of the increase in market rates compared to Q1 2022.
–Romania’s job candidates’ salary expectations are on average 30% – 40% higher than employers’ offers. Expectations by field of activity: IT: RON9,000, Retail: RON5,000 Construction: RON7,000 Automotive: RON6,500, data from Salario, developed by online recruitment platform eJobs, showed.
–The Finance Ministry raised RON1.78 billion on Thursday (May 4, 2023) through two government bond issues, at annual average yields of 7.34% and 7%, respectively.
–New registrations of road vehicles for passenger transport in Romania increased by 3.5% in the first quarter of 2023 y-o-y, the National Institute of Statistics (INS) showed.
–The Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) ended the first quarter of 2023 with RON12.9 million revenues, down 18% y-o-y and RON1.8 million net profit, down 68% y-o-y amid falling operating revenues and rising operating expenses.
–Retail sales volume (excluding the trade with motor vehicles and motorcycles) went up by 7.3% in unadjusted data and by 6.7% when adjusted for seasonality and number of working days, in March 2023 y-o-y, INS data showed.
TODAY’S MARKET
EXCHANGE RATES
| EUR 4.9273 | GBP 5.6318 |
| USD 4.4680 | CHF 4.0082 |
| BGN 2.5193 | MDL 0.2488 |
BNR INTEREST RATES
| Deposit facility: | 6% |
| Policy rate: | 7% |
| Lending facility: | 8% |
INFLATION RATE
| 14.53% (March 2023) BNR Target 2022: 2.50% (variation band: ± 1pp) |
BUCHAREST STOCK EXCHANGE (BVB) INDICES
| BET 0.22%, BET-TR 0.22%, BET-FI 0.58%, BET-NG 0.24%, BET-XT 0.25%, BETXT-TR 0.25%, BET-BK 0.38%, RO-TX 0.58%, BETAeRO 0.36% |
CAPITAL MARKET COMMENTARY
| Bucharest stocks head into the weekend higher mirroring the uptrend across Europe where markets wrapped the first week of May with gains following European Central Bank’s policy decision and data releases. Eurozone’s business activity was seen to be improving gradually in April. |
