Ioan Cuzman, the president of SIF Banat Crişana will step down

• Dragoş Bîlteanu, the top contender for becoming chairman of SIF1, according to sources

Last night, on the occasion of the reception held to celebrate the anniversary of 20 years of institutional activity, Ioan Cuzman announced he would step down from the position of president of SIF1 Banat Crişana.

The vice-president of the company, Dragoş Bîlteanu, is the top contender for the helm of SIF1, according to some sources close to the situation.

Before a numerous audience, consisting of SIF1 shareholders, directors of bank branches of Arad, heads of multinational companies as well as local authorities that on Friday, he would meet with the members of the Board of Directors and that he intends to step down.

Ioan Cuzman has served as president of SIF Banat Crişana for the last 17 years. He has declined to publicize the reasons which caused him to make this decision.

• After 20 years of activity, the president of SIF Banat Crişana concedes the blame for the reactions to the economic crisis

The president of SIF Banat Crişana, Ioan Cuzman, accepts the blame for a certain failure, in the 20 years of operations, namely the fact that he did not react very well to the economic crisis, like he said on Thursday, in a press conference held in Arad.

Ioan Cuzman said that he could blame himself for the fact that it took longer for the management of the company to adapt to the context generated by the economic crisis.

The president of SIF1 said: "I think I have misread some of the signs of the crisis, because some of our reactions to this phenomenon have been belated. We had a reactive attitude when it comes to the crisis. We had no major problems, but perhaps we could have performed better".

Nevertheless, even though we are in full crisis, SIF Banat Crişana is doing very well in terms of cash, and the president of the company sees no difficulties over the next 2-3 years.

"At the present time, I think that we are in a very good situation, first of all due to the performance which the company had over the last 20 years, and secondly, I can say, without any hesitation, that SIF1 has a very good financial balance, which allows it to deal with all the challenges the future will bring". We operate in the Romanian environment, but we are also connected to what is happening in Europe, both through the things we do on the European equity market, as well as through the fact that companies in our portfolio are for the most part focused on exports to the EU. This is a very important aspect which our future depends on, on one hand the economic policies which the Romanian state will adopt, most importantly the European context, and I would not exclude the fact that there is a global economic context", Cuzman also said.

The president of the SIF also said that he doesn't rule out the relocation of the headquarters of the SIF to another city.

"When it comes to the relocation of the headquarters, I can't make any statements. But when the shareholder structure changes, it is up to the shareholders to make a decision. I can tell you that, compared to how it was in the beginning, 27% of the share capital of our company is held by foreign individuals and companies, and also, that the weight of the shareholders has shifted to other areas of the country. I can't say that it is going to move, but I can't rule out the fact that there is such a risk", Ioan Cuzman also added. He also said that there is still work being done on a logistic center in Arad and that the only connection it had with the local public administration was a project concerning the building of a multi-storey parking, for which SIF1 received a plot of land which was the object of litigation. Since the company did not want to get involved in a never-ending lawsuit, the project was dropped.

The institutional activity of SIF Banat Crişana began in 1992, when the Private Property Fund 1 - Banat-Crişana was created, and in 1996 the Financial Investments Company SIF Banat-Crişana SA was created. In 1998, the first dividends were paid out to shareholders (0.0114 lei/share).

In its 20 years of operation, SIF Banat Crişana has invested 431 million on the stock market, has participated in the privatization of 323 companies and has paid out 379 million lei as dividends. SIF1 has also seen its stock market capitalization increase 41 times, as the stock was trading at 0.027 lei in November 1999 and its NAVPS increased 10 times, from 0.2267 lei/share in 1997.

On the anniversary of 20 years of operation, the management of SIF Banat-Crişana opened the trading session of the Bucharest Stock Exchange, a first for one of the SIFs.

The representatives of SIF Banat-Crişana who opened the trading session of the BSE are Ioan Cuzman, president and CEO, Dragoş George Bîlteanu, vice-president and Carmen Dumitrescu, deputy CEO.