Volksbank Romania plans capital increase

Volksbank Romania plans to increase capital this summer to support its expansion strategy. “Depending on this year’s lending trends, we plan to have a capital increase in June-July. We have drafted some forecasts, but the market trends may contradict them,” the bank’s president Laurentiu Mitrache said yesterday. The bank’s equity amounts to 380bn ROL, of which Osterreichische Volksbanken AG controls 99.96%. Mitrache added the equity would grow by 10-15m euros by the second half of 2003, both from credits granted by the parent-bank, as well as from potential capital increases or bond issues. ZF