CCIR: The total turnover of Romanian companies will not exceed EUR 350 billion in the next five years

The chairman of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Romania (CCIR), Mihai Daraban, says that out of 1,170,000 active companies, only 768,372 lodged the balance, so that almost 401,000 companies do not lodge any financial balance.   According to him, the Romanian economy is extremely polarized, and 3,845 companies represent 0.5% of the number of those who lodge the balance and who make 62% of the total turnover of those who lodge the balance, 329 billion euro. So, the total turnover of the Romanian companies will not surpass 350 billion euro in the next five years.   At present, Romania is facing very weak capitalization of the companies, as well as the lowest level of financial go-between between the member states of the European Union. Thus, there is acute necessity for the growth of the level of financial go-between and, implicitly, of lending of the companies on the part of the banking system, as well as for combating the low degree of capitalization of the companies and economy in general.   Florin Dragu, Head of Service, Financial Stability Directorate of the national Bank of Romania, said that “there are vulnerabilities, especially coming from the high number of companies that have negative capital, representing 30, 7% of active companies, respectively 229.700 companies, a number that has remained regardless of the phase of the economic cycle.” The listing of the companies with the Stock Exchange Bucharest (BVB) represents one of the solutions for capitalization, in this sense the chairman of BVB, Radu Hanga,  present at the conference, said that ‘ over the last four years over five billion euro were financed  through the capital market, the Romanian state using the platform of the stock exchange to finance its necessary. Over the last seven-eight years we see the deposits with the banks have increased with high rate, existing 280 billion lei in deposits of the population, which means that there is capital and at the same time, there are companies which need it’.   Even so, according to the chairman of the Association of Brokers, Dan Paul, weak financial go-between and reduced investments from BVB are the result of the lack of trust of the Romanian investors.    ‘The financing offered through the Programme IMM Invest were used by companies, in majority, for the working capital and less for investments’ said Dumitru Nancu, general manager of the National Fund for Guarantee of |Loans for Small and Medium Entreprises(FNGCIMM).   “Of the 60.000 guarantees, 85% went into working capital financing and only 15% went toward investment. FNGCIMM approved 60.000 guarantees, the value thus infused by the financial-banking system being 40 billion lei, or 5% of GDP, and the guarantees granted by us being 33 billion lei, which means saving over one million jobs. When we made the decision to implement this program in 2020, we noticed that 34% of SMEs had negative capital or were in difficulty,” said the General Manager of FNGCIMM.