The over 130 officials and heads of the biggest companies in the six richest Arab countries, Bahrain, Kuweit, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, present in Bucharest in the last few days, are willing to bring hundreds of millions of euros to Romania, estimates a journalist from the English language newspaper Bahrain Tribune. "Gulf businessmen could invest 200 million dollars this year and a further 500 million dollars over the next two years," estimated Ahmed AlSaati, director of English language publication Bahrain Tribune, present at the Forum of the Gulf Cooperation Council, Romania, Bucharest: Business opportunities in South-Eastern Europe, organised by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Business Environment, the Gulf Cooperation Council and Forum Invest in Bucharest over the past few days. AlSaati said investors in the Gulf are interested in businesses that can bring them an at least 10% yield. "Before the crisis (a yield of) 20% was right, now we accept as little as a 10% yield, but not less. Imagine that businesspeople in the Gulf have big amounts of cash available and cannot let them be devalued by inflation. They have to be permanently on the lookout for investment opportunities," AlSaati said

March 4 (Bloomberg) -- European stocks fell after U.S. wages failed to keep pace with a surge in energy costs and oil climbed as investors speculated that pro-democracy protests in North Africa will spread to the Arabian peninsula. Carrefour SA, the world’s second-largest retailer, slid 4.4 percent after Citigroup Inc. advised investors to sell the shares. WPP Plc declined 2.6 percent after posting sales growth that failed to match its competitors. SBM Offshore NV, the world’s biggest producer of floating oil rigs, jumped 6.3 percent after earnings beat analysts’ projections. The benchmark Stoxx Europe 600 Index declined 0.6 percent to 281.87 at the 4:30 p.m. close in London. The measure lost 0.8 percent this week as concern that popular protests will spread to Saudi Arabia offset better-than-estimated corporate earnings and signs that the global economy is strengthening. Stocks erased earlier gains today after a U.S. Labor Department report said average hourly earnings failed to grow in February. Economists in a Bloomberg survey had forecast 0.2 percent growth.

OECD - Fast growing economies

Fast-growing economies in the east should spend the vast savings accumulated through trade on their own people rather than use it to accumulate bonds and shares in the west, an influential thinktank said today.
The organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) warned that policies designed to rebalance currencies would fail unless countries adopted more far-reaching and fundamental reforms.
The Paris-based research group, often described as the rich nations' thinktank, said in a webcast that world leaders needed to go beyond discussions about currencies at the G20 summit in South Korea next week and examine conflicts that hold back growth in the world economy.
It said: "Structural reforms, such as the strengthening of social safety nets and the development of financial markets in emerging economies, should be employed to reduce their savings and dependence on financial markets in advanced economies. The OECD sees structural reforms, such as the liberalisation of product markets, also as crucial to recover the output losses associated with the crisis and to help put public finances back on a sustainable path."
The pace of the global economy recovery had slowed since earlier this year, the OECD said, while public debt in most OECD countries was set to reach all-time highs.
"With support from fiscal stimulus fading, output and trade have softened," it said. "Average GDP growth across OECD countries is expected to be between 2.5% to 3% this year, between 2% and 2.5% in 2011 and between 2.5% and 3% in 2012. Activity is projected to vary widely across countries, particularly within the euro area.
"The US is expected to gain considerable momentum in 2012, while the Japanese recovery is expected to lose some steam. In many emerging-market economies growth is continuing robustly, although at a slightly slower pace than earlier in the recovery.
With public deficits and debt at "unsustainable levels", stabilising debt relative to GDP in most countries would require a historical consolidation effort of between 6% to 9% of GDP, said OECD secretary general Angel Gurría. "But in fact even more is needed to bring debt back to sustainable levels."
The OECD, which has promoted free trade as a route to promoting growth and easing poverty, urged the eurozone to cut taxes on employment that could reduced their ability to bring down unemployment over the next few years.
It also backed moves in the west to cut public spending as a way to "strengthen the cost-effectiveness of expenditures that enhance growth, in areas such as health care, education, innovation and infrastructure development".
Gurría said interest rates would remain at historic lows until 2012 and could be maintained at low levels if the world economy continued to struggle over the medium term.
Monetary easing by the US, the UK and Japan will brings its own problems as investors turn away from low-yielding western markets, the OECD warned. "Continued monetary easing in many advanced economies prompts capital flows to emerging economies where they risk creating asset bubbles while putting upward pressure on their exchange rates. The recent unilateral interventions in foreign exchange markets and the resulting volatility could prompt protectionist responses. Better to reach a common understanding on how global imbalances are to be reduced."

The EBRD, the biggest institutional investor in Romania, has improved its estimates on GDP growth next year, from zero in July to 0.9%. Even so, the forecast on Romania is by far the most pessimistic of all forecasts for countries in the region. For this year, the EBRD expects the economy to fall by 2%, an improvement on the previous -3% forecast.Forecasts of some analysts for next year have become pessimistic, anticipating a return to economic growth as late as in 2012. But the IMF and the government expect a 1.9% economic decline for this year, with 1.5% growth expected for next year.
Sources taking part in talks with the IMF told ZF the Fund was unofficially taking into account the risk of 2011 being the third consecutive year of recession. Officially, however, the IMF is, standing by its 1.5% forecast for 2011, which is more optimistic than the EBRD's.BCR, the biggest bank on the market, has stood by its forecast for next year, expecting a 1.2% economic growth - the lowest in the region. For this year, BCR has revised its forecast up, expecting a 2.1% GDP decline instead of the 3% contraction expected after the VAT hike to 24%. Analysts of the lending institution are thus approaching the official forecast, supported by the IMF.

The biggest Romanian-held private bank - profit.

Banca Transilvania (TLV stock exchange symbol), the biggest Romanian-held private bank, posted a 69.7 million-RON (16.3 million-euro) net profit in the first nine months of the year, 44% higher than in the similar period of last year.
In the first nine months of the year, the bank's operating revenues amounted to 1.104 billion RON, up 17% on the similar period of last year. At the end of September, the bank had a volume of loans of 13.173 billion RON, up 8% against the beginning of the year, with the biggest share (around 60%) being held by loans granted to companies.
Non-performing loans, more than 90 days overdue, account for 6.92% of the overall loan portfolio. The bank's solvency ratio is 12.33%.
"We were very careful about the provision policy and the risk management, as well as about cost control, our focus continues to be to meet 2010 targets, although another difficult period is coming," said the bank's CEO Robert Rekkers.
For this year, the bank has budgeted a 150 million-RON profit.