The Public Finance Ministry is working at a draft act amending the Tax Code, with envisaged measures including the introduction of a 10 percent flat tax from 1 January, the granting of certain tax deductions and the introduction of the fiscally acknowledged household, Finance Minister Viorel Stefan announced.  "Joint teams have been working at the MFP (...) on transposing into a regulatory act the idea to reorganise the way the tax income is administrated, aiming to reintroduce the incomes' globalisation and the global incomes' taxation. This under no circumstances means new taxes, new forms of taxation, we talk about the same flat tax which is today 16 percent and the intention is to make it 10 percent starting with 1 January 2018, and apply it to the globalised incomes, to all incomes regardless their source," Stefan told in a press conference at the Victoria Palace....more »

The establishment of some public procurement central units could annually generate savings of over 1.8 billion euro to the state budget, which represents 10 pct of all public procurement conducted each year in Romania, is the conclusion of a diagnosis-study on resources' waste in the absence of national coordination, presented by experts of the Institute for Public Policy.  ...more »

Hourly labour costs ranged from 4.4 euros to 42.0 euros across the EU member states in 2016, having been the lowest in Bulgaria and Romania - 4.4 euros and 5.5 euros, respectively - and the highest in Denmark and Belgium - 42.0 euros and 39.2 euros, respectively - according to date released on Thursday by the Eurostat statistics office of the EU.  Developments in hourly labour costs in Romania has been inconsistent, from 1.9 euros in 2014, to 4.2 euros in 2008 and 4.1 euros in 2012, going up to 4.6 euros in 2014, to 4.9 euros in 2015 and to 5.5 euros in 2016. Throughout these years, Romania and Bulgaria kept recording the lowest such costs in the EU....more »

Net investment carried out last year in Romania's national economy stood at 70.281 billion lei, declining 3.3 percent from 2015, according to data released on Wednesday by the National Institute of Statistics (INS).  In Q4 2016, net investment in the national economy totalled 23.804 billion lei, by 14.9 percent lower than in the same quarter of 2015....more »

Romania's trade balance deficit (FOB/CIF) hit 9.957 bln euro in 2016, by 1.591 bln euro higher than in the previous year, shows data released by the National Institute of Statistics (INS). In comparison with 2015, exports and imports increased last year by 5.1 pct and 7.0 pct, respectively. FOB exports totaled 57.385 billion euros, while CIF imports amounted to 6.734 billion euro. The product groups with a significant share in the country's trade were machines and transport equipment (47 pct for exports and 38 pct for imports) and other manufactured products (32.4 percent for exports and 31.0 percent for imports, respectively)....more »

Former Public Finance Minister Anca Dragu maintains that in 2016 there were registered approximately 1.5 billion lei savings in the budget, taking into account that, according to the current estimates, the year ends with a 2.59 percent budget deficit, under the initial 2.8 percent of the GDP initial target.  "Not only that we haven't exceeded the 2.8 percent of the GDP budget deficit target, but we have even had savings, taking into account that we have a deficit estimate at the year-end of 2.59 percent of the GDP. In cash, it means savings worth approximately 1.5 billion lei," Anca Dragu told Agerpress on Monday....more »

High taxation, fiscal environment unpredictability and competition, as well as the access to finance remain the main problems the companies in Romania are confronted with, reads a Survey on the access to finance of non-financial companies in Romania, logged in December 2016, and carried by the National Bank of Romania (central bank, BNR).  "Also found was an increase of the number of companies that deem the availability of the labour force a pressing issue as compared to the previous report," says the survey.  ...more »

Nestor Nestor Diculescu Kingston Petersen (NNDKP) advised Value4Capital (V4C) on the sale of its entire shareholding of 36.25% in Medlife S.A., Romania’s largest provider of private healthcare services.  The exit came seven years after V4C purchased the shares from Medlife’s founders and the International Finance Corporation (with NNDKP acting as local counsel) and was performed through an initial public offering on the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BSE). The transaction became the first IPO of a private company performed in the past decade in Romania. ...more »

Romania's leasing industry could attain in 2017 its medium- term growth potential of 15 pct, while the value of financed assets could exceed 2.3 billion euro, president of the Financial Companies Association (ALB) Bogdan Speteanu said on Wednesday at the annual conference of the industry. "Speaking of expectations for the leasing industry in 2017, I would say that we will attain our growth potential. In recent years we came to the conclusion that a figure around 15 percent represents a sustainable growth for the leasing market. In the current context and considering the macroeconomic forecasts for next year, and also in connection with Romania's economic growth rate which hopefully will further stay on tops of the EU charts (...) we consider that a 15 percent growth is realist ic. Next year we hope to see the leasing market go towards 2.3 billion euro," Bogdan Speteanu told the 12th ALB Romania national conference organised together with Govnet Conferences....more »

Romania's national passenger railway carrier CFR SA and the European Commission - via its Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (INEA) have signed a funding contract for the upgrading of the Apata-Cata railway portion worth a total 440 milli...more »