CEC remains state-run for two more years

Casa de Economii si Consemnatiuni (Romanian Savings Bank-CEC), one of the financial-banking institutions controlled by the state, will not be privatised sooner than 2003-2004.

According to CEC management, this is the time needed for the audit currently conducted by ING Barings at CEC and by the restructuring process to be completed as well as for reaching an agreement upon CEC’s operating status.

“There’s no way CEC privatisation could be conducted before 2003-2004. First of all, the audit must be completed and then comes CEC restructuring. ING Barings, the institution in charge of the audit, will finalise it some time around April 15 and present it to the authorities,” Ion Ghica, CEC president, told Ziarul Financiar.

He also mentioned that ING Barings would make recommendations on the manner in which CEC should operate in the future, and so far, the signal in this regard has been clear: retail bank to provide services for individuals and SMEs, both in local and foreign currency.

“After all, this change is stipulated in the proposition to modify CEC’s operating status, which is already on National Bank of Romania’s desk. The two important changes are bringing CEC in line with the Banking Law 98/1998 on the one hand, and setting CEC’s core business, that is retail banking, SMEs inclusive, on the other,” Ghica mentioned.

CEC restructuring will entail improving the product and service range, the organisation of activities and the technical endowment level, the personnel structure and quality and the number of clients, as well as the retailing channels, so that a proper profitability level could be reached with utmost prudence, according to Ghica.

As for one of CEC’s requests, that is performing transactions in foreign currency, Ghica says that although the logistics are in working order and the operating norms have already been set, the implementation of the new product cannot be done yet.

“We still can’t provide our clients with products in foreign currency because NBR licensed us to attract deposits, but did not allow us to perform operations on the forex market, so that we can’t keep the foreign currency in our bank,” Ghica explained.