* The BSE invested 64 million lei in bank deposits and government bonds
The Bucharest Stock Exchange (symbol:BVB) saw its profit nearly double YOY in the first semester of 2010, to 4.37 million lei, as its turnover increased 56%, to 8.48 million lei. For comparison, in H1 2009, the BSE had a profit of 2.62 million lei, for a turnover of 5.41 million lei.
In spite of the increase in earnings compared to 2009, at the end of July 2010, the Board of Directors of the Stock Exchange announced that it would implement several measures to restructure the company"s operations in order to cut employee costs by approximately 10%.
Anca Dumitru, the general manager of the BSE, said for BURSA that the restructuring of the BSE"s operations will proceed as plan: "Cost cutting was a priority of the BSE in 2009 as well. Compared to the previous year, we succeeded in making major progress in this respect. The preoccupation for the improvement of the operations of this company, even more so now that we are a public company, is a natural concern of the management. We have already implemented some new cost cutting measures and we will continue in this direction", said Anca Dumitru.
In the first semester of 2010, the operating revenues of the company increased to 8.59 million lei, up 58.7% YOY, whereas operating expenses decreased slightly from 6.68 million lei at the end of June 2009, to 6.2 million lei at the end of June 2010. As a result, the BSE made an operating profit of 2.39 million lei. In the first semester of 2009, the BSE had posted an operating loss of 1.26 million lei.
The financial revenues of the company followed a downward trend in H1 2010, dropping 33% to 2.93 million lei. At the same time, the company"s financial expenses amounted to 95,754 lei, leading to a profit of 2.83 million lei.
For comparison, in H1 2009, the BSE had a financial
