Economic Press Review, November 16

The Ziarul Financiar runs the headline ‘The most pessimist analysts change their forecast regarding the economic recovery in 2011’.

‘The data in the third quarter, although declining, have exceeded expectations. The 2011 estimates are now somewhere between +0.2 and +2 percent.’

‘All the data lead to the idea that the economy will improve next year, but managers are still uncertain,’ the newspaper reads.

‘Although it must have been submitted to the Senate by October 15th,the budget draft cannot be drawn up without the Salary Law having already been adopted,’ according to the daily quoted in another article under the headline ‘The Government files another motion and takes responsibility for the Salary Law,’ ‘We are walking the wire’ is the opening headline of the Curierul Naţional.

The approval of the second version of the Single Salary Law, the entry into effect of the Pensions Law, the approval of the state budget for next year and the alteration of the Loan Ordinance are the conditions that the Romanian authorities must fulfill in order to receive the second IMF loan tranche.’

The Curierul Naţional reads that if these documents’ provisions will not be applied next year, ‘the Romanian authorities face the risk of running out of money for pensions and salaries. Moreover, the lending cost will also increase,’ the Ziarul Financiar adds.

The daily Economistul dedicated a full page to the celebration of 90 years of economic education in Cluj, the first economic superior educational institution in Transylvania.

Attending the events marking this anniversary, the governor of the National Bank of Romania stated that considerable amounts of money were being spent for allocating the small budget, instead of intensifying the efforts to achieve a long-term growth.

‘The governor compared the Romanian budget with a cake that must be sliced in several pieces, for several persons, but which preserves its dimensions.’

‘It would be preferable to enlarge the dimensions of the cake, rather than slicing what is left of it,’ the newspaper quotes Mugur Isărescu.

Under the headline ‘The black market raises problems in the dairy industry also’, the Curierul Naţional reads that ‘only 20 percent of the milk in Romania is collected by milk collecting centers, and 80 percent is divided between auto-consumption and other things.’

‘Black market is represented by local dairy products sold in local shops that are not registered at the Business Register’ and that are unfairly competing with companies that pay their taxes.

‘At the same time, the dairy products included in this category are not tested, therefore they are of low quality.

'The milk sold on the markets by small owners contains germs in a quantity that considerably exceeds the allowable limits and poses the risk of spreading serious diseases from cows to human beings', the Curierul Naţional warns.

The article in Ziarul Financiar entitled ‘Loans for natural persons, banks’ only hope in the fourth quarter’ is worth mentioning.

Large companies hesitate to launch investment projects because they are reluctant to face new risks and prefer to wait for the demands from natural persons to increase again.

‘However, most banks are still reticent to offer mortgage loans because, according to their forecasts, the building prices will rise in the fourth quarter.’

Generally speaking, forecasts remain positive as far as the consumer credit is regarded, although there are banks that are taking into consideration the possibility of tightening the loan standards by asking further guarantees, reduction of the loan value and the debt ratio.


Translated by: Raluca Mizdrea
MA Student, MTTLC, Bucharest University