Turning the crisis into an ally

Even so, Bogza told Business Arena Magazine that because of the difficult economic environment, companies appear “dried of resources, since they’ve been working for a long period of time, more precisely since October 2008, when the crisis started, below their economic capacity.” He added: “The situation is also affecting our individual clients, who are now making sacrifices to pay their installments. Therefore, the volume of non-performing loans has expanded constantly, although its growth rate has slowed down compared to last year.”
With bad news coming from the EU, and other countries announcing quite high budget deficit levels, one wonders whether Bancpost Romania, as a Greek-owned bank, is worried.  “Fortunately, our bank has not been affected by the present economic situation in Greece,” said Bogza. “The problems in Greece are mostly rooted in the public finances area; therefore the banking sector has not been affected and I don’t believe it will be seriously affected in the future.” Besides, last year, Bancpost Romania benefited from two capital increase operations from its parent bank, Eurobank EFG. Moreover, the Greek bank’s representatives acknowledge Romania’s potential for development in the banking field, and thus Bancpost has an aggressive development budget for 2010. Also, Bogza anticipates double digit growth in the volume of loans granted by the bank. “The first months of the year failed to fetch a significant increase in our credit portfolio, as the crisis was more stubborn than we’d thought it would be, but we remain positive,” he explained. However, compared to the same period of last year, Bogza pointed out that the bank granted more loans in all its market segments this year. Even so, the lending level remains low compared to the pre-crisis period. “Romania will never go back to the dynamics of the lending process we witnessed in the pre-crisis period,” he said.
This year, Bancpost has developed a number of aggressive campaigns targeting all lending areas: “We had advertising campaigns for mortgage loans, small enterprises and authorized individuals, which ended in April. We have also started below-the-line campaigns for our corporate clients, for consumer loans and cards, targeting specific groups.”
Bancpost, which was founded in 1991 and privatized in 1999, allocated around 1.5 million Euro for marketing campaigns, with plans to continue investments in this field for the rest of the year. “We have allocated a larger marketing budget, one third larger than the one we had last year. We have also launched an advertising campaign for deposits, Bancpost being one of the banks that has attracted more funds from its clients than the volume of loans granted to clients,” said Bogza, adding that the bank was also very well capitalized.
Referring to the bank’s lending operations he reiterated that the current economic conditions made it difficult for some clients to repay their debts, aspect which has been reflected in the bank’s level of non-performing loans. “For those clients willing to cooperate with the bank, we have provided various loan rescheduling opportunities,” he said.
Last year the bank reduced its staff by around ten per cent and closed down seven units. “This year, we have not closed down any more units, on the contrary, we have opened one. However, we will continue to analyze the business perspectives of each unit by the end of the year,” Bogza added.
With a portfolio including more than one million clients, Bancpost relies on efficiency and expertise to remain among the major players in the market. Bogza said most of the bank’s individual clients have shown greater interest for mortgage loans, due to a decrease in prices in the housing market. In turn, some of its strongest corporate clients operate in the food and beverages industries, where demand was less affected by the crisis.
Talking about the competition, Bogza admitted that every successful strategy in the banking segment is quickly adopted by the other competitors, making it more important for the banks focus on successfully implementing their strategies rather than devising new ones. “One distinguishing aspect that gives Bancpost an edge against competitors is the fact that we are the only bank issuing American Express cards in Romania. We also stand out through our treasury quality, which allowed us to be selected by the Ministry of Finance, along with our parent bank, Eurobank EFG, to participate in Romania’s Euro-bond issue,” said the CEO and added: “We are also proud of our human resources’ quality – we have a very strong team.” Finding satisfaction in the everyday challenges in his activity, Mihai Bogza is determined to lead Bancpost to become one of the top five banks in Romania.

Favorites:
City:  Bergamo
Country:  Italy
Bucharest Restaurant:  Mama Leone
Food:  Asian cuisine
Drink:  Orange juice and Limoncello
Last book read: Jurgen Thorwald – “La Debacle Allemande”
Car: Mercedes
Hobby:  Travelling and sports
Artist: Celine Dion
Film: All Bruce Willis films
Sport: Tennis
Team: Steaua Bucharest
Astrological Sign: Cancer
Last vacation taken:  Mexico, in April
Date of birth: July 6, 1956