The Bucharest Stock Exchange Climbs Record Highs

The index of shares on the Bucharest Stock Exchange reach new highs after foreign investment funds started to trade more vigorously in view of the prospective liberalization of the capital accounts next spring.

Stere Farmache, head of the Bucharest Stock Exchange

The aggregate index of the ten best placed shares reached 4,072.8 points on Wednesday and 4,120 points before closing the trading session on Thursday.

BET-C (the aggregate index of all shares except the state investment funds) and BET-FI 9 the aggregate index of the five state investment funds) were also on the rise.

The most sought for were the shares of Petrom, which traded at 3,160 lei per share when at their highest, which is a rise with 110% more since the beginning of the year.

The trading value of Petrom (which means the value per share multiplied with their number) is over 80% higher than the net profit last year.

For its part, Rompetrol Refinery Constanta (which owns the Petromidia oil refinery) traded for 944 lei per share at the highest, on Thursday, which is close to the nominal value of 1,000 lei.

The shares of Banca Transilvania and of the Romanian Bank for Development also traded at new highs, as did shares at the state investment funds.

The recent surge in trading Petrom shares was also prompted by a rise in the risk rate of Fitch Ratings, which marked its futures as a BB, from BB-, previously. Also important was the fact the OMV, which bought the company, just paid the shares which will give it the controlling 51% of the stock. While the interest for Rompetrol surged after Petromidia reported profit for three months in a row and the company reported it will issue new shares.

The new found attraction in the Romanian market also made champions of some of the brokerage companies. SWISS Capital took back its first place on the market, with a total volume of the transactions made in November at 723.8 billion lei. It is noteworthy that 45.6% of all transactions conducted this year by SWISS Capital took place this November.

This also goes to prove that _hot money_ enter the market. This type of funding seeks short term investments, which trigger the local currency appreciation. But these funds leave the market as quick as they entered it, triggering serious currency unbalances.

Romanian authorities think this trend will only go even more serious, once the capital account investments will be liberalized, in April 2005, and foreign investors will be able to deposit their money in Romanian banks and Government Bonds. The aggregate value of the Bucharest Stock Exchange and of RASDAQ went over 6,536 billion lei in November.