Management & Marketing no. 3/2014

The effects of IMF conditionality on Romanian economy: evidence from the Bucharest Stock Exchange

Andreea Săseanu,
Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Hosney (Harry) Zurub,
Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Gurgen Ohanyan,
Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Natalia Bob,
Bucharest University of Economic Studies, Romania

Abstract. The financial crisis has hurt almost all the countries in the world, strengthening the role of the international financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Given that Romania turned to the IMF to cushion the impact of the crisis, our paper investigates the influence of the IMF programs on the macroeconomic indicators of the Romanian economy in the recent years and the effects on the investment environment represented by the volume of transactions on Bucharest Stock Exchange (BSE). The method used to achieve our goal is the analysis of the time series consisting of the monthly moving average of the volume of transactions on BSE, the consumer price index (CPI), the credit interest rate (Lombard) and the Euro/Ron rate of exchange fluctuation in the last 10 years. The contribution of the paper comes from its findings which draw an interesting and useful conclusion on the effects of the interventions of the IMF in Romania that can work as a guideline for further interventions.

Keyword: Romania, IMF conditionality, financial crisis, Bucharest stock exchange, market, credit, interest rate.

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