The chief economist of BRD Groupe Société Générale, Florian Libokor, does not rule out that the war in Ukraine will end this year. “The impact of tensions in Ukraine has been debated for the past two years or so. From my point of view, they may end this year. I bet on it. I was talking to friends recently and they told me that even WWII lasted 4 years. And it was a world war!” Libokor said on Thursday.

Answering the question about a flat rate or a progressive tax, the economist believes that this is a false topic. Regardless of whether Romania had a progressive quota or a single quota, the problem remained the same: low collection. “We were outside the European Union, we entered the European Union, we were ruled by left, right, union governments. I was outside NATO, I was in NATO. We were poorly developed economically, we made such a recovery compared to Western countries. We had a progressive quota, we have a unique quota, and with all this, with the exception of the government of 2000-2004, if I am not mistaken, when the collection figure was, Romania did not collect more than 32-33% of GDP equivalent. What this tells us, or at least what it tells me, is that the problem is not in quotas, numbers, 5, 6, progressive levels and so on, but in the assembly,” Florian Libocore also stated at the conference “Macroeconomic prospects and the 2024 financial year of Romania”, organized by the News.ro press agency

“The impact of tensions in Ukraine has been debated for the past two years or so. From my point of view, they may end this year. I bet on it. I was talking to friends recently and they told me that even WWII lasted 4 years. And it was a world war. I don’t know if this is necessarily an argument, but I think the tension will be eased there. How will it end? I don’t know, but there will be a new market in which there will be large investments. And Romania benefits from a position, I would say privileged, near this new market. I trust both the economy and the government. They need, no matter how much we criticize them, they need the support of the population, they need the support of other institutions in the private sector. At the same time, they should be transparent, concise, clear and demonstrate that what they say, they will do! , – says Libocor.

“The economic cycle in Romania or the Romanian economy was about nine years. The last four economic cycles were approximately nine years. Approximately seven years of growth and two contractions, or eight years of growth and two contractions, nine, ten years. Until we get to the end of this interval, I would say that there are things that are a little more important than whether or not any economy goes into recession. In our case, it seems important to me that we must correct the two deficits that have been talked about, that we must clarify once and for all the history of the four European freedoms, I mean freedom of movement and implicit positioning. Schengen, because it greatly damaged Romania’s economic opportunities to develop. (…) This lack of integration has affected us economically,” said Florian Libokor.

He also mentioned the pension reform, but also the national debt. “Let’s talk about contribution and share capital, when we talk about pension reform, let it be done exclusively from contribution and share capital. Why pension reform? Because it comes at a price. No one disputes the need to increase these revenues, but many people are also interested in what we do after that. Then it would be possible to talk more about the state debt, which state debt, probably, no one will write off, but we are not yet in a position to ask for it or need it. We have about 50% of GDP. And if we talk about the public debt, then it has a component that affects the budget: interest. Reducing the deficit from six to two, by four percentage points, means 14 billion euros. Assuming that Romania’s GDP in 2024 will be 350 billion, €14 billion represents half of the PNRR. This is not enough. On the other hand, it depends on which of the two buttons – revenues or expenses – will be used more,” explained the chief economist of BRD Groupe Société Générale.