Clal sells Romanian company

Israeli group Clal is discussing the sale of its Romanian insurance company just two years after entering the market because it no longer has the necessary funds to invest in its development, having been hurt by turmoil on financial markets. This makes Clal Romania the first subsidiary of an insurance group to be directly affected by shareholder problems. “They are currently discussing the sale to an investment fund whose area of interest is Central and Eastern Europe, but which is yet to enter the Romanian market. Things have come to this because the shareholder is affected by what is happening on the international markets, ended the year with losses, with its business on a decline, so it can no longer conduct the necessary investments,” Valentin Tuca, general manager of Clal Romania, told ZF. In May last year the Israelis announced they intended to invest a further 50-70 million euros into the insurance company, and that they were planning to see it reach the top ten by 2012, after it posted an around 2 million-euro turnover last year, making it one of the smallest players on the market.