ING to Expand Operations in Romania, Poland and India

The Dutch banking group is about to start expanding its banks network in Poland, Romania and India, also following new development opportunities on the local market, the Dow Jones news agency informs. In Romania, ING aims at owning 250 units before 2009.

Unlike its main Dutch competitors, ING preferred during the past few years to focus on just a few countries, all chosen for the development potential. “We could have had a far more important role on many banking markets, but it was not our goal”, says Eli Leenaars, from the ING retail and private banking division.

“Still, the banks that were available for acquisition were not in our target”.
Instead of paying large amounts for new banks, ING chose to expand its banking franchises and to export know-how to countries where is was already active. Leenaars added that the ING retail division was traditionally interested in markets where its kind of services were missing.

HotNews.ro, Sep 20, 2006

What the newspapers say: September 20, 2006

As politicians struggle to maintain a clean image, more and more unveilings show that many of Romania’s most appreciated politicians have a Securitate collaboration background. Still, nothing seems to be clear enough for a verdict. Forgetting about our own disgraceful past, some newspapers concentrate on the “francophone dictators’ summit” in Bucharest.
The meeting that gathers tens of presidents is about to serve as a smoke curtain for the continuing growth of utilities’ price and for major investigations at the Anticorruption Prosecution’s Office.

The body researching the former Securitate archives, CNSAS fails to offer consistent information on the background of leading politicians.

Recently expelled Liberal Mona Musca was found writing notes on foreigners’ activity in her youth, while she was a teacher, yet the final verdict was she indeed committed acts that include her in the “political police” activity, as Evenimentul Zilei informs.
On the other hand, CNSAS made it clear that Gyorgy Frunda had nothing to do with the former Securitate. The statement drives the former Securitate head in the Mures county crazy, the officer swearing for the same Evenimentul Zilei that Frunda was on his informers list.
Meanwhile, Bucharest prepares to meet the world’s finest French-speaking presidents at the 11th Francophones' Summit in a couple of days.

Cotidianul finds it somehow ironic that 10 dictators will attend the discussions that are to be held in the People’s House, Ceausescu’s largest architecture “accomplishment”.
As scandals and political stars blur the public opinion’s sight, companies and institutions continue to release bad news for the soon-to-come winter.
The Natural Gas Regulation Authority finds fuel market leader OMV with unnatural and unjustified price growth in natural gas, a move that is about to affect 97% of the Romanian captive clients, Gandul informs.
Since gas won’t worm up too many Romanians during the following months, lower income workers can be pleased with cheaper tobacco, as the State Debt Recovery Agency tells Adevarul that cigarettes smuggling is on a fast rise after the last “vice tax” came into force.

HotNews.ro, Sep 20, 2006

Seven verdicts in case of politicians who worked with ex-Ceausescu's political police

The Romanian body studying the archives of the Communist political police made a series of decisions on Tuesday in the case of several politicians who allegedly collaborated with ex-dictator Nicolae Ceausescu’s dreaded Securitate.

Cazimir Ionescu, a spokesman for the National Council for the Study of Securitate Archives-CNSAS, said the institution gave negative verdicts for six politicians whose allegedly ran political police activities under the former regime. But he said CNSAS found one politician to have in fact had collaborated with the Securitate.

Verdicts in three other cases of suspected politicians were postponed.

Ionescu did not name who was found to have been involved in such activities, but national TV station TVR quoted CNSAS sources who claimed it was Mona Musca, a respected Romanian MP and former Culture minister who’s been expelled from the governing National Liberal Party over revelations that she was a Securitate collaborator.

Musca has been insisting that she had signed papers to work for Ceausescu’s secret police, but said she did not operate as an informer, as speculated.

HotNews.ro, Sep 19, 2006

False alarm in Brussels over Romania, Bulgaria report

A piece of news distributed by German news agency DPA read on Tuesday that the European Commission has decided to postpone the presentation of a long-expected report on Romania’s and Bulgaria’s preparation to join the EU on January 1, 2007.

The document was programmed to be presented on September 26 this year.

The DPA report, which did not explain the reasoning for such a move, could not be confirmed from other sources during the day.

Another news agency, Reuters, quoting Brussels official, reported that the DPA story was in fact about Turkey, while sources from the European Integration Ministry in Bucharest told HotNews.ro there was no official information related to a possible postponement of the EC report.

HotNews.ro, Sep 19, 2006

Competition Council analyzes Romexterra bank takeover by MKB Bank

The Romanian Competition Council announced on Tuesday it would analyze the operation of economic concentration produced by the takeover of the Romexterra Bank by MKB Bank Nyrt. The Council will notify the two banks about its decision within 30 days.

Several days before an offer for the takeover of Romexterra Bank, addressed to all its shareholders, expires on September 23, MKB Bank has secured a 50% plus one share state in the company, the minimum requirement to become the strategic investor in the bank.

The offer is run by a Cyprus-based company, Demera Investments, which is due to transfer shares to MKB.

Romexterra Bank is active on the Romanian banking market, on the leasing services market through Romexterra leasing IFN and in the field of financial investments through Romexterra Finance. In 2005, it reported a gross profit of 6.2 million euro, up 120% compared to 2004.

MKB Bank Nyrt, a member of the BayernLB group, is not present on the Romanian market through other societies. It is the third biggest bank in Hungary.

HotNews.ro, Sep 19, 2006

Siemens opens new research center in Cluj-Napoca

Siemens Program and System Engineering, one of the Siemens companies in Romania active in the field of research and development, has inaugurated a new R&D center in the northern Romanian city of Cluj-Napoca. The investment is about 1 million euro.

A company press releease, the center currently has a surface of 1,000 square metres and is due to double by the end of the year, when the number of employees is due to reach 100.

“We chose Cluj-Napoca due to the universities with tradition that can be found here and with which we already have important partnerships”, explained Alexander Simionescu, general manager for Siemens PSE Romania.

It is the second such center Siemens PSE opens in Romania after the one opened in the central Romanian city of Brasov in 2001.

HotNews.ro, Sep 19, 2006

Political crisis sparks reactions in Romania

The violent protests in Budapest on Monday night, sparked by a record in which Hungarian PM Ferencz Gyurcsany admits he lied before the public opinion in order to win the general elections in April, reverberated among the Hungarian community on Tuesday.

Gyorgy Frunda, a top member of the Hungarian Democrats, an ethnic political group that belongs to the governing coalition in Bucharest, said in a TV appearance on Monday morning that in his view the events in Budapest were proof of the deep political divisions of the Hungarian population.

And a branch of a separate, less moderate Hungarian movement in Romania, the Hungarian Civic Union (UCM), asked the leadership of the UCM to organize a peaceful demonstration before the Hungarian Consulate in the Central Romanian city of Miercurea Ciuc, in a sign of solidarity with anti-Gyurcsany protesters in Budapest.

Thousands of rightist demonstrators gathered before key institutions in the Hungarian capital to call for Gyurcsany’s resignation on Monday, following the publication of the report in which he admits he lied the electorate.

The protests turned violent in the evening, when some 150 people were hurt and dozens of cars burnt as marchers sieged the national TV station, bringing it off-air temporarily, and clashed with the water cannon-wielding police.

In an interview for Reuters on Tuesday, Socialist PM Gyurcsany said he would not resign and promised to stick to the economic reforms he’s been pushing for months, which include a series of rather unpopular austerity measures.

HotNews.ro, Sep 19, 2006