Financial Press Review, December 3

‘Gambling with the first matriculation’ – is the Curierul Naţional’s headline. The Ministry of Environment raises the car tax to fund its Rabla 2011 programme.

80 percent of the Environment Fund comes from car taxing.

Next year, a voucher will cost the 21 percent less than it does now, but it will charge 25 percent more for matriculation, the Curierul National writes.

The Ziarul Financiar: ‘Consumer spending withstands VAT hike and salary cuts’.

The daily synthesizes the latest data published by the National Institute of Statistics.

The major agricultural decline and the construction and commerce decline have taken their toll on the economy in this year’s third quarter.

The industrial sector brings good news, though. It continued its rise (even though moderately), but also customer spending dropped only one percent of GDP in the third quarter, compared to last year’s quarter.

Once again on the subject of agriculture, the Ziarul Financiar notes that the field was dragged down by the late harvest.

Even though this year’s harvest was better than last year’s, agriculture had a negative contribution to July-September, since rainfall delayed the harvest.

The daily Economistul comments on today’s NIS Bucharest data, adding the conclusions of a preliminary estimate published yesterday by EUROSTAT.

The data highlights the fact that Greece and Romania were the only EU member states to record an annual GDP shrinking in the third quarter.

The daily Bursa: ‘Wine price should be the same as 2009’.

This was a good year for wine, in spite of the fact that 2010 had troublesome weather.

Wine quality is due to major investments in fito-sanitary treatment.

Experts say, as a consequence, shelf price should be at least equal to that of last year’s, to cover producer expenses for this year’s vine treatment.

Translated by: Ciocănel Tudor
MA Student, MTTLC, Bucharest University