Eight winners and six losers among top banks

On a rising banking market, many banks have managed to expand their slice of the market after the first six months of this year, yet the game of market shares also had its losers, even among the top players.
In mid 2004, the Romanian banking system totalled about 17.2 billion euros in assets, 30% higher as compared to the corresponding period of last year. In line with NBR estimations, assets are likely to reach 20 billion euros at the end of this year.
Obviously, the increase is rooted in the powerful expansion of lending, especially starting with the second half of 2003. Some of the winners grew along the retail banking segment, on the basis of loans granted to individuals and small and medium-sized enterprises (SME), while others raised their market shares continuing to bank on the corporate sector, as they had done in the previous years. Still, the orientation toward retail activities is the prevailing trend.
Hierarchy changes are not spectacular, except for the position swap between ABN Amro Bank and Banc Post. The market share of the Dutch bank branch did not keep up with the overall increase and tumbled from 5.6% in June 2003 to 4.39% in June 2004. Even though Banc Post climbed only from 4.2% to 4.4%, this was enough for the bank owned by the Greek group Eurobank to go up to the fifth position, while ABN went down to the sixth position.
The Dutch are however launching this month a retail market approach strategy after coming to the conclusion that this is the only way they can stay at the top of this market, after having focused on the corporate segment for years. Under the circumstances, the battle for market shares is due to be a rough one, especially at the middle of the top 15 players ranking.
According to expectations, the share of total assets Banca Comerciala Romana (Romanian Commercial Bank-BCR) holds is still shrinking, without harming the top position of the bank, though. BCR has reached a 28.59% share as compared to 31.6% in June 2003, with its loss translated in the gains of smaller players.
The second largest bank, BRD-SocGen, has practically succeeded in maintaining its last year position amid a substantial growth of the market, registering a 13.2% market share. Raiffeisen Bank consolidated its third position it had climbed to late last year. The Austrians climbed to 8.32%, that is 2.3 percentage points more than the share they held in mid 2003, therefore accounting for the strongest expansion on the market.
At the level of the first 15 players, the 30% increase of the market has allowed eight banks to raise their shares, while one retained the same position and the other six saw declines. razvan.voican@zf.ro