The Merger of Bucharest Stock Exchange and RASDAQ Was Postponed for 2005

Officials of both stock exchanges in Bucharest said that the merger will likely occur around mid 2005. The unification of the two entities into one legal entity is awaited with great interest by professionals in the field.

The official reasons refer to the legal terms which have to be abided by in order to turn the Bucharest Stock Exchange into a public company. "The merger may start only when the BSE goes public and the process may take around four months to be completed. It follows that the process may not end before June," explained Andrei Siminel, the president of the National Association of the Stock Markets and co-president of the BSE-RASDAQ Joint Development Committee.

The BSE will go public with turning part of its patrimony into stock. The KPMG report found that the BSE patrimony is 15.5 million euros worth. The issue of stock will be equivalent to 5.08 million euros, according to sources close to the BSE management.

The merger of the two stock exchanges should make possible easier and cheaper transactions for the listed companies and also increase the international transparency of the Romanian stock market.

The merger of the two Romanian stock markets to take place is part of a European trend. Romanian brokers would also welcome closer cooperation with the Stock Exchange in Vienna, and an eventual merger with the Stock Exchange in Athens.