The champions of 2009

The main fields that registered increases last year were energy, the pharmaceutical industry, IT and constructions, while the hardest hit businesses were those from the car sector, chemical industry, metallurgy and steel industry, as well as building materials distribution and production, in line with the Top of the 300 largest companies in Romania received from the Trade Registry. On the basis of this ranking, ZF has drawn up two lists of 50 companies each, ordered depending on whether they saw their turnover rise or decline in 2009, the first complete year of crisis the domestic market experienced. ONRC representatives specified, though, that one in five companies has not submitted its balance sheet for 2009, so that some firms may not be included in ZF rankings. As regards the companies that managed to boost their turnover last year, when the national economy contracted by 7.1%, most of them come from fields such as energy, pharma or constructions. “We may have 2-3 firms with turnover increases in certain fields, but this does not mean the field in itself is faring well,” says Matei P`un, owner of BAC Investment M&A consultancy. Specialists say these companies boasting spectacular growth are just a few champions, 2-3 isolated cases in the context where most fields suffered in the first year of crisis.