BCR employees interested in buying the Bank's shares

There is a great interest by BCR's employees for the 8% stake that they are able to buy in accordance with the bank's endorsed privatization strategy, stated Mr. Ilie Mihai, BCR vice-president. "The employees' association has already registered and includes current employees, members of the Board and retired BCR employees. Now we expect to have negotiations with the APAS for the stake", he said. "The bank is extremely profitable-actually its profit is equal to 42% of the whole banking system's profit. We expect the employees' association to buy the whole 8% stake availabl", he added. Another vice-president of the bank, Mr. Ion Nitu, was recently appointed president of the association.

The sale of the 8% stake to employees is the second stage of the Bank's privatization; it started this month, when the APAPS wrote a letter inviting the employees' association to start direct negotiations. The price cannot fall bellow the face value, or ROL 10,000 for one share. No installments are allowed, meaning that employees are expected to pay about USD 20 million.

Mr. Ilie Mihai explained that "The association includes 2,000 former employees and 12,000 current employees - almost everybody. Shares shall be distributed to employees according to several criteria, such as their seniority. They are bound to keep the shares for at least three years."

The first stage of BCR's privatization was the takeover by the EBRD and the IFC of 25% of the shares. The contract was signed in November 2003 and the price reached USD 222 million. The last stage is the bid for a stake of at least 51% of the shares, expected to be bought by a strategic investor - either a well-known financial institution or a consortium of strategic investors including at least one well-known financial institution.

The equity capital of the Commercial bank is ROL 7,924 billion. The profit reported for the last year reached USD 160 million.