Banca Agricola privatisation in Parliament's hands

Negotiations for the privatisation of Banca Agricola have reached a standstill again, only two weeks before the deadline for submitting bids expires.

The offer that is to be made by Raiffeisenbank, a large Austrian bank, is conditioned on the Parliament’s enacting the emergency ordinance on re-capitalising the state-run bank by 3,944bn lei.

Operating on the Romanian market since 1997, Raiffeisenbank has been probing the market lately, with a view to its expansion, which can be operated only by a take-over or a merger.

The quoted sources say the Austrian bank is “quite in a hurry” to close the deal, in an attempt to make up for lost time.

“The Parliament’s endorsing the emergency ordinance on the re-capitalisation of Banca Agricola is the biggest problem to be solved for the privatisation contract to be signed,” the bank’s president, Eugen Radulescu, told Mediafax.