Romania Feed

Metropolitan Life Pensii Private, which manages the third largest mandatory private pension fund in Romania, after NN Pensii and AZT Viitorul Tau, increased its ownership stakes in Banca Transilvania (TLV.RO), Romgaz (SNG.RO) and Transport Trade Services (TTS.RO), over the course of May 2023, as per the latest data aggregated by Ziarul Financiar (ZF) daily.

Black Sea Oil & Gas (BSOG), whose owner is US giant Carlyle, has announced the start of the authorization process for an offshore energy corridor in the Romanian sector of the Black Sea along the infrastructure of the Midia Natural Gas Development (MGD) Project.

French-held TotalEnergies has bought a portfolio of five solar projects with a total capacity of more than 200 MW located in north-western Romania from Germany’s PNE, after taking over a similar portfolio in Poland this year.

Technology company 2Performant Network (2P.RO), the leading affiliate marketing company in Romania, announced that its platform brokered 690,000 sales in the second quarter of 2023, a 76% increase compared with year-ago period.

Daniel Anghel, Tax and Legal Services Leader PwC Romania, was elected President of the Foreign Investors Council (FIC), for a one-year term.

Companies show a record level of optimism regarding the investment climate inn Romania, and intentions to increase operations and investment plans in 2023 are still at high levels for the next three years, as per a survey conducted annually by AmCham Romania.

The IRCC, which is used by banks to calculate interest rates for new loans taken out starting with the spring of 2019, decreased to 5.94% a year. The new value corresponds to the first quarter of 2023 and it will be used by lending institutions for the third quarter of 2023 (the July-September 2023 period), in line with central bank data released on Tuesday (July 4).

The “Made in Romania” Nominations Committee has selected its 50 semi-finalists out of the 386 companies nominated on the platform www.investingromania.com.

The largest share sale in the history of Romania ended on Tuesday, July 4 at 12 p.m., with the closing of the initial public offering of electricity producer Hidroelectrica (H2O.RO), where minority shareholder Fondul Proprietatea (FP.RO) put up for sale 78 million shares for about RON8.8 billion.

A group of Polish entrepreneurs and investors, who had previously run Valuetech Seed, one of the top performing Polish venture capital funds for emerging technologies, have raised a EUR25 million investment from the European Investment Fund (EIF) for a new project: venture capital fund Radix Ventures. Another name connected to this fund is Daniel Dumitrescu, CIO of accelerator InnovX.

Romania's industrial production prices for the total (domestic market and non–domestic market) increased by 7.7% in May 2023 compared with May 2022, data from Romania’s National Statistics Institute INS showed on Tuesday (July 4, 2023).

Grain trader Ameropa Grains, who is the market leader in Romania, ended 2022 with RON8.57 billion revenue, an increase of 51% year-on-year, ZF has calculated from Finance Ministry data.

The asking prices of the old three-room apartments in Bucharest slowed down in June as the annual growth reached a mere 0.5% or EUR550 year-on-year to EUR109,750, the ZF real estate index compiled in partnership with real estate consultant SVN Romania shows.

Local online store Atu Tech (a2t.ro), which specializes in the sale of security products and is also an importer of security equipment, has invested EUR200,000 to streamline its operations this year.

Rinf Outsourcing Solutions (rinf.tech), a local company specializing in software development, consulting and BPO, has opened its third office in Romania, in the city of Cluj-Napoca, and intends to recruit 100 IT experts, company representatives said in a statement.

Romania's foreign exchange reserves stood at EUR53.4 billion in June 2023, higher by EUR335 million versus May 2023, central bank data showed on Monday (June 3).

Innova Capital, a leading private equity fund in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), has joined the shareholding structure of Romanian-Belgian EMI Group after buying a 51% stake via combination of partial buy-out and EUR15 million capital increase.

Retail investors subscribed RON5.9 billion worth of Hidroelectrica (H2O.RO) shares in the first seven days of the IPO, so their tranche is almost 450% or 3.5 times oversubscribed, ZF has found by aggregating data from brokers’ platforms. They introduced subscription orders for 52.65 million Hidroelectrica shares.

Domeniile Ostrov, one of the largest fruit producers in Romania and South-East Europe, now during peak summer fruit harvesting season, estimates a cherry production of 500 tons, down 10% from 2022, due to bad weather.

Brick Romania, a local DIY and home improvement retailer based in Constanta, has invested RON1 million to install photovoltaic panels on the rooftop of its store in the south-eastern city of Constanta.