Salaries are not the problem: ASF needs an exorcism

If you ask Gabriel Grădinescu what a public offer is, he looks at you as if you asked him for the square root of something.

He gets 11,000 a month from the Financial Supervisory Authority (ASF), where he is vice president.

It's about euros.

Salary.

But that's not all!, he is also paid additionally when his head hurts, like everyone in ASF - they don't get 12 salaries per year, nor 13, nor 14, but... 16!

His boss, Nicu Marcu, the president of ASF, gets 12,600 euros per month and the rest.

I envy Nicu Marcu, I would also like to be young and hear, at 54, for the first time, about squeeze-out.

Please, the ASF institution, in its entirety, is blessed with a golden shower - the woman who washes the floor gets as much as a university assistant.

It's not a joke.

Actually, I don't know these things, they are rumors from the media.

Last week, the mass media, electrocuted by indignation, learned what income ASF employees have.

The information was obtained by force by Claudiu Năsui, USR deputy, who sued the ASF for hiding its income, thus violating the law.

What a stir, what a commotion!

I'm not minimizing.

It is a success.

He wrote Hot News, he wrote the newspaper Ziarul Financiar, he wrote Adevărul.

In fact, this year, Adevărul wrote for the third time (at least) about ASF salaries.

Cool!

I'm glad that at least this part of the capital market problem has become so popular that, in Adevărul, a math teacher writes about it, without shying to christen ASF as the "Fiscal Supervision Authority".

Straight from Boolean algebra.

George Boole.

However, the subject of ASF salaries has always been popular.

A decade ago, I wrote in an article ("EVENT: A PHILOSOPHER DISCOVERS THE CAPITAL MARKET! Liiceanu against ASFodeu"/MAKE/BURSA/21.02.2014):

" I would like to say that "THE STOCK EXCHANGE has drawn attention to...", but this time it would be an incomplete truth; the whole press has always been talking, for years, about how high the salaries are in CNVM and what a bad job it is doing".

CNVM is the current ASF.

Careful!

This is what I wrote ten years before.

I don't know how to emphasize, I'm going to say "man, do you understand me?!"

Ten years ago, the salaries in the ASF were about the same (so today's are low), except that deputy Claudiu Năsui was to enter politics only after two years. And it had nothing to do with ASF.

The subject of ASF salaries had been put on the back burner then, not by a mathematics teacher, but by Gabriel Liiceanu himself.

It was tasty.

He believed that the CNVM would have come into being in 2005.

That's what he wrote.

But CNVM was established in 1994.

If it comes to Liiceanu, his last two books - "What is God thinking?" and "My Jesus" - are about the same level of documentation-processing as his article about ASF.

It's unbelievable, these people pretend to call the shots and we take notes - our cultural and financial elites compete in limbo.

I mean the Trinidadian dance.

The conclusion of the 2014 article is just as valid today in 2023:

"The salaries in the ASF are disproportionate.

But only apparently.

[...]

They are proportional to how much is stolen in Romania.

You can't put supervisors over some markets and not pay them properly with what they steal from them.

If it's not stolen, then you don't need surveillance.

If they steal a little, then you put some controllers there and throw some grains at them.

But, if a lot is stolen...hey!, then you hire about 500 wives and maids and you pay them well not to do anything, not to disturb anyone and you pay the bosses with salaries of over 100 thousand Of euro".

But, if the conclusion of almost a decade ago is valid today, then what is the point of this article?

First of all, it's meant to make you re-read that one since then.

Secondly, it is worth pointing out that nothing has changed in ten years, and the situation is more than ten years old.

Thirdly, what has been so far has been the preamble - the article just begins here.

I will be brief, because you also have limited time and I also want to see a horror movie, to recover, although there is not much difference.

The level of ASF salaries is not illegal.

If anyone is still shocked by the level (although I explained that there is no pay for supervision), then think about what they would do in the place of ASF employees, when the law allows them to set their own wages.

ASF is a state institution, but it does not take money from the budget (nor does it give).

Bugetul ASF se alimentează necontenit din taxe la orice mişcare pe piaţa de capital, de la autorizaţii, la tranzacţii şi procesarea operatorului de piaţă, la taxe pe activele fondurilor de investiţii şi zeci de alte surse.

Salariile din ASF nu au nicio legătură cu performanţa supravegherii, ba chiar supravegherea fondurilor de investiţii se află în confict cu interesul ASF în cuantumul taxelor asupra activelor; activele umflate aduc taxe umflate.

Toate sunt ştiute.

În mod paradoxal, privilegiile acestea au început să fie obţinute în urma rezultatelor de dezastru ale CNVM/ASF.

Ca şi când, la fiecare catastrofă de pe piaţa de capital, ca rezultat al ilegalităţilor comise de CNVM/ASF, supraveghetorul a primit mai multă putere, mai multă independenţă şi mai multă autoritate, ieşind complet de sub control.

Mai întâi, la prăbuşirea FNI din anul 2000, probabil ca reacţie la faptul că a fost posibilă arestarea preşedintelui CNVM de atunci şi a altor doi comisari, a fost schimbată legea, în favoarea autonomizării supraveghetorului fraudulos; apoi a a venit rândul altei garnituri din CNVM să fie arestată, în ocazia speculaţiilor cu acţiunile "Rompetrol", din 2004, moment de la care instituţia supraveghetorului pieţei şi-a perfecţionat anticorpii la lege, iar în 2012 s-a transformat în ASF, pierzându-şi imaginea compromisă.

Dar oamenii au rămas aceiaşi.

Şi sistemul.

A dispărut din noua lege vocaţia supraveghetorului să urmărească dezvoltarea pieţei - nu există bază legală ca ASF să fie trasă la răspundere pentru ruinarea pieţei.

A apărut autonomia bugetară ASF şi infailibilitatea interpretării sale a legii pieţei de capital.

Aproape tot ceea ce face a căpătat o nuanţă de fraudă, iar Cooperativa şi-a dat seama la ce este ea bună.

Dar ceea ce nu s-a observat până acum este următorul articol din Ordonanţa de urgenţă nr. 93/2012 privind înfiinţarea, organizarea şi funcţionarea Autorităţii de Supraveghere Financiară, CAPITOLUL IV/Bugetul A.S.F:

"Art. 20. - Disponibilităţile băneşti ale A.S.F., în vederea fructificării lor, pot fi plasate, în condiţii de piaţă şi cu evitarea conflictului de interese, în instrumente purtătoare de dobândă la instituţii de credit, în titluri de stat sau titluri ale administraţiei publice locale, precum şi în alte instrumente cu grad de risc scăzut".

Singura modalitate ca ASF să investească în titluri evitând conflictul de interese este să cumpere titluri străine.

Ca să facă asta, trebuie să aibă analişti de piaţă şi echipă de investiţii.

Dacă face asta, atunci investiţiile sale trebuie să fie transparente.

Dacă dă publicităţii portofoliul său de investiţii, atunci oferă publicului indicaţii de investiţii şi intră în conflict de interese.

Prin urmare, Ordonanţa de constituire ASF este autocontradictorie.

Sunteţi toţi bine?

Ticăloşi şi fericiţi?!

În opinia mea, piaţa noastră de capital - scumpa mea piaţă de capital! - nu mai are niciun cuvînt de spus, dar pe tura mea nu trece poanta cu salariile.

ASF are nevoie de altă lege şi de o exorcizare, indiferent de salarii.