Romania’s leading business daily has reached its 3000th issue. Read pages 7-14 to see how the Romanian economy has developed over the twelve years since the first issue of the newspaper came out on November 16, 1998.
Launched at the peak of economic crisis, when few would have
believed Romania would join the NATO and the European Union in less
than a decade, Ziarul Financiar was the supporter of capitalism
from the start at a time when the word was not part of the
vocabulary of the politicians in Romania yet.
In 1998, Romania’s gross domestic product stood at 30 billion
dollars, it now stands at 170 billion dollars (120 billion euros).
Exports had barely reached 8 billion dollars for years on end back
then, they are now at over 45 billion dollars (34 billion
euros).
There was hardly an analyst among those Ziarul Financiar quoted at
the time that believed this country could get foreign investment
inflows of 9 to 10 billion dollars a year, considering that from
1990 through 1998, i.e. over nine years, the cumulated stock had
reached 2 billion dollars.
Ziarul Financiar has become, issue by issue, after as difficult a
beginning as the economic conditions in the 1998-2000 period were,
the front page of business, that is the premier source of
information for the domestic business sector and the most powerful
business publication in Romania.
Since 2004, Ziarul Financiar has been releasing a series of
Yearbooks – “Most Valuable Companies in Romania”, “Biggest Players
in the Economy”, “Top Transactions” “Who’s Who in Business” now at
their fifth or sixth edition each. They were published out of a
need for references, of a need to know who really matters in the
Romanian business sector, who the people and companies moving the
market are.
At the same time, Ziarul Financiar has become the main player on
the business meetings market, with its “Night of the Hard ROL” (the
redenomination of the currency) in 2005 and the “Launch of private
pensions” in 2007 tied to major events in the Romanian
economy.
The economy has been going through one of the most difficult
periods after 1990 over the last two years, but it is only these
difficulties that will reveal who truly believes in the market
economy ideas, in the value generated by effort and creativity, in
innovation and in the freedom of capital, people, ideas and money
movement.