The Largest Companies In Romania

The ranking, which considered separate fiscal entities, not groups of firms, shows that the top 20 companies by turnover had turnover of almost EUR26 billion in 2011, i.e. 19% of Romania’s gross domestic product. These companies boosted their turnovers by around 20% in a year in which the economy was still struggling with uncertainty and insolvencies came one after another.

Petrom remains leader of the ranking, but Dacia recorded a strong rise, with an extremely tough fight expected at the top of the ranking in the coming years. The difference between the two companies is of less than EUR800 million. The turnover of the largest company on the market returned in 2011 to the 2008 level, helped by the doubling of the price of gasoline. Petrom posted the largest profit ever recorded by a company in Romania last year.

While Petrom’s profit is going strong, Dacia continues to lose ground on this count: the company’s net profit fell 8% last year, from EUR71 million to EUR65 million. The number of units sold by the carmaker also declined, but the turnover was helped up by sales of the Duster model, the most expensive car manufactured so far at the Dacia plant.

Dacia is also Romania’s largest exporter, with the company delivering cars worth EUR2.18 billion (70% of production). The share of the carmaker to Romania’s exports (EUR45 billion) amounts to 4.8%, according to ZF calculations.

2011 came with significant growth both for Rompetrol and for British American Tobacco. Rompetrol still hasn’t managed to get over losses at any of the companies that rank in the top 20.

Expansion came with higher turnovers for retailers, as well. In all 13 companies had turnovers of over EUR1 billion, with five of them posting results of between EUR900 million and EUR1 billion and just two posting less than EUR900 million in turnover.

No company controlled by a Romanian entrepreneur made it into the top 20.

The ranking put together by ZF shows that energy and oil were the best-represented segments in the ranking, and two companies in the top 20 are state-run.

(English version by Daniela Stoican)