November 29 (SeeNews) - Romania's new government formed by National Liberal Party (PNL) aims to list stakes in state-owned hydro power producer Hidroelectrica and savings bank CEC on a stock exchange within a year, finance minister Florin Citu said.
"We talked before about Hidroelectrica listing, the project is quite advanced now and it is included in the PNL governing programme. Besides this, I added CEC to the list, and I will see these projects through," Citu said during a talk-show on national TV station Digi24 in Thursday evening.
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According to the finance minister, at least 20% of CEC Bank will be listed within a year.
"Listing means transparency. We want to have a true state bank, but one which is able to compete with other banks," Citu said.
An economic adviser to prime minister Ludovic Orban said earlier this month that the government aims to list stakes in CEC, Hidroelectrica and Bucharest Airports National Company (CNAB) on the Bucharest Stock Exchange.
CEC, currently Romania's seventh largest bank, booked a gross profit of 433 million lei ($101 million/91 million euro) in 2018. At the end of last month, the European Commission approved Romania's plan to recapitalise CEC Bank with 200 million euro ($221.8 million), after establishing that the move does not represent a breach of the EU's state aid rules.
Hidroelectrica exited insolvency In April 2017, which paved the way for the company's listing on the Bucharest Stock Exchange expected to be the biggest in Romania’s history. The initial public offering of a 15% stake in Hidroelectrica is expected to raise 1 billion euro, the court-appointed administrator of the company said at the time.
CNAB, established in 2010, operates Romania's main airport Henri Coanda and a smaller one, Aurel Vlaicu..
(1 euro=4.7781 euro)
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