The top 45 companies controlled by the Romanian state last year registered 10bn-euro turnover, but their over 200,000 employees, though earning twice as much as people working in the private sector, brought the state a 70m-euro loss. The average profitability of companies in Romania revolves around 10% of turnover, and had state-owned firms been competently managed, they would have fetched 1bn-euro revenues to the state budget per annum, namely 0.8% in GDP. The Government has recently raised the VAT as it needed a further 1bn-euro in revenues for 2010. The total losses of state-owned companies would have been much deeper but for exceptional cases such as that of Electrica, which generated gross income worth 148m euros last year in the wake of a deal with CEZ. In the absence of this profit, overall losses would have topped 200m euros. In the order of losses, the top 10 state-owned companies brought losses of around 700m euros, with Compania Naţională a Huilei leading, with over 144m euros. Moreover, the same 10 companies, which are the biggest black holes in the state's portfolio, at the level of 2008 had total debts of above 16bn euros. What is the solution for these firms in the context where Romania borrowed billions of euros to pay pensions and salaries while the most valuable assets in the state's portfolio are practically unused? Doru Lionăchescu, managing partner with Capital Partners investment house, has a clear-cut opinion on this issue. "We cannot afford letting them lose so much. Business lines need to be closed down, aberrant routes such as in the case of CFR Călători need to be rethought, personnel needs to be cut, suppliers through which money is siphoned need to be identified. (…)".

The top 45 companies controlled by the Romanian state last year registered 10bn-euro turnover, but their over 200,000 employees, though earning twice as much as p